The Vanishing Art of Building and Flying Hand Launched Gliders (HLG) and Catapult Launched Gliders (CLG)

In the good old days, the Chuck Glider was the very first item built when starting to build and fly model aeroplanes, thereby acquiering  at least the basic knowledge required for constructing the models there after.

With the advancement of technology, new and very effecient equipment relating to model flying started flowing into the market, resulting in a big boom in the hobby of model flying.

Unfortunately the wonderful art of building models , started fading away due to the ARF Models (almost ready to fly) being introduced. Building a model out of a balsa kit, glueing the parts together on top of a plan, covering it with tissue, doping the model after covering is now very rearly heard of. Nowadays no one talks about the Angle of Attack, Dihedral Angle, Down Thrust, Side Thrust, Wash in, Wash Out   etc.     

The aim of this series of articles is to bring back my memories of building and flying those magnificient gliders, in to our younger generation. With my fourty years experience in model flying I still consider building and flying hand launched gliders or catapult launched gliders as a challenge to any one. You will be amazed to realise that how much knowledge and devotion is needed to get one of those flying perfectly. And once you achieve that status you will be enjoying flying chuck gliders as much as you enjoy flying our sophisticated R/C models.

The plans for the construction of the following model was obtained from the Internet.

I must say that I really enjoyed buiding every bit of this tiny model. As I previosly mentioned, getting "Tiny" flying perfectly  was definitely a CHALLENGE. 

WARNING !!!!!.......  DO NOT ATTEMPT TO FLY THIS MODDEL IN A SMALL FIELD.

 Have Fun! Happy Gliding!

Edward Perera.