ABOUT THE AEROSENTE GLIDER PROJECT
Aerosente offers a full line of balsa wood gliders and sailplanes starting with our simple hand toss gliders and culminating with our vintage and classic scale sailplanes. We carefully selected our gliders and sailplanes in stepping stone fashion - from simple to complex, and from easy to fly to most challenging. Most of our models are kitted by Thomas Martin of TMRC who is well known for his adaptation of classic and vintage sailplanes. We sell most of Tom's kits, plans, and fine art prints here at the Aerosente Glider Workshop. Tom also provides front line support for our customer community and his expert commentary on vintage and classic sailplanes is available daily on Tom Martin's Flightline.
Building and flying balsa wood gliders is a great father/son activity. With
Facebook, Youtube, MTV, Madden 2008 and iPhones monopolizing the time
and imagination of our young boys - it's really quite refreshing to
consider a hobby that teaches boys how to build something with their
own hands. A hobby that allows them to work with hand tools, even sharp
tools, adhesives and abrasives. A hobby that allows a father to begin
teaching his small son about the important things in life. There is enough here to keep dads and sons occupied for many years to
come. We even offer a 108" scale Pawnee gas powered tow plane to to tow
your glider! Talk about the ultimate father son project - your boy
flying the tow plane while you pilot the classic gull wing sailplane.
Dads... it doesn’t get any better than that.
I say this because I have fond memories teaching my son how to build and fly gliders. From dime store "chuck gliders" to exotic carbon/kevlar discus launched gliders, I have many treasured moments of early morning flying sessions and late night builds with my son - now a college senior studying mechanical engineering. Our Thermic Series of hand toss gliders are great starters for young boy and their dads! Start your journey today.
ADVICE FOR THE NOVICE BUILDER
If this is your first venture into building and flying gliders I have a very simple piece of advice. Keep it simple. Stay away from the gaudy plastic and foam planes advertised on TV and sold in many hobby shops - most of them made in China. They're cheap kits that end up scaring away more folks than they attract. The problem with these planes like many toys these days, is that they use maximum bright and shiny stuff to attract the child, a price point low enough to attract the parent, and a product bad enough that it rarely survives the first couple of outings.
I like basic balsa wood gliders because they are fun and cheap to build. The building part is important because it teaches your son how to follow instructions, read a plan, and work with tools. Balsa is pretty forgiving so if they make a mistake it's never fatal. Once you've built the glider they provide hours of sport and entertainment. If you break something - take it home and repair it yourself. You can build a new wing, repair a crack in the fuselage, or whatever needs fixing yourself - which is one of those small but important lessons every boy needs to learn.
The other thing about balsa is the simple amazement that comes from taking a stack of flimsy wood and building something that actually flies - watch the look on your son's face as he tosses his glider for the first time! To get started I'd suggested buying a couple of Thermics. Build them with your son - fly them, break them, fix them - repeat many times. Once you've got the hand toss gliders mastered move up to the Baker McMillen Cadet. With this model you'll master basic building and covering techniques, and the resulting model is really cool to fly - this is a tow line glider which means your son can tow it into the air like he would a kite. From the Cadet move on to the Thermic 50 or 70. These are classic balsa build-up gliders that will continue to hone your build skills and allow you to begin working with basic radio control components. After completing a Thermic 50 or 70 you're now ready to move on to the really really cool stuff - scale classic and vintage gliders.
I have been building and flying gliders since I was a kid. For me it started with a 10 cent balsa wood glider tossed off the top of a sand dune. They were cheap, disposable planes - we always bought a bunch of them on vacation just for the dunes. We'd toss the gliders off the top of the dunes then run down to the bottom and fetch the planes back up to the top. Each time seeing who could get the longest flight. But one time my plane didn't come down. It kept going up, and up. Like magic I watched in awe, eyes skyward, jaw agape as the little plane slowly kept circling up, and eventually out of sight. I was hooked.
Over the next 20 years I would build a small fleet of balsa wood "build-ups" - Oly II's and Gentle Ladys that were launched into midwest summer skies. I enjoyed building them. I enjoyed flying them. Nothing fancy. Two channel radios controlling rudder and elevator. Moving to the west coast in the late 90's opened a new form of gliding for me. Slope soaring. Combat foamies like the Zagi and 60" and 80'" composite crafts were now a passion. Most importantly, I was now able to share my hobby with my young son who was soon building and flying his own fleet of slope gliders.
There was a problem though. Speed. Slope gliders moved. And the guys flying them were good. Really good. See I could build them. I could launch them. I could fly them ok, but I had trouble landing them. Especially on some of the rock outcroppings that constitute many of our better slope sites in Northern California. So I was up to my elbows in aircraft carnage. And I found that I missed the simple art of gliding. Especially the feeling you get when you take a stack of balsa wood and build a glider with a 3 meter wing span.
I hope you bookmark our web site and return back often!
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KLINGBERG 100" FLYING WING SAILPLANE Kit
do you sill make them
Posted by: Dale | September 12, 2009 at 09:00 PM