Micro light powered sailplane

This is my powered sailplane I finished building after 4 years work and first flew in 2001. At first flight 'Alnair' was really a pure sailplane with a small 5 hp. Zenoah spinning a 28" prop at the back of the pilot pod. It was hoped the engine would be a sustainer but alas it would not quite keep her at altitude. Did extend the glide a bit though! Swapped 5 out for a 10 hp powerbee with same prop and on cooler days that setup would allow self launch and true sustain though climb was very slow and all in all the setup proved unreliable. Then in 2003 I placed the engine in the port wing root and belt reduced to the 64" two blade folding powerfin prop out on port wing only as you see in the photo. The system worked moderately well but the weights I incurred in the implementation of the design were considerable. Went from U/L to Experimental. Received N number in Nov. of 2003 and made her maiden flight as experimental Feb. 17, 2004. This is photo taken on power off landing that first flight. Flight climb was in the neighborhood of 400' per minute and I flew at power for about 10 minutes to see what she would do. All control seemed fine excepting small right turning tendency to counter and seemed smooth enough overall but alas my power suffered with altitude and I could climb no higher than about 1000 agl. So I shut down and just soared there on that still winter morning for another 5 minutes. Was only sinking at about 100 ft. per minute at 40 mph and lined up for landing pictured. Prop is not folded as it was windmilling slowly due to not having yet installed a hub brake on it. Blades were power swung opened so if spinning would remain open. All in all a very gratifying moment after so many flight attempts with the other engine/prop ideas.... some successful some not soooo.!

Abandoning the assymetric thrust and going to something more powerful and quasi conventional. Will report the results in the near future.

Thanks for looking at my project and hope your flying dreams come true.

G. Malm:ban: