World Class Nationals (US)

I'm very curious to know how the World Class is doing (dare I say
growing) in other parts of the world (other than USA). Comments?

Curt - 95

On Jun 10, 6:43*am, JC wrote:
Why is there always so much PW5 bashing?

Just to be clear the purpose of my post was not to bash the PW5 or the
World Class. It was about having a Nationals with only 7
participants.

One of my contest goals is to finish in the top 10 at a Standard
Nats. I set that goal when it was normal to have 40-50 contestants.
Meeting that goals if only 7 contestants showed up would be
meaningless.

Following the same thought, the turnout at the US Std Nats this year
is disappointingly low too.

Andy

On Jun 10, 9:03*am, Andy wrote:
On Jun 10, 6:43*am, JC wrote:

Why is there always so much PW5 bashing?

Just to be clear the purpose of my post was not to bash the PW5 or the
World Class. *It was about having a Nationals with only 7
participants.

One of my contest goals is to finish in the top 10 at a Standard
Nats. *I set that goal when it was normal to have 40-50 contestants.
Meeting that goals if only 7 contestants showed up would be
meaningless.

Following the same thought, the turnout at the US Std Nats this year
is disappointingly low too.

Andy

only 12 gliders in the 1-26 nats which seems pretty low to me too. I
suspect a combination of the economy and having the contest on a
coast.

but 7 PW-5's is 10% of the fleet which doesnt seem like too bad
representation to me.

On Thu, 10 Jun 2010 06:53:06 -0700, CLewis95 wrote:

I'm very curious to know how the World Class is doing (dare I say
growing) in other parts of the world (other than USA). Comments?

I've been flying for 10 years in the UK and can't recall seeing one here.
There was one on our field for a few months but I never saw it out of its
trailer.

OTOH I flew one in NZ in 2003. It seemed pleasant enough to fly off aero
tow. Then I flew an H.201 Libelle, which I preferred, and that is what I
fly now.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

On Jun 9, 7:51*pm, Scott Alexander
wrote:
Who got to pick the PW-5 for world class? *What were they
drinking!!???

We have a PW-5 in my club and it hardly ever gets flown. *When it
does
fly, it tends to stay locally even though our club promotes and
encourages cross country soaring. *That glider just doesn't have long
enough legs
to run with. *I like the Discus idea above, or maybe an ASW-20 type
ship. *I
would love to compete in a one design class, it would surely reduce
the
"$$$$$" aspect of winning a race. *If you have an ASW-20 and compete
against an ASG-29 in 15M.....good luck! *With a one design class, the
pilots skill would shine rather than the aerodynamic engineers skill
shining.

It's not the "legs" of a PW 5 that is a problem. It is the fact that
some pilots who have the opportunity to fly them don't have the skills
or the courage to get out there without a long "final glide" to ease
their fears. It's the pilots not the ship that keeps some PW 5s at
home. It is an especially great ship for Parawan but is also great for
weak Gulf Coast conditions.

No need for anyone to respond to this message unless you have done a
few 300+Ks in one or had a great time flying one close to home.
Otherwise, it will be like the numerous PW5 bashings that seem only to
be an attempt to limit soaring rather than help it grow.

On Thu, 10 Jun 2010 06:53:06 -0700 (PDT), CLewis95
wrote:

I'm very curious to know how the World Class is doing (dare I say
growing) in other parts of the world (other than USA). Comments?

Speaking for Germany, the World class here has always been regarded as
a joke - and people flying PW-5s instead of standard or club class
gliders have been laughed at. No joke.

General consensus here is that someone who buys a glider with Ka-6
performance for the same price as a used LS-4 must be mentally ill.

I don't know of any PW-5 that has ever been purchased by a German
club.

Of course there are lots of good and reasonably priced used gliders
available here.

Cheers
Andreas

On Jun 10, 10:35*am, Tony wrote:
On Jun 10, 9:03*am, Andy wrote:



On Jun 10, 6:43*am, JC wrote:

Why is there always so much PW5 bashing?

Just to be clear the purpose of my post was not to bash the PW5 or the
World Class. *It was about having a Nationals with only 7
participants.

One of my contest goals is to finish in the top 10 at a Standard
Nats. *I set that goal when it was normal to have 40-50 contestants.
Meeting that goals if only 7 contestants showed up would be
meaningless.

Following the same thought, the turnout at the US Std Nats this year
is disappointingly low too.

Andy

only 12 gliders in the 1-26 nats which seems pretty low to me too. *I
suspect a combination of the economy and having the contest on a
coast.

but 7 PW-5's is 10% of the fleet which doesnt seem like too bad
representation to me.

Also to keep in mind is that the Worlds are at the end of the month,
so a couple of US pilots are not at the Nationals. Plus, one regular
competitor is acting as contest manager instead of flying.
Nonetheless, 10 competitors is pretty poor. On the other end of
the spectrum, there are 11 pilots signed up for the US Open Nationals,
of which several are actually flying 18M ships.

The class itself had a certain logic to it; the SGS1-26 class is
very popular in the US and this was an attempt to extend that
success to an international level. Arguably the L33 was a better
machine (lighter plane, same L/D, can be tied out for extended
periods, except that it failed the stall speed with spoilers out).
However, the whole concept got swamped by the club class/
sports class idea. Now THAT's a National contest -- full field
at a spectacular soaring site this year.

-- Matt

On Jun 11, 11:50*pm, Andreas Maurer wrote:
Speaking for Germany, the World class here has always been regarded as
a joke - and people flying PW-5s instead of standard or club class
gliders have been laughed at. No joke.

General consensus here is that someone who buys a glider with Ka-6
performance for the same price as a used LS-4 must be mentally ill.

I'd really love to know where all these mythical LS4s are.

Our two PW5s cost us NZ$25k each brand new, which would have been
around $15k or 13k EUR at the time.

If I recall correctly, they came out from Europe in the same container
as some gliders coming for the '95 Worlds. I also seem to recall that
people were still flying LS4s in the Worlds at that time.

The used glider alternative would have been a Libelle or Cirrus from
the early 70's.

Those certainly have more performance than a PW5, but they are far
less suitable for early solo flying and first cross country flying and
outlandings. The Cirrus has a belly hook and an all flying tail. Both
have much more marginal airbrakes than more recent designs.

We throw people in the PW5 after about 5 solo flights in the Grob
(back then) or DG1000 now. Would you do that with a Libelle or Cirrus?
I don't think so.

I'd certainly be interested to learn if German clubs do it with an
LS4.

On Fri, 11 Jun 2010 17:59:28 -0700 (PDT), Bruce Hoult
wrote:


I'd really love to know where all these mythical LS4s are.

http://www.segelflug.de/classifieds/

For example:
ASW-19, without instruments, otherwise good condition, 16.600 Eur
LS-4 23.500 Eur
DG-300 22.000 Eur
ASW-15 12.000 Eur



Our two PW5s cost us NZ$25k each brand new, which would have been
around $15k or 13k EUR at the time.

Well... at this time we still had the D-Mark, the PW-5 being
significantly more expensive than a used LS-4 at this time, definitely
beyond the 35.000 DM border.


Those certainly have more performance than a PW5, but they are far
less suitable for early solo flying and first cross country flying and
outlandings. The Cirrus has a belly hook and an all flying tail. Both
have much more marginal airbrakes than more recent designs.

Maybe some of the 1st generation gliders have some disadvantages
compared to a PW-5, but certainly not the ASW-19 and later gliders.


We throw people in the PW5 after about 5 solo flights in the Grob
(back then) or DG1000 now. Would you do that with a Libelle or Cirrus?
I don't think so.

I'd certainly be interested to learn if German clubs do it with an
LS4.

They do, although usually there are solo flights required on the
double seater (we usually use the winch).


But that's not the point.
Worldclass was a clear failure due to the chosen glider. The success
uf Club class demonstrates what people really want.

Andreas

On Jun 12, 10:26*pm, Andreas Maurer wrote:
On Fri, 11 Jun 2010 17:59:28 -0700 (PDT), Bruce Hoult

wrote:
I'd really love to know where all these mythical LS4s are.

http://www.segelflug.de/classifieds/

For example:
ASW-19, without instruments, otherwise good condition, 16.600 Eur
LS-4 23.500 Eur
DG-300 22.000 Eur
ASW-15 12.000 Eur

Note that that is now, not in 1995 when we bought our PW5s.

How deep is that market? What if 100 people join gliding tomorrow and
want to buy gliders? How about 1000?


Our two PW5s cost us NZ$25k each brand new, which would have been
around $15k or 13k EUR at the time.

Well... at this time we still had the D-Mark, the PW-5 being
significantly more expensive than a used LS-4 at this time, definitely
beyond the 35.000 DM border.

My recollection is that over long periods of time the DM was very
close to being the same value as the NZ$. In recent history, it's
always been very close to 1 EUR being the same as NZ$2. And, if I
recall correctly, you swapped DM for EUR at a rate of 1.95 in 1999.
So the NZ$/DM/EUR rates have been quite stable over this time period.
(far more stable than any of those currencies have been against the US
$ or Yen, for example)

The aircraft advertisements you quote above put the LS-4 at about
45000 DM *now*. I doubt that they were less than 35000 DM in 1995.
Probably they were at or above the current price.

We paid about 25000 DM for our PW5s. That is a lot less than the 35000
DM you give, not to mention the 45000 for a used LS-4 today.


But that's not the point.
Worldclass was a clear failure due to the chosen glider. The success
uf Club class demonstrates what people really want.

Surely the PW5 is not sufficiently worse than the Russia, or any other
entrant in that design contest, to make the chosen glider the reason
for failure? At the very least, you would have needed a completely
different set of goals for the design contest.

But in fact I think the main reason the World Class is a failure as a
competition class is due to the general world-wide decline of gliding.

Had the sport grown, as I'm sure we would all like, there would not be
enough used LS-4's, Discuses or even ASK6's to go around, at any
price. The advantage of a new glider, such as the PW5, is that as many
could be manufactured as required to meet demand, with prices probably
decreasing as a result.

People don't seem to appreciate how very inexpensive the PW5 was when
it was introduced (and would I think have remained given more demand).