Making a Good Choice

Landing out is the most fun in a 1-26!

Bob Johnson

skysailor wrote:
I am in the market for a sailplane and am having a difficult time in
choosing among five of them. They all seem to be one or two generations
before current "state of the art" aircraft. The ones that I am
interested in are as follows: DG-300,LS-4,LS-6,Discus B,& ASW-19. I
realize that the LS-6 is flapped and the others are not. I have
approximately 120 hours in gliders and currently checked out in the
Blanik L-23,Grob 103,Sparrowhawk and the PW-5. Does anyone have any
opinions or advice that they would want to share concerning the five
which interest me the most? I want to have something which is docile
and with no suprises in flight characteristics. It needs to be one
which can go cross-country
with a reasonable chance of being able to complete a task without
landing out. I realize all sailplane pilots will land out occasionaly
if they are pushing their individual envelopes and trying to better
their skills. (I have aleady landed out once safely with no damage.)
These five sailplanes all seem to fall in a price range of $30-45K.I
would appreciate any objective,unbiased opinions.( I realize this may
be impossible.)