Pegasus life limit

I just received an email update from Greg Davison at FAA OK City
concerning the Pegasus 3000 hr life limit. The gist of the message is
as follows:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello, Mr. Mocho:

Just want to keep you informed concerning the status of the Pegasus
life
limit issue.

I was recently contacted by another 101 operator asking about the
status
and the possibility of registering the glider in the experimental
category.
Here was my reply:

I contacted Centrair and the french civil aviation authority on March
15th
to address the life limit situation. They indicated their awareness of
the
operator's concerns, that they are working on it, and will let me know
when
a solution is available.

As far as being able to register it as experimental, once an
airplane/glider has been issued a T.C. and a standard airworthiness
certificate, it can not be placed in the experimental category.
------------------------------------------------------
I have not included the FAR section that he sent referring to the
Experimental Certificate requirements. If you would like to see it,
email me directly and I will forward it.

Mark Mocho

I'm pretty sure my ASW 15 went from Standard to Experimental before I
bought it. ASW 15s were Standard Certificated, weren't they? It was
Experimental when I got it.There were a bunch of letters between the
original owner (3 or 4 owners ago) and Herr Waibel regarding the
addition of water bags to the wings which was ultimately completed w/a
337 documenting it. I don't know why as, given the pilot weight, the
most that could be carried was 30 lbs. or so. When I got the glider the
bags had been removed but some other plumbing remained. I removed that
and had the ship receive a new Standard Certificate in order to do away
with the potential headaches concerning Racing/Exhibition letters, etc.
The A&P has all lthe paperwork for annual so I can't refer to it for
the details. All probably highly illegal but all signed off by the
proper FAA people.

Mike

Actually, I'm not sure at all. This is what the guy who sold it to me
said. That was seven or eight years ago and I haven't looked at the
paperwork since. I seem to remeber an issue concerning the annual
inspection when I first got it wherein, even though it had an EXP Cert
an A&P had to sign off on the annual since it once had a Standard Cert.
I was under the mistaken impression that all ASW 15s had a Standard
Certificate when brought into the country. I'll look thorough the
papers again when I get it back from annual.

Mike