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DG-300/303 owners...
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DG-300/303 owners...
On 4/7/07 12:34 AM, in article
, "Marc Ramsey" wrote: You should take a look at this: http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html Marc My German skills are non-existant. Can anyone tell me if the lengthier German part mentions which serial numbers are affected, because the English part says the manufacturing error began sometime during the production run. Presumably that means some of the early DG-300's were built right. Thanks, Bullwinkle |
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DG-300/303 owners...
On Apr 7, 6:01 am, Bullwinkle wrote:
On 4/7/07 12:34 AM, in article , "Marc Ramsey" wrote: You should take a look at this: http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html Marc My German skills are non-existant. Can anyone tell me if the lengthier German part mentions which serial numbers are affected, because the English part says the manufacturing error began sometime during the production run. Presumably that means some of the early DG-300's were built right. Thanks, Bullwinkle You can try translating the DG webpage with this one: http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/tr Just drop the URL into it, and choose "German to English". -John W |
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DG-300/303 owners...
On Apr 7, 7:28 am, Bullwinkle wrote:
On 4/7/07 5:16 AM, in article . com, "rasposter" wrote: On Apr 7, 6:01 am, Bullwinkle wrote: On 4/7/07 12:34 AM, in article , "Marc Ramsey" wrote: You should take a look at this: http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html Marc My German skills are non-existant. Can anyone tell me if the lengthier German part mentions which serial numbers are affected, because the English part says the manufacturing error began sometime during the production run. Presumably that means some of the early DG-300's were built right. Thanks, Bullwinkle You can try translating the DG webpage with this one: http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/tr Just drop the URL into it, and choose "German to English". -John W OK: thanks! Did that, and to answer my own question: no, no serial number range is listed. Hopefully that will come out as DG and Elan/AMS continue to work the problem. As a summary, much of the longer German portion appears to be heavy duty mental handwringing over what DG should do with the info that the spars are weaker: ground the fleet, require a very expensive inspection, or just impose some restrictions on speeds and weights. Clearly they have done the latter. I have to believe that Elan/AMS has sufficient manufacturing records to determine when they changed their process, either by serial number, or by date (from which affected serial numbers could be derived). You'd think they'd keep those records for legal reasons, if no other. Hoping for further clarification, Thanks, Bullwinkle- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - My wife is a native speaker of German. I asked her to read this and even though she isn't familiar with some of the terminology here is a summary of generally what it says. The glider that was inspected which resulted in this discovery is about 20 years old and they did not report its serial number. At some point ELAN started manufacturing the wings not to design specifications. They apparently started using epoxy resins rather than polyester resins (as were specified) in the affected part of the spars possibly to reduce the curing times. This was done without notification let alone approval from Glaser-Dirks. ELAN is aware that they did this and ELAN does not dispute doing it but says they refuse to take on any inspection costs. Also, they have been unresponsive to DG's inquiries regarding this matter. DG estimates the inspection cost to be around 6,000 euros and repair cost could easily come to 5,000 euros per wing. DG says to maintain consistency the inspection and repairs should all be done at the DG factory in Germany so there will also be shipping costs. DG goes on to say this option is not really discussion worthy for the pilots. They rather opted for doing calculations and endurance tests on the affected parts to prove that they are still sufficiently stable and that the airplanes can be flown safely at reduced speeds and use. This is apparently why they decided to just reduce the speeds, take off weight and limit use. They say the current fleet is about 500 gliders worldwide. I, for one, bought a DG-300 for its superior strength among other reasons. We will have to wait for more clarification from DG but at this point it seems that strength has now been reduced. Since this is admittedly the fault of ELAN for not following the correct manufacturing process and not notifying DG that they were altering the manufacturing process this seems like a negligence issue. I would hope they would do something to rectify the situation. Bob DG-300, S/N 3E-127 |
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DG-300/303 owners...
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DG-300/303 owners...
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DG-300/303 owners...
The Company ELAN from Slovenia, which produced for Glaser Dirks GmbH
changed the production process without permission of Wilhelm Dirks at an unknown date. This means that nobody knows which gliders are affected. Andreas http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html My German skills are non-existant. Can anyone tell me if the lengthier German part mentions which serial numbers are affected, because the English part says the manufacturing error began sometime during the production run. Presumably that means some of the early DG-300's were built right. Thanks, Bullwinkle |
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DG-300/303 owners...
On Apr 7, 2:34 am, Marc Ramsey wrote:
You should take a look at this: http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html Marc Try this: http://translate.google.com/translat...language_tools |
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DG-300/303 owners...
On Apr 7, 2:34 am, Marc Ramsey wrote:
You should take a look at this: http://www.dg-flugzeugbau.de/holm-dg300-e.html Marc I tried to read the computer translation out of curiosity, it is dreadful. To encapsulate: Most, if not all DG 300 are restricted to a much lower speed and load envelope due to flaws found in the spar production. The fibers in the spar caps are not strait or aligned due to manufactured flaws in the root area, hence the compression strength is reduced. The gliders will be able to fly with a reduce flight envelope. Not fix is possible due to cost. In a nut shell the value of that glider is substantially reduced. Udo |
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