Performance World Class design proposal

tango4 wrote:
The LS4 is/was a great sailplane.

Do you think that DG really wants competition from a low wage, low health
and safety, low production cost country offering a product in competition to
its current range?

I don't think so!

I think you have it perfectly right. One could produce the LS4, say for
example in India, with perfect quality and ridiculous price. But this would
kill the market for expensive new gliders and even used ones, so nobody wants
to engage this way. This being said, yes, it is clear that the LS4 would be
the best choice for a monoclass, since it is very easy to fly, hence would
be perfect for beginners, and still has good performance.




--
Michel Talon

Do you honestly believe you could produce a glider
in India with 'perfect quality'? I don't.

The Germans have been refining their production processes
for years. The people that work in the factories are
highly skilled and highly experienced.

You can't just pick that up and replicate it in India
overnight. It's just not that simple. If you go and
look around the factory you will see what is involved
- it's amazingly complex.

Also, the Germans have lots of checks in place to ensure
the final product is safe.


At 07:12 03 September 2004,
wrote:
tango4 wrote:
The LS4 is/was a great sailplane.

Do you think that DG really wants competition from
a low wage, low health
and safety, low production cost country offering a
product in competition to
its current range?

I don't think so!

I think you have it perfectly right. One could produce
the LS4, say for
example in India, with perfect quality and ridiculous
price. But this would
kill the market for expensive new gliders and even
used ones, so nobody wants
to engage this way. This being said, yes, it is clear
that the LS4 would be
the best choice for a monoclass, since it is very easy
to fly, hence would
be perfect for beginners, and still has good performance.




--
Michel Talon

In article ,
wrote:

tango4 wrote:
The LS4 is/was a great sailplane.

Do you think that DG really wants competition from a low wage, low health
and safety, low production cost country offering a product in competition to
its current range?

I don't think so!

I think you have it perfectly right. One could produce the LS4, say for
example in India, with perfect quality and ridiculous price. But this would
kill the market for expensive new gliders and even used ones, so nobody wants
to engage this way.

"So nobody wants to engage this way"? I presume you must mean the
current owner of the LS4 design and in that case of course you are right.

However, if *someone* finds a very inexpensive (wage) but skilled-enough
workforce somewhere on this planet and has them produce a nicely
designed and built glider (wouldn't have to be exactly the LS4) for a
significantly reduced price, then I suspect many consumers would be all
for it.

Welcome to the world of global economic competition.

Regards,

-Doug

Ben Flewett wrote:
Do you honestly believe you could produce a glider
in India with 'perfect quality'? I don't.

Yes. The Indians are able to produce software of excellent quality,
as good not to say better than what is produced in our countries.
The very expensive French cloth makers delocalize a lot of their production in
India, and they expect perfect results. I cannot count the number of high
precision objects made in China such as electronic cameras and so on.
By comparison gliders are absolutely trivial objects and they should not
cost the tenth of what they are sold.

The Germans have been refining their production processes
for years. The people that work in the factories are
highly skilled and highly experienced.

Come on, this sort of argument covers vacuum.


--
Michel Talon

"Gldcomp" wrote
Perhaps you should go over it again.

Well. I went. Statement by statement. Look below.

"Gldcomp" wrote

I don't know where you get your info, but :
1) There is no handicap in the World Class competitions.

Nobody has said that there is. World Class does not equal Club Class.

2)Yes, the PW-5 is a true monotype for olympic specs : design is
public

What is so special in PW-5 model that cant be replicated in LS-4 if it's
being made public? You described the very idea of the monoclass. It is
independent of the specific model and can be applied on LS-4 as well.
About racing PW-5 in Olympics - it's the same as if in the sailing an
Optimist would be Olympic class. Leave the beginners gliders for beginners
and competition gliders for competitors.


Any glider Manufactured by ONE company is not public domain and not
manufacturable in any part of the world

How many companies currently produce PW-5? More or less than one? Overall I
agree with You. Monoclass does not mean that it has to be produced by one
manufacturer. The glider drawings have to be public.

"Doug Hoffman" wrote in message
. com...
In article ,
wrote:
tango4 wrote:
Do you think that DG really wants competition from a low wage, low
health
and safety, low production cost country offering a product in
competition to
its current range?
I don't think so!

I think you have it perfectly right. One could produce the LS4, say for
example in India, with perfect quality and ridiculous price. But this
would
kill the market for expensive new gliders and even used ones, so nobody
wants
to engage this way.

"So nobody wants to engage this way"? I presume you must mean the
current owner of the LS4 design and in that case of course you are right.

However, if *someone* finds a very inexpensive (wage) but skilled-enough
workforce somewhere on this planet and has them produce a nicely
designed and built glider (wouldn't have to be exactly the LS4) for a
significantly reduced price, then I suspect many consumers would be all
for it.

Welcome to the world of global economic competition.

They might be all for it, but unable to buy it--here's why. Many/most folks
sell their current glider and upgrade to a newer, higher performance ship.
If a cheap new ship enters the market it would destroy the market for older
ships. If that happens, it also destroys much of the market for the new
cheap ships by taking 'trade in cash' out of the pockets of potential
buyers.
Welcome to the world of existing markets and investments.

Cost of entry to the gliding market must be quite high. Factory, ovens,
Moulds, jigs, training, worldwide certification of the desig etc etc etc.
say 5 million Euros.

Now what's the annual global market for new sailplanes? Must be a couple of
hundred at the very most.

Even if through some fantastic media coup a whole new demand was created for
say an extra 500 gliders per year and the company made say Euro 2500 per
glider ( difficult when you are trying to make a low cost, high performance
glider for say Euro 20000 ) you are going to take between 3 and 5 years to
get back into the black. at which time market saturation would be reached by
current levels!

Now,
* Gliding is not an Olympic sport ( and won't be for at least 20 years ),
gets little or no TV airtime and as far as the general population is
concerned is an elitist, expensive pass time with no benefit to society.
* Private aviation is increasingly under pressure and is likely to become
more and more restricted rather than less!
* Western countries are becoming increasingly risk averse.
* Then there's the complete resistance of the current market to 'new'
suppliers. Just look at the comments in this forum disparaging the
capabilities of the Lithuanians, Czechs or Poles.

If you had money to invest would you even consider building gliders given
the above scenario? Venture capital investors these days want cast iron
guarantees of at least 30% ROI within 36 months at the very least.

Tell you what . If I win the lottery I'll might go and buy a share of a
glider manufacturer and subsidise the production of a side-by-side two
seater high performance turbo ship ( like a Stemme turbo ) But I'm under no
illusions that all I'll be doing is paying a lot of money for a personal
dream. You know what they say, to make a small fortune in aviation it's best
if you start with a large one.

The best way you can help the cost of gliding is either to have already
bought a PW-5 ( support for the concept of a one-design class would have
worked wonders ) or to refuse any german manufactured ships and be
vociferous in your support for the newer manufacturers in Eastern Europe.

The market cannot afford, nor does it want cheap sailplanes!

Ian



"Doug Hoffman" wrote in message
. com...
In article ,
wrote:

tango4 wrote:
The LS4 is/was a great sailplane.

Do you think that DG really wants competition from a low wage, low
health
and safety, low production cost country offering a product in
competition to
its current range?

I don't think so!

I think you have it perfectly right. One could produce the LS4, say for
example in India, with perfect quality and ridiculous price. But this
would
kill the market for expensive new gliders and even used ones, so nobody
wants
to engage this way.

"So nobody wants to engage this way"? I presume you must mean the
current owner of the LS4 design and in that case of course you are right.

However, if *someone* finds a very inexpensive (wage) but skilled-enough
workforce somewhere on this planet and has them produce a nicely
designed and built glider (wouldn't have to be exactly the LS4) for a
significantly reduced price, then I suspect many consumers would be all
for it.

Welcome to the world of global economic competition.

Regards,

-Doug

For Example John Smith wrote:


Welcome to the world of global economic competition.


They might be all for it, but unable to buy it--here's why. Many/most folks
sell their current glider and upgrade to a newer, higher performance ship.
If a cheap new ship enters the market it would destroy the market for older
ships. If that happens, it also destroys much of the market for the new
cheap ships by taking 'trade in cash' out of the pockets of potential
buyers.
Welcome to the world of existing markets and investments.

Speaking as someone who has bought and sold several gliders (new and
used), I think it's cheaper for pilots if the new gliders are, well,
cheaper! The only person that benefits from high prices on new gliders
is someone selling his glider and leaving the sport, because high priced
new gliders lead to high priced used gliders. If you are buying a new
glider, you want it to be as cheap as possible.

Take a look at new prices and used prices. Are you better off buying a
new glider for $100,000 and selling your old one for $50,000, or buying
a new one for $50,000 and selling your old one for $15,000? As a pilot
in the USA, I've seen this kind of situation come and go as currency
rates change.

As I said, my observation and personal experience is cheap new gliders
are good for the new pilot wanting a used glider, they are good the
experienced pilot wanting the latest new one, and they are good for the
sport. The only loser is the person leaving the sport and selling his
glider but not buying another one, because he doesn't get as much money
for it.

Further, it's cheaper to insure a cheap glider and it's cheaper to get
spare parts for it. Still costs as much to tow, though.


--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

Eric Greenwell wrote:

As I said, my observation and personal experience is cheap new gliders
are good for the new pilot wanting a used glider, they are good the
experienced pilot wanting the latest new one, and they are good for the
sport. The only loser is the person leaving the sport and selling his
glider but not buying another one, because he doesn't get as much money
for it.

Further, it's cheaper to insure a cheap glider and it's cheaper to get
spare parts for it. Still costs as much to tow, though.

Yep. Really the retract Russia AC-4c looks to be the likeliest
contestant for the next WC, if retract is allowed.
I dunno about the Silent or Sparrowhawk or others, they may
not want to bother entering, or may not meet some of the
specs...

I just don't see the LS-4 meeting a good price point, even assuming
the owners of the rights would enter it or produce it at all...
--

------------+
Mark Boyd
Avenal, California, USA

In article ,
"For Example John Smith" wrote:

They might be all for it, but unable to buy it--here's why. Many/most folks
sell their current glider and upgrade to a newer, higher performance ship.
If a cheap new ship enters the market it would destroy the market for older
ships. If that happens, it also destroys much of the market for the new
cheap ships by taking 'trade in cash' out of the pockets of potential
buyers.

You are assuming that many/most have already "invested" in a relatively
expensive glider. I don't believe this is the case. Although I
completely agree with you that it would be very disappointing to have
invested in a high dollar ship and then have its value go down due to
the sudden appearance of high-quality/low-cost competition. Welcome to
the free market.

Aren't we already seeing some *very* nice ships at significantly less
cost (LAK, HpH, Apis, others?)?


Recently, the auto market has had to react to some surprisingly high
quality products at very low prices from places like Korea. Hyundai,
Kia. The consumer is the winner. I say this even though I work for
DCX. Facts are facts. We work harder at DCX because of the Koreans and
others. Nothing wrong with that.

Regards,

-Doug