The Marske Pioneer IID

windows media (xp) video clip of the launching of the Pioneer IId last november 2002.

On our computer using explorer we do not get good results for the videos. when using netscape we get very good results... but they do take a long time to download.

Mpeg Video of thePioneer on tow July 2003

Windows Media File of Pioneer in flight

Pioneeer In slow flight (07/30/03) no airspeed registering
Windows Media File

Stall and Spin entry attempt: (08/15/03)works best in netscape with real player. . good quality! Takes a long time to load at low bandwidth.

Our story follows:

April 23, 2003 to Sept 13, 2003

September 13, 2003

Mike Flying the Pioneer

On Saturday Sept 13, 2003, Mike flew the Pioneer. He has been very busy trying to win back his model Jet record so has not spent much time in the Pioneer. Today while Mike was busy flying the Pioneer, I took to the air in a Grob 102 and tried to chase him. I then immediately flew the Pioneer for comparison.

I could not catch Mike in the Pioneer! It was obvious that I could almost match the climb but in the straight runs, at high speeds, the Grob fell very short, however the Grob gives the feeling of being easier to fly . The ailerons seemed to work easily and smoother than those of the Pioneer and the rudder on the Grob 102 is definitely more effective. The Grob is a lot more tolerant if your yaw string is out of place.

The above being said to myself, I jumped in the Pioneer. Surprisingly the tow seemed easier in the Pioneer and the first thermal did seem easier to fly than the Grob. There is just no comparison at high speed! The Pioneer will easily outdo the Grob 102. At one point when I was flying the Grob, trying to catch Mike, the Grob felt too far from home whereas in the Pioneer it was an easy glide home. The rudder is not as immediately as responsive as the Grobs but it is very important and works very well. As I continued to fly the Pioneer I was noticing that there was a real air of enjoyment in piloting this bird. Careful attention has to be paid to the Yaw string and this is one glider that readily lets you know when the yaw string is out of whack. Keeping the yaw string straight back is actually no difficulty at all.

Landing in both ships was relatively straight forward but the Grob has the better spoilers.

In conclusion I did find both ships had their merits but flying the Pioneer is certainly the most enjoyable and most rewarding. Knowing that the Pioneer has a much better final glide brings home to me the advantage of having a flying wing.

Since my discovery of the very low speeds in an attempt stall in order to confirm the speeds, I installed my turbine airspeed on a boom in front of the Pioneer. You can actually see it in the picture above. I redid some stall attempts watching the GPS ( it was a calm day) and recorded the airspeeds with the turbine. No I did not go 20 mph as indicated but 34 mph.

I also moved the CG back and found that it flew just fine. I'll measure that location in the next few days.

Now that the fall weather has arrived we will do more L/D testing.

September 08, 2003: Back from vacation Mat flew in the local sailplane contest with the Pioneer IId. Mat won the first day with a flight of about 48 miles in two hours. It was a very difficult flight with thermal heights of only 3000 agl. In this first day Mat initially followed an ASW 19 to the first turnpoint and due to the need to fly at the maximum L/D, the speeds where quite slow between thermals.There was no apparent difference in performance from the asw 19 at the 60-65 mph cruise between thermals. The Pioneer flying at 3.6 lbs/sq ft really held its own against modern sailplanes with wing loadings of more than 6 lbs /sq ft. At high speed there would have been a much bigger difference.

The Pioneer IId in the grid for the contest. Yes it is backwards to everyone else so that it could easily be pushed to the hard surface.

Unfortunately Mat landed out on the second day leaving him in 5th place for the entire event.

The handicap the Pioneer was flying under was 1.44 which for these slow conditions seemed a little high since I was able to keep up quite well with everyone.

The Pioneer Mat flew is still undergoing repairs and is still considered in a rough state. We look forward to rebuilding the fuselage this winter.

August 14, 2003: The photo below shows the airspeed at 20 mph, sink rate at about 200 down, altitude about 2500 msl and control stick all the way back.

.Finally I was able to get a day to record spin attempts. First I established that in a stall attempt the wing will not break. The consistent airspeed I was able to obtain was 20 mph... yes thats twenty miles and hour. for the regular spin entry I brought it to 20 mph then hit the rudder hard..... what followed was a slow rotation in what ever direction I hit the rudder. Attempting the spin entry at 30 mph had the same result. Next I tried cross controls... again just a nose high rotation without dropping wing. And this was all done on video! One has a good view of the control stick and instruments.See the m,peg video above.

August 8, 2003. Been rather poor weather the last week for flying but I did get some videos of a launch by Mike Couts. The nose wheel has a fairing now and a wing dolly for moving the glider out to the runway unassisted is nearing completion.

	view of the nose wheel faring in the mold.

July 30, 2003
The Cross Country of July 30, 2003 and video of zero airspeed

The near zero airspeed on a stick full back attempt at a stall which I held for about 5 seconds! Note 100 ft/ min sink

Near Galion on my way to Bucyrus. Thermalling at 40 mph at 4700 msl.

IGC file for the cross country

This was a "character building day" as Bill Rettig would say.. I started on my cross country flight just a little too early and had got down to about 2000 agl just southeast of the airport about 5 miles away , over the golf course. I decided to do a final glide back to the airport and get a relight rather than struggle to find lift.

On my second flight I was also unsure of where to go and decided to head south since I had not been to Delaware and I started on the way but the viability was very poor so I adjusted my course to go to Morrow County. Bill and Joe had decided to head to the south west for their 300 km run to Caesar Creek.

The height of the thermals was about 3500 ft agl. and I got fairly low on my way to Morrow county about 2300 agl... but just before airport I got back to altitude about 4300 ft. agl. I next set my gps to Galion and the clouds seemed to work just fine and I got consistent altitude gains on this leg maintaining betrween 3200 and 4800 agl.

After Galion aiport, Bucyrus was off in the merky distance somewhere... the visibility was only about 5 miles and I had to relay on my GPS for finding the airport. Luckily the Water reservoir to the north was visible first.... and then the race track and then airport was just ahead. Again I had good luck on this run with altitudes from 3400 to 5500 agl.

But time was getting late it was 4:20 pm and the thermals were getting weaker. My height was only about 3500 ft5 agl and the final glider computer said it was a go, and I really did not have much of a headwind so I pushed on to Marion. Unfortunately I had more sink that I had planned for... and got to less than 2000 ft agl halfway to Marion. Luckily I hit some weak lift and circled in it gaining 500 ft, easily enough to get home.

I came in to the airport and got ready to land.. called in my downwind and got down to 700 ft agl but met a light thermal. I cancelled my downwind and took the thermal up to 3000 ft agl and attempted some stalls for the video camera. By puling the control stick all the way back I was getting down to less than 15 mph and..even once had zero airspeed. Luckily this is all recorded on video and the instruments are readily visible. This glider would not stall.. I tried it a number of times. Although it wanted to turn off to the left since there was a left turn in the glider... but it went very slowly and with just a small movement of the stick returned to flying.

I am very happy that I have decided to just learn how to fly the glider to the fullest for the season. I am excited with the results and the new gap seals seems to have made a momentous change to the high speed but I still have yet put on the lower seals on the elevators : those have the greatest gap so another performance improvement is yet to come.

The more I fly this glider the more confident I feel and I can say with confidence that the Marske planform will make the greatest improvement in glider performance in the next ten years.

July 25, 2003.Many more flights in the Pioneer! Mat did 3.5 hours today with some flights down to 25 mph with stick fully back.

I have learned a tremendous amount about the Pioneer in the many hours of flying over the last few weeks. In this glider if you are having to hold aileron pressure on the control stick you need to adjust your rudder. To start a turn lead with the rudder first then feed in aileron.

I tried to stall the glider but all I could do was to have the nose drop very slightly then it would resume flying again. Approaching 25 mph indicated with the control stick all the way back the glider did want to fall off to the left since we have a turn in the glider but with some right rudder I was able to get the stick all the way back and eventually the nose came down slightly and it resumed flying again. I did try a spin but as soon as the nose dropped slightly the glider was flying again and in full control. I will try get all of this on video. I could not fly with the video on this flight since I pulled the plastic threads out of the camcorder mount just before launching. Repairs have been made and I will again attempt these maneuvers on video in the next few days.

Thermalling with a wing loading of about 3.6 lbs/sq ft also is different from the normal 6 lbs per sq ft and : this I'm sure partially explains thecontinuous adjusting the wing does to aloign with the current. When I am searching for a thermal I generally fly about 60- 65 mph but 70 to 75 is also used but on entering a good thermal it is quite easy to get slow. With the low mass of the glider speed bleads of quickly and it is important to gather speed in sink and let it out in good lift. As stated earlier if the thermal is not too turbulent fly at 40mph or less hands off: time for lunch and map reading.

On todays flight I lost the vario about 12 miles out from Marion which made flying rather difficult for me. I did have a back up but it was not total energy so I had to try keep my speed constant in the thermals. At one point I was about 1300 agl and hit a strong thermal, I got very aggressive in my climb and averaged about 500 up to 4000 msl.but most of the thermals were weak. Some thermals in the core where it was fairly smooth I was thermaling at about 40 mph... in small turbulent thermals I was doing 55 or so. I do feel much better about my thermalling technique!

I must say there is a lot to learn about this glider and I am sure it will eventually lead to a tremendous step forward in the performance of gliders in the years to come.

July 17, 2003. Another day of flying! Mat did four hours in the cockpit.

I was disappointed with my performance on last Sunday so I had a chance to rethink the thermalling technique. The conditions (similar to last sunday) were turbulent with broken thermals. This always makes it uncomfortable flying but I was determined so I held more speed in the circling about 55mph but did higher banked turns. This seemed to help with giving me more control. As I climbed above 3000 agl I was able to flatten out the bank and fly slower to about 40 mph if the lift was smooth. I seemed to get the hang of it and my flight showed good progress. I did at one moment fly with the control stick all the way back: somewhere about 30 mph indicated it started a slow turn to the left ( we do have a slight left turn in the glider). Jim said it would take about a season to really learn to fly the glider and I think he is right! I shot a good video of the flight as well.

July 14, 2003. Mat has flown the Pioneer four times in the last few days and writes a flight report: The new ventilation system works great! The cockpit remained cool and comfortable but the noise level is up and we will work on that!

	Note the new headrest and the video camera mounted beside the headrest. Yes we have some good videos.
	That is a busy panel.... and you still have a GPS not in the picture on the left side down low not shown! The palm pilot to the right is the final glider computer.
	Looking down at the airport from the north west.

Flying the Pioneer IId July 13, 2003 a Flight Report:

The takeoff is quite normal however in my first few tows I was too low behind the tow plane since when seated in the cockpit it is difficult to see the tow plane if you want the tow plane wings on the horizon. This did cause a number of difficulties as it does with all other sailplanes in the same position. At first such as feeling that the ailerons just could not overcome the forces to keep the wings in level flight but moving up to a normal position cured all of this. We are currently using a 50 ft bridle attached the the wing root. There is no perceptible pitch to overcome with this position nor does it seem to influence the yaw or turning of the Pioneer on tow..

The CG position is important too. I have been flying with a measurement of 8 1/8" from the ground to the bottom of the fuselage just behind the tail wheel before the rudder. I feel that 7.5" would be more comfortable.

As the tow plane pulls the rope taught and the nose is pulled down where it stays until the roll starts. Very quickly the ailerons are effective and the elevator can lift the nose so that one is up on the main wheel. The Pioneer lifts off with a very slight back stick and then leveled off at about 10-15 ft until the tow plane reaches 65 mph. Keep above the tow plane especially on the early stages of the launch which is the same for all gliders. Getting slow on tow then letting the tow plane get above you is very uncomfortable should you meet turbulent air.

Seeing over the nose of the Pioneer is a problem much like the 1-34, however moving to one side behind the tow plane does help. The glider reacts quickly much like a 1-26. Turns on tow are not a problem just remember to keep the tow planes wings on the horizon. Use bopth the rudder and ailerons.

As with tailed gliders if the tow plane goes up immediately use up elevator to anticipate the lift or sink.

Once off the tow the glider feels fairly normal and the glider will trim out at about 45 mph. You can make a turn just with the rudder although once past a certain point it needs ailerons to co-ordinate the turn. I find that beginning the turn with the rudder and applying ailerons is best.

In calm weather the glider feels entirely normal. In turbulence the sailplane reacts to the air it is flying through and it at first causes a feeling of anxiety as the plane seems to be doing other things than what you are wanting it to do. First relax and let the sailplane adjust to the air it is flying through. This takes some getting used to.

I have felt that there was too much dihedral in the wings since the addition of the wingtips. The glider can be turned with the rudder in shallow turns and especially in a thermal one notices that it is entirely stable in circling. In calm weather ( of not too turbulent thermal) the sailplane will fly in a circle with hands off!

The sailplane has been flown to 30 mph indicated with no stall possible and then flown to a comfortable 110 mph.

Circling flight seems normal but at this stage with very turbulent weather I am inclined not to have a great bank angle. It does not drop a tip despite the lack of washout. If the thermal is not too turbulent flying can be done between 35 and 40 mph. Infact you an remove your hands from the controls and just use rudder and it does a very respectable job of thermalling on its own. The only area of control where I have a issue is that to reverse the circling direction does take more of an effort than say the grob 102 but if one leads with the rudder and the speed is under 50 there is really no problem.

Landing the sailplane is easy but the spoilers are not as effective as the ones on the grob 102. However it does a good slip and I have found little difficulty in landing it. The best landing speed seems to be about 50 -55. I have never had it drop suddenly to the ground as many seem to speculate should happen. I have even landed with stick full back with no sign of a stall although the decent rate was a bit high.

July 9, 2003. We have had thunderstorms and rain for the past few week! So during this time we needed to rethink our ventilation system since the last time we flew it became quite evident that the Pioneer was going to be very uncomfortableover the summer months. We found that we were limited in our altitude becuase the cnaopy was fogging up!So the venitlation tube in the nose was enlarged to 2 inches from one inch! A defrost vent was also put in..... all we need now is good weather to try out the new system!

	A new hole in the fuselage! That ribbed 1 1/4" line will be replaced with a smooth 2 inch line.
	The defogger mold from foam, coated with plaster and then painted with latex paint.
	The defogger installed, and the enlarged ventilation vent in the instrument panel.

June 28, 2003. Mike and Mat flew on Saturday. Mike few first for a couple of hours then Mat took a flight about 4 p.m. the lift was fairly good to begin so he took off to Upper Sandusky about 15 miles away. He went from cloud to cloud in diminishing lift and finally arrived at Upper Sandusky airport but the lift was failing. Now Mat had thought he was smart by taking a route at 90 degrees to the wind but he had forgotten that once low at Upper Sandusky he would have to thermal and that would carry him downwind away from Marion. And yes, he got low over Upper Sandusky and he did thermal and he did get carried downwind by the 16 mile an hour wind. The final glide computer said it would be really tough to reach Marion with no lift so he decided to follow the wind and land at Bucyrus He arrived at 1500 agl and then radioed that he was going to land immanently but would play in the light lift for a few more moments. Well Mat climbed to 3600 ft agl and yes he had drifted downwind a couple of miles but the final glide said that if he was really lucky he could make the final glide from 3600 agl with a 16 mph headwind. It looked really bad but why not try, one can always turnback. It was nip and tuck but that 14 miles went by awful slowly ; the point of no return was passed and the airport still seemed miles away at less than 1500 feet agl. He knew he needed a little luck. Small pockets of lift were encountered and soon the runway appeared with little altitude to spare. Really that was a great flight!

June 23, 2003. Flew the Pioneer on June 21 and 22, 2003. Saturday was extremely windy and I was quite delighted at the excellent control I had. The secret is to stay high on the tow plane just like any other glider. Sunday was not quite as windy but aloft I saw about 13 mph at 5700 msl. Saturday and sunday we began filming the Pioneer in flight. These first films experimented with placement of the camcorder.

On sunday Mat did a small cross country of about 50 miles out and return. I did happen to meet Robert Mudds Apis early in the flight. My thermalling skills at the beginning of the flight were lacking and with the close presence of Robert I fumbled around flying at about 50-55 mph rather than my usual 40 mph, However we seemed fairly equal in performance in the climb.In the high speed run to about 85 mph where I expected the very clean and polished Apis to easily overtake me we again seemed about equal. However this was a very small test and I'm sure that there will be more comparison flights to come. I did not have a chance to adjust the moveable weights on this flight.

	Looking out over the right wing at about 5000 ft msl June 22, 2003. Note my Palm pilot used for final glide. It is mounted on a gooseneck so it is easily moveable.... yep thats Walmart aircraft parts... lamp section.

June 14, 2003.
Have a windows media (xp) video clip of the launching of the Pioneer IId last november 2002.

June 9, 2003
Here is the June 6, 2003 IGC file of the save from about 700 ft on a rather weak day.Note the airspeeds at the end going to over 90 mph down to 35 mph. This is a gps readout with no adjustment made for wiind speed..

June 6, 2003
This was a very emotional day for me.
Mike had only flown the Pioneer once this season and I was very anxious for him to try since I had changed the CG ( now at 7.5" measured from the ground to the rear bottom of the fuselage while balancing with the pilot in the cockpit), put gap seals on the wings, added a nose wheel etc. Infact it was now quite a different handling glider. Mike took off and did a tow to 2000 ft but could not center in a thermal and ended up landing on some soft grass complete with a ground loop when the front skid dug in. ( yes I have not added my teardrop skid yet over the wheel) Mike was upset and mentioned that he just did not feel comfortable with the glider. This really brought home to me how differently the glider flies to someone who does not know the glider. As for me I was so proud of the excellent handling I just could not understand! So resisted the oportunity to fly the Apis, which Robert Mudd kindly offered, and flew the Pioneer just to make sure it was still the same glider. The tow was excellent.. well at least what I had of it: you see I had a rope break at 600 ft... the metal clip I had used to attach the bridle had broken. It had worked fine for Mikes flight..but I had done something stupid. I had forgot to check my preflight checklist and forgot to get my water within reach... so what did I do? Yes I was fiddling around pulling on it and happened to cause quite a jerk on the line when I made a sudden course correction. So here I was at 600- 700 ft agl headed for a landing... but wait I was in light lift... so I circled... gained an inch or two then another and before you know it I was somewhere over 3000 agl. My thermalling speed was about 40 mph with an estimated bank angle of 20 degrees.I think I more than surprised everyone on the ground... although I was reminded that I was a bit low for such a save! The sky was very overcast so I headed for better skies about 3/4 the way to Bucyrus finding more thermal activity and getting to about 4600 agl. There was no buzz since I had ripped off the bottom elevator gap seals... so what will itdo? I slowed to 30 mph then sped up to 100 mph. I am still amazed at the low sink rate at speed but I do need some side by side comparisons before my claims can be validated. I also talked with the tow pilot and he still assured me that despite the lower empty weight of the Apis (about 300 lbs) the Pioneer still was the lightest to tow with its heavier weight of about 400 lbs and definitely requiring 20 degrees of flaps on the tow plane.

Jim Marske had been on hand to see my low save from 6-700 ft and I think he felt very validated after the dissappointment that Mike had not felt comfortable in the glider. I have an analogy. Flying other tailed gliders is like riding a tricycle. Flying the pioneer is like riding a bicycle! At first one does not feel comfortable but after a few hours it becomes very natural and I must say feels far superior to anything I have ever flown but not the easiest to learn!

So this really makes me realize the importance of the two place trainer! And we are making progress on that... Mike is ready to cut the wings and Mat is doing the co-ordination of getting the project going and we need some financial support too from you.

Anyone wishing to help sponsor test flights to measure the performance of the Pioneer is very welcome. We need 5000 ft tows and an assembled group of volunteeers at 6:30 in the morning. Cost of a session would be about $200 to cover the tows.

I feel that what we are doing is probably the some of the most important aviation research being done but the least funded!

	Getting ready to tow the glider out... yes and thats Jim on the wing tip with Mike in the center walking.
	Mike and Pioneer waiting for a tow.

June 14, 2003. It has rained constantly! So lots of projects to make piloting more comfortable... goose neck gps and palm pilot and more recently a folding headrest. Also try this windows media video of a Pioneer IId take off last nov 2002.

June 2, 2002,
I finally got a good flight in today.
It was quite overcast but I managed to struggle up to 3300 agl and speed off to the thermals about 12 miles away. This was another landmark day. With the addition of the luggage rack I had overcompensated with the nose weight and the control hamony was not correct. I moved one of the weights back so it was on my lap and a magic moment occurred. The Pioneer suddenly became alive and the handling was harmonized!
I had also wanted to make the ailerons a little crisper and added better gap seals.. it worked too....what didn't work was the gap seals on the underside of the elevator. ...they just would not stick down....they came loose on tow but below 65 mph did not seem to have any effect however the noise above 65 was disturbing... so I flew the two hours below 65 mph which is unusual because I usually fly at 80- 90 mph between thermals.

Since high wpeed was out of the question I tried to fly as slow as I possibly could... who would have guess I flew below 30 mph!Now this is indicated speed and we have not calibrated the airspeed below 40 mph... but for me it was surprising!

I may have also discovered something else on tow. I think we have been towing too slowly... 65 to 70 mph seems to work fine for me but most important do not get low on the tow plane. It is easy to be too low on the tow plane because when looking out from the Pioneer the tow plane almost dissappears below the canopy. I found that keeping the two planes wheels on the horizon worked just fine. I had experienced an oscillation even on the long 50 ft bridle that Mike had experienced on the very short bridle and I feel it was that we were both low and slow behind the tow plane. We may haveto go back and re-investigate the lengths of bridle used.

	Wating for a tow... I just could not resist taking the photo!
	Looking down at Bucyrus airport while chasing thermals

May 29, 2003.
The weather sure has been lousey but that has not kept us from working on the Pioneer!

	We have a new luggage compartment!
	A side pocket made from a car accessory. I first glued it in with a spray glue... not successful so it was glued in with epoxy.
	Note the new control stick boot. The moveable weight is tied on the left side to the spoiler handle, note the rope on the seat going to the weight on the floor ahead of the seat.

May 23,2003. The question of what length of bridle has been solved. We purchased a new 100 ftpolypropylene 1/4" rope and made that our bridle.... so a 50 ft bridle and it worked very well! It was a very good day to give it a try since it was one of the most turbulent thermal days we have had this spring, and the tow with the 50 ft bridle worked just fine. Part of the soilution was in the new rope which has a lot of stretch to it.

May 18, 2003. We have been using a 30 ft bridle to tow the Pioneer and Mike thought we should try a short bridle. Mike tried a short bridle but abandond the flight at 200 ft feeling that the tow was almost uncontrollable. It did not work and we feel that the reason for this was that the nose was pulled around by the sides of the bridle giving an input that made it uncontrollable. A fifty foot bridle has been made up to attach to our normal attach points at the wing root. We have not flown with the 50 ft bridle yet.

Mike found out that the new nose wheel needs a more rounded skid to avoid digging into soft mud!

May 14, 2003. Mat was elated today. It had been raining a lot lately so Mat undertook a few modifications to the old Pioneer. First he removed the skid and replaced it with a large aerodynamic covered skateboard wheel. ( still needs some smoothing at this writing) This took a lot of weight out of the nose and changed the CG which was good because all of the weight had been taken from the nose and but now we have a little back in there to play with.The ailerons had the end gaps sealed and the rudder had a lining of felt put in and all access to the fusleage was sealed with aluminum tape.It was a new glider! Mat was able to fly in the vicinity of 35 mph and flew up to 100 mph incidated. Noticebly quieter and quite different in handling.He can't wait for Mike to give it a try.

the new nose wheel

May 5, 2003 .Mat Flew the Pioneer yesterday for about 3 hours. He was the one of the first soaring flights of the day. Mat used a moveable weight to aid in cruise and climb.He reports that it indeed made a positive difference with lower speeds in the thermalling and faster speeds in the cruise with the same elevator setting which was kept very close to neutral. Despite the poor thermals early in the day he managed to fly to Morrow County Airport and most of the way to Bucyrus. A certain caution in the cross country was observed since Mike had to cut the lawn that evening and keeping on the good side of his wife, Liz is important!.

April 28, 2003. A fun flying day yesterday. The highest we got was about 4000 agl late in the day. The thermals were hard to find and hard to center in at first and it was only late in the day we attained any altitude over 3000 ft. The interesting thing about this flight was that I got to chase the new Apis around the sky for at least 30 minutes. I could easily stay with him but in both climb and in 75 mph runs I felt the Pioneer was slightly superior. In the circling I could turn tighter and fly slower and in the run I definitely gained on the apis. Not bad for an old gal in need of some drag reduction in many areas ! I flew for 3 hours and 20 minutes in the Pioneer. -mat

A view of the new palm pilot holder as I was heading back the airport after a 3 hr 20 minute flight.

April 23, 2003. Mike has already had an hour and a half soaring flight in the Pioneer but today Mat took it up for a flight. Mat had not flown for about 3 months and so he started with instruction in the Grob 103 and then proceeded to a solo flight in the Grob 102. It did take a while to brush up the skills! But today he took the Pioneer out. Yes it was very gusty and the thermals only went to about 3000 agl... and lots of sink and his first save was down about 1000 agl.

Pilot report:

The tow was tough with the great amount of turbulence but nothing I could not handle in the Pioneer. I do find that with the Marske wings it is important to keep the yaw string aligned with the fuselage. Mike had taken off the mylar gap seals from the rudder which made for a much quieter flight.

I perhaps flew too fast in the thermals using an indicated speed of about 55 mph since it was so turbulent...... but that ship could thermal! It is so quiet down around 40 mph that one wonders just if it is flying at all.

Downloadable IGC Flight Log of April 23, 2003

I was delightfully surprised at the great handling in such turbulence. The thermals were very small indeed and ragged... but that Pioneer excelled in every way. I look forward to a lot of cross country this spring... keep posted. -mat

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Past history of the Pioneer rebuild

RETURN TO: MARSKE FLYINGS WINGS HOMEPAGE

Designer:
Jim Marske

Phone :(740)-223-3550
Marske Flying Wings
c/o Marion Industrial Center
3007 Harding Higway East
Marion ,OH, 43302