That's awesome Quigley. Does it do pretty good on knowing quickly when you hit a thermal? Is there any audible for thermals? I'm thinking of selling my 12FGA to pick up one of these. I really liked how Hitec did their glider setups on the Optic 6 and Eclipse 7... Would be fun to get into the modern world with an Aurora.

Meanwhile, the new shop project is 'creeping' along. I've taken the time to look at lots of plans for the next glider build. LOL!!! Ain't finished this one.... So, after many hours and not finding just exactly what I want to do, I dove into my CAD program and started tuning up in 3d mode. I'm getting close! It seems to me that doing a plan in 3d would be good on many fronts. First, a good representation of the model. Then putting it all together 'on screen' before getting to the build table to realize something doesn't exactly work. Anyway, I'm going through a huge batch of tutorials and picking up on some things I didn't have in my arsenal of tools and about to come out of the other side to actually start drawing. What am I going to draw?

Well, my name is John Hinton, so I think I'll do the Von Hinten.... yes you heard it here first. Von Hinten is German for something like "out of rear" or "from the rear" and as I'll be pulling this one out of my.... it seems rather appropriate! What will it be?

I'm thinking this could be a 'open source' plan. I hope to just put it up somewhere for anyone that wants it. I'm aiming for something sort of retro and 'scalish'. Maybe from the late 30s to pre-glass era. I'll start a thread on this somewhere along the line. I have lots of questions about some basics. First, most sailplanes from that time had gull wings, whereas it seems dihedral has sort of taken over. I have never flown a gull wing glider, so don't know much about that. They are pretty! What I want to end up with is a very light wing loading... duration in mind... nothing really aerobatic... just an easy flier that can ride along for a long time on light lift on light to medium wind days. I'm also thinking of doing plans in multiple spans... same model just rescaled a bit with fewer bulkheads and ribs... or more. I'd like to have the largest one at around 20ft and the smallest at maybe 6 or 8 feet and maybe one in the middle between these two sizes. The basic design might be something like the Slingsby Dart or maybe just a bit more fuse belly than that.

Meanwhile there are lots of decisions to make. Airfoils, wing design, which method for tail feathers... something with modern know how but a model that can be stick built without going into fiberglass work and 'look' at least a bit like something that may have been a real model. I really don't want to be limited by starting out replicating a real plane and get stuck in the 'scale' box. I might however want some suggestions on size, just in case anybody wants to be able to fly in some contests. I really don't know anything about that either.

So.... there you have it.... what I've been working on... mostly in my head... but the thing is getting more real all the time. Now, if I can just do everything I want without having to dump a lot more money into the Pro version of my CAD package.