How hard is a Diamant to assemble?

A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. He was told it's
very hard to rig. He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

In article
,
Spam wrote:

A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. He was told it's
very hard to rig. He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

Which Diamant? I have never assembled a long wing Diamant, but I did
help assemble a 15 meter Diamant HBV a long time ago. The HBV Diamants
were built with slightly modified 301 Libelle wings (which is why the
serial numbers on 301 Libelle wings do not usually match up with the
serial numbers of the rest of the ship). The HBV went together pretty
easy.

On Jun 26, 8:17*am, Spam wrote:
A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. *He was told it's
very hard to rig. *He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

Hi
The Diamant with long wings is a very good aircraft. Not difficult to
rig but you need a good, (steady) fuselage dolly and 2 good wing
dolly because the wing are heavy . I know from experience.
S6

On Jun 26, 11:56*am, Gaetan Trudel wrote:
On Jun 26, 8:17*am, Spam wrote:

A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. *He was told it's
very hard to rig. *He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

Hi
The Diamant with long wings is a very good aircraft. Not difficult to
rig but you need a good, (steady) *fuselage dolly and 2 good wing
dolly because the wing are heavy . I know from experience.
S6

I've helped rig a long wing Diamant a few times. Offhand, I hope
never to do it again............. It may have had something to do
with the owner and the setup, but the wings are heavy - around 180# if
IIRC.

really pretty straight forward and typical...though the wings are a bit
heavy...I did it once with a diamant with no one around to show me anything
special about it, with a very unskilled helper I had it together in about 30
minutes...and this was the first attempt....just line things up and they go
together like any other glider (better than many!) but it is heavy..
tim

"Spam" wrote in message
...
A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. He was told it's
very hard to rig. He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

On 26 June, 18:39, "Tim Mara" wrote:
really pretty straight forward and typical...though the wings are a bit
heavy...I did it once with a diamant with no one around to show me anything
special about it, with a very unskilled helper I had it together in about 30
minutes...and this was the first attempt....just line things up and they go
together like any other glider (better than many!) but it is heavy..
tim

"Spam" wrote in message

...

A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. *He was told it's
very hard to rig. *He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

In the early 80s I used to regularly one man rig a Diamant 18 with no
problem. The wing was a lot lighter than a Kestrel 19 I had later. I
used 2 wooden tip trestles and a low wing root trestle. The wings had
dollies attached to the roots and were stowed root first in the non-
lift-top trailer. Position the tip dollies then pull wings out and
set the tips leading edge down an the trestles. Lift and rotate the
wingroot level onto the root trestle - remove root dolly and feed the
spar stub in. I have used essentially the same method on every glider
since - except when I was in a Duo syndicate and had a Cobra trailer
which was much more inconvenient for rigging.

John Galloway

On Jun 26, 8:17*am, Spam wrote:
A friend of mine is considering buying a diamant. *He was told it's
very hard to rig. *He's not a member of this group so I am asking for
him.

Anyone ever tried to assemble one? Or dis-assemble one?

If it's the long-winged version, then some decent dollies or at least
supports are a must. I helped with the long-winger twice, and as
others have said, would never do it again unless the owner had the
right rigging gear.

I also helped with an HBV, and it was a pleasure.

P3

I've endured l-o-o-o-n-g rigging sessions with both a family HBV
(Libelle 301 wings) and a friend's 16.5 meter Diamant. In both cases
the problem was operator error. The HBV is almost as easy as a 301
except you can't see what's happening inside the fuselage. And if you
rig the wrong wing (R, I believe) first in defiance of the owner's
manual, the flap drive will jam and prevent your getting the other
wing on. The long-wingers are much heavier but no more complex. IIRC,
a few people had problems with the socket in the L wing into which a
pin from the right wing spar is inserted. The socket is a floating,
slightly tapered bushing and I think it can rotate 180 degrees, making
it impossible to plug the spar pin into the small end of the bushing.

This is probably more than you want to know about either type.
Basically the long wingers are MUCH heavier and you've gotta have good
wingstands or very strong assistants. But both types assemble fairly
easily if you know what you're doing. The horror stories began, I
think, because many of the early owners didn't know much about rigging
these fairly early fiberglass gliders.

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"
USA

I may rig my Diamant18 tomorrow, and it is not difficult.

Yes, wings are heavy on the the ground, so 3 tressels, 2 tip, one root,
(as mentioned by John Galloway) are very usefull. Use the root tressle
while adding/removing the root dolly. My tressels are felt covered so the
wing can then be slid in to the fuselage and small adjustments made hands
free.

RIght wing first, just watch every thing line up carefully. Recent tip I
read on the web, ... tape the right wing before adding the left, stops the
right wing sliding out as the left is pushed home.

When the main pin is in, only the ailerons need an easy pip pin
connected. Tailplane is really easy one man job. flaps, airbrakes,
elevator controlls auto connect.

Laid back flight position, but not for huge / tall pilots perhaps, but
flys without any vice, and great "44" performance for the first all
plastic composite glider in the world.

Slightly wobbly wing tip camera, winch launch & enjoy, ..
David.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9FZbgzWDJA

I wonder what the AoA meter would read?



At 19:43 26 June 2009, Chip Bearden wrote:
I've endured l-o-o-o-n-g rigging sessions with both a family HBV
(Libelle 301 wings) and a friend's 16.5 meter Diamant. In both cases
the problem was operator error. The HBV is almost as easy as a 301
except you can't see what's happening inside the fuselage. And if you
rig the wrong wing (R, I believe) first in defiance of the owner's
manual, the flap drive will jam and prevent your getting the other
wing on. The long-wingers are much heavier but no more complex. IIRC,
a few people had problems with the socket in the L wing into which a
pin from the right wing spar is inserted. The socket is a floating,
slightly tapered bushing and I think it can rotate 180 degrees, making
it impossible to plug the spar pin into the small end of the bushing.

This is probably more than you want to know about either type.
Basically the long wingers are MUCH heavier and you've gotta have good
wingstands or very strong assistants. But both types assemble fairly
easily if you know what you're doing. The horror stories began, I
think, because many of the early owners didn't know much about rigging
these fairly early fiberglass gliders.

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"
USA

Laid back flight position, *but not for huge / tall pilots perhaps, but
flys without any vice, and great "44" performance for the first all
plastic composite glider in the world.

Hmmm, glad to hear it's well mannered and comfy, but it's not exactly
the first plastic ship. The first *production* models (Ki Ba Vo
Diamant prototypes used wooden K-6 wings/tail...) used H301 wings, an
all plastic ship which was obviously in production before the HBV came
out.. which was then followed by the 16.5m, and finally the 18m
variant, which didn't come around till 68'... For all plastic, the 301
itself even came after the:
Phonix http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akaflieg_Stuttgart_FS-24 ,
(actual first glass ship...)
Pheobus http://phoebus.vassel.com/site_page_2511/
BS-1 http://www.sailplanedirectory.com/glasflugel.htm#BS-1 and I'm
sure there were some others too...

The 18m variant was after the D-36 was, which led to the W-12 by 65
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schleicher_ASW_12
Even the Open Cirrus was flying by 67' , but I'm not sure if the
Kestrel 17 (Glasflugal 401) was slightly before, or after the 18m
Diamant in 68...

Still an early glass bird though

-Paul