BLANIK L-13 AD Status

Current Status of the Blanik L-13 SPAR AD Grounding?

Does anyone know what the current status of the Blanik L-13 Eddy
Current testing procedure is? Has the University of Prague developed
this procedure for LET’s review?

It is my understanding the clubs of the Czech Republic have been
flying the L-13’s by claiming hardship to the Czech Federal
Government. This doesn’t help the situation, as there is no pressure
being applied against the LET Factory.

Thanks for any information you may be able to provide.

Tim Hanke
Adirondack Soaring Group, Inc.
Saratoga Springs, NY USA

[subject edited to address wider concerns]

I wouldn't hold my breath on any kind of satisfactory resolution to
this. My sense is that the Blanik was designed for an operational
environment where it was expected to be crashed before approaching the
end of its 3000 hour lifetime. Absent the Soviet-era air defense
infrastructure that needed them as introductory trainers, and was also
desperate for Western cash, there's no hope of seeing any more at
affordable prices.

About the best we could do is resolve not to buy any LET or Blanik
products on the general principle that they do not support their old
products, so we cannot expect them to support new ones. Unfortunately,
LET seems to have so little connection to the earlier company that
actually built all those two-seaters that they couldn't really care
less about them. In fact, in today's risk-averse aviation environment,
it is probably in their best interest to sweep as many of them out of
the sky as it can. Furthermore, most of us already don't buy LET
products, and it seems to have had little effect on the situation.

The situation begs the wider questions, where do we get new glider
pilots if trainers become so scarce and expensive? If we let the cost
of soaring instruction rise with the burdened price of training
gliders, who will want to even start? Do we let the commercial,
consumerist, invisible hand of the marketplace sweep our sport from
the sky? Or is there some legitimate way to subvert the laws of supply
and demand?

Thanks, Bob K.

This is strictly second hand info but I know someone who was told by a
non-destructive test engineer that, even if they approve some sort of
eddy current test, it would likely cost several thousand (I think the
number was "5" but I'm not sure) to do the test. The cost was
attributed to the type of machine necessary to do the test. From what
I understand, the location of potential cracks is buried deep inside
the wing and normal equipment can't do it. On top of that it would
likely be a recurring AD. This particular engineer, citing liability
concerns, said he wouldn't do the test even if he had the equipment
and could get the price. We were offered $5000 for ours before the AD
came out and we were a little insulted by the offer.

On Feb 3, 9:19*am, Tim Hanke wrote:
Current Status of the Blanik L-13 SPAR AD Grounding?

Does anyone know what the current status of the Blanik L-13 Eddy
Current testing procedure is? Has the University of Prague developed
this procedure for LET’s review?

It is my understanding the clubs of *the Czech Republic have been
flying the L-13’s by claiming hardship to the Czech Federal
Government. This doesn’t help the situation, as there is no pressure
being applied against the LET Factory.

Thanks for any information you may be able to provide.

Tim Hanke
Adirondack Soaring Group, Inc.
Saratoga Springs, NY USA

On Feb 3, 2:30*pm, Tim Hanke wrote:
On Feb 3, 9:19*am, Tim Hanke wrote:



Current Status of the Blanik L-13 SPAR AD Grounding?

Does anyone know what the current status of the Blanik L-13 Eddy
Current testing procedure is? Has the University of Prague developed
this procedure for LET’s review?

It is my understanding the clubs of *the Czech Republic have been
flying the L-13’s by claiming hardship to the Czech Federal
Government. This doesn’t help the situation, as there is no pressure
being applied against the LET Factory.

Thanks for any information you may be able to provide.

Tim Hanke
Adirondack Soaring Group, Inc.
Saratoga Springs, NY USA

Tim,

Never say "Thanks for any information you may be able to provide" on
this forum. Ask for factual information otherwise you get all the
"sky is falling" and "I heard from a friend of a friend" reports that
add nothing to the conversation.

I would suggest calling or e-mailing the SSA government liaison, the
FAA representative in charge of the AD and daily calling the US
representative of Blaink until we get additional details such as the
proposed inspection plan, the current status of the testing and a
tentative date of when the testing will be done.

I would guess we may need to form a group or several groups to
purchase the correct probe and then send them to those that need it to
help reduce the cost of inspection.

There are enuff Home Builder's out there, what is stopping us from reverse
enginering the wing and doing a wood spar and built up rib's. By using all
the factory fitting's and linkage's,it should not be that much heart
ache.

Ken

On Feb 4, 5:57*am, Bob Kuykendall wrote:
The situation begs the wider questions, where do we get new glider
pilots if trainers become so scarce and expensive? If we let the cost
of soaring instruction rise with the burdened price of training
gliders, who will want to even start?

I don't think that's a big problem. Most people seem to get solo by
about 40 flights and 10 hours of air time. At our current club rates,
that's about NZ$2500 (US$2000) for tows and NZ$600 (US$450) for hire
of a DG1000 at casual rates [1]. A glider that we could hire out for
half the hourly rate would save less than 10% of the total (and I
didn't even include club membership fees, logbook and other training
material, landing fees).

The equation changes if you're using a winch for training but 1) US
clubs don't use winches, and 2) the Blanik was never the trainer of
choice for a winch operation.

[1] in fact you'd pay less via one or other bulk-buy scheme: either
the "prepay to solo" scheme, or the NZ$900/year "all you can eat
scheme".

On Feb 3, 10:18*pm, Bruce Hoult wrote:



The equation changes if you're using a winch for training but 1) US
clubs don't use winches, and 2) the Blanik was never the trainer of
choice for a winch operation.


1) not quite true: winching is regaining some popularity in the US and
there are currently around 35 winches in operation used mainly for
primary training.
2) not quite true: pretty much all L-13 I have seen in operation in
Europe were used primarily in winch operations with the Y-bridle.

U. Neumann

On Feb 3, 7:36*pm, Ken Latam wrote:
There are enuff Home Builder's out there, what is stopping us from reverse
enginering the wing and doing a wood spar and built up rib's. By using all
the factory fitting's and linkage's,it should not be that much heart
ache. *

Ken

I like that idea! Form a Blanik interest group to pool some cash.
Build a simplified wing without the complex Fowler-flaps and an
updated airfoil. How about a composite wing to get over that metal
fatigue issue? That would breath new life into the old bird.

U. Neumann

On Feb 3, 8:57*am, Bob Kuykendall wrote:
The situation begs the wider questions, where do we get new glider
pilots if trainers become so scarce and expensive? If we let the cost
of soaring instruction rise with the burdened price of training
gliders, who will want to even start? Do we let the commercial,
consumerist, invisible hand of the marketplace sweep our sport from
the sky? Or is there some legitimate way to subvert the laws of supply
and demand?

www.retroplane.net/forum/download.php?id=496

What if they had based the design on the K13, rather than the K18?
I've spent the last 5 years designing a low cost winch (yes, I'm slow,
but I'm almost ready to cut metal, really), and am acutely aware of
the fact that there aren't a lot of decent low cost training gliders
left to go along with our winch...

Marc