Gerhard Waibel (engineer)
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Gerhard Waibel (engineer)
Gerhard Waibel (born 3 October 1938) is a designer of gliders who worked for Alexander Schleicher GmbH & Co producing many famous designs. Biography Waibel was born in Frankfurt. His father Karl Waibel had worked with Wolf Hirth in the 1920s. Gerhard began flying models in 1948. In 1951 he helped with building the SG38. He then studied at Akaflieg Darmstadt. In 1962 Gerhard's father arranged a practical course in a steel plant in Sheffield Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties o ... for him and Wolf Lemke. In the evenings they started designing the D-36 ''Circe''. After much development back in Germany, Waibel flew the D-36 to victory in the Open Class of the German Championships in 1964. Waibel joined Schleicher in 1964. His first design, the ASW 12, was based on ...
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Gerhard Waibel Flygplanskonstruktör
Gerhard is a name of Germanic origin and may refer to: Given name * Gerhard (bishop of Passau) (fl. 932–946), German prelate * Gerhard III, Count of Holstein-Rendsburg (1292–1340), German prince, regent of Denmark * Gerhard Barkhorn (1919–1983), German World War II flying ace * Gerhard Berger (born 1959), Austrian racing driver * Gerhard Boldt (1918–1981), German soldier and writer * Gerhard de Beer (born 1994), South African football player * Gerhard Diephuis (1817–1892), Dutch jurist * Gerhard Domagk (1895–1964), German pathologist and bacteriologist and Nobel Laureate * Gerhard Dorn (c.1530–1584), Flemish philosopher, translator, alchemist, physician and bibliophile * Gerhard Ertl (born 1936), German physicist and Nobel Laureate * Gerhard Fieseler (1896–1987), German World War I flying ace * Gerhard Flesch (1909–1948), German Nazi Gestapo and SS officer executed for war crimes * Gerhard Gentzen (1909–1945), German mathematician and logician * Gerhard Armauer H ...
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Glider (sailplane)
A glider or sailplane is a type of glider aircraft used in the leisure activity and sport of gliding (also called soaring). This unpowered aircraft can use naturally occurring currents of rising air in the atmosphere to gain altitude. Sailplanes are aerodynamically streamlined and so can fly a significant distance forward for a small decrease in altitude. In North America the term 'sailplane' is also used to describe this type of aircraft. In other parts of the English-speaking world, the word 'glider' is more common. Types Gliders benefit from producing the least drag for any given amount of lift, and this is best achieved with long, thin wings, a slender fuselage and smooth surfaces with an absence of protuberances. Aircraft with these features are able to soar – climb efficiently in rising air produced by thermals or hills. In still air, sailplanes can glide long distances at high speed with a minimum loss of height in between. Sailplanes have rigid wings and eithe ...
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Alexander Schleicher GmbH & Co
Alexander Schleicher GmbH & Co is a major manufacturer of sailplanes located in Poppenhausen, near Fulda in Germany. It is also the oldest sailplane manufacturer in the world. History The company was founded in 1927 by Alexander Schleicher using money that he had won as a pilot in a gliding competition. It grew quickly in size and fame, producing many notable designs including the ''Anfänger ("Beginner")'', ''Zögling ("Student")'', ''Professor'', ''Mannheim'', and the ''Stadt Frankfurt (City of Frankfurt)''. Meanwhile, the aircraft produced under contract by the company continued to grow in size and complexity, reaching their pinnacle with the ''DFS Rhönadler (Rhön eagle)'' and '' DFS Rhönbussard (Rhön buzzard)'' designed by Hans Jacobs, and a huge, three-seat experimental glider built from a design by Alexander Lippisch for the ''Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Segelflug'' (DFS - German Research Institute for Sailplane Flight). Production during WW2 By the time war ...
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Frankfurt
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its namesake Main River, it forms a continuous conurbation with the neighboring city of Offenbach am Main and its urban area has a population of over 2.3 million. The city is the heart of the larger Rhine-Main metropolitan region, which has a population of more than 5.6 million and is Germany's second-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr region. Frankfurt's central business district, the Bankenviertel, lies about northwest of the geographic center of the EU at Gadheim, Lower Franconia. Like France and Franconia, the city is named after the Franks. Frankfurt is the largest city in the Rhine Franconian dialect area. Frankfurt was a city state, the Free City of Frankfurt, for nearly five centuries, and was one of the most import ...
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Wolf Hirth
Wolfram Kurt Erhard Hirth (28 February 1900 – 25 July 1959) was a German gliding pioneer and sailplane designer. He was a co-founder of Schempp-Hirth, still a renowned glider manufacturer.Segelflugbildkalendar 2011 Hirth was born in Stuttgart, the son of an engineer and tool-maker. He was the younger brother of Hellmuth, who founded the famous Hirth aircraft engine manufacturing company. Early years As a young man, Hirth took up gliding and was soon drawn to the Wasserkuppe, then the focus of the German gliding movement, earning his pilot's licence in 1920. In 1924, Hirth lost a leg after a motorcycle accident. From then on, he would fly while wearing a wooden prosthesis. He had the fibula from his amputated leg fashioned into a cigarette holder In 1928, he graduated from the Technical University of Stuttgart with a diploma in engineering and began to focus on aircraft construction. Over the next decade, he would also tour the world, promoting gliding throughout Europe, the Un ...
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Akaflieg
Akaflieg is an abbreviation for ''Akademische Fliegergruppe'', groups of aeronautical engineering students from individual German Technical Universities, pre and postwar, who design aircraft, often gliders. History Otto Lilienthal published his book ''Der Vogelflug als Grundlage der Fliegekunst (Birdflight as the Basis of Aviation)'' in 1889. This described the basics of modern aerodynamics and aircraft construction. Lilienthal then made many successful flights starting in 1891. However attention then shifted to powered flight after World War I. Gliding re-emerged as a sport after the war because the building of powered aircraft was restricted in Germany by the Treaty of Versailles. The main originator of the gliding movement was Oskar Ursinus, who in 1920 organised the first contest, known as the Rhön-Contest, on the Wasserkuppe. Thereafter the contest was held annually. Students of technical universities brought gliders which they had developed and built themselves for test ...
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Darmstadt
Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it the fourth largest city in the state of Hesse after Frankfurt am Main, Wiesbaden, and Kassel. Darmstadt holds the official title "City of Science" (german: link=no, Wissenschaftsstadt) as it is a major centre of scientific institutions, universities, and high-technology companies. The European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) and the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) are located in Darmstadt, as well as Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung, GSI Centre for Heavy Ion Research, where several chemical elements such as bohrium (1981), meitnerium (1982), hassium (1984), darmstadtium (1994), roentgenium (1994), and copernicium (1996) were discovered. The existence of the following elements were also ...
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Sheffield
Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties of England, historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its southern suburbs were transferred from Derbyshire to the city council. It is the largest settlement in South Yorkshire. The city is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines and the valleys of the River Don, Yorkshire, River Don with its four tributaries: the River Loxley, Loxley, the Porter Brook, the River Rivelin, Rivelin and the River Sheaf, Sheaf. Sixty-one per cent of Sheffield's entire area is green space and a third of the city lies within the Peak District national park. There are more than 250 parks, woodlands and gardens in the city, which is estimated to contain around 4.5 million trees. The city is south of Leeds, east of Manchester, and north ...
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Wolf Lemke
Wolf Lemke is a designer of gliders who worked for Rolladen Schneider and after it was taken over in 2003, for DG Flugzeugbau GmbH. He was one of the student members of the Akaflieg Darmstadt who designed the revolutionary D-36 "Circe" in the period 1962 to 1964. This team also included Heiko Fries, Klaus Holighaus and Gerhard Waibel. While the members of the Akaflieg built the D-36 (V1), a common friend of the students – Walter Schneider – built a second D-36 (V2) in his shutters factory. Walter Schneider almost killed himself in it when he took a winch launch with a disconnected elevator but he parachuted to safety. Soon after the success of the D-36 Walter Schneider asked Wolf Lemke to design and build gliders professionally in his shutters factory – which then became a glider manufacturer as well. His most significant design was the LS 1 which he first flew in May 1967. It was built by Walter Schneider, at first under the name Segelflugzeugbau Schneider OHG, but lat ...
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Akaflieg Darmstadt D-36
The Akaflieg Darmstadt D-36 Circe is a single seat, high performance sailplane designed and built in Germany in the mid-1960s, one of the early "glass ships". It was the winner at the German National Championships in 1964 and came second in the World Championships the following year. Design and development The Akademische Fliegergruppe of the Technical University of Darmstadt ( Akaflieg Darmstadt) was first formed in 1921. It was, and is, a group of aeronautical students who design and construct aircraft as part of their studies and with the help and encouragement of their University. Design work on the Circe began in 1962-3 by a team of students, Wolf Lemke (responsible for the wing), Gerhard Waibel (fuselage and tail) and Heiko Friess (airbrakes). They were later joined by the younger Klaus Holighaus. Professor Franz Wortmann designed a new airfoil for the Circe. Construction began in 1963 and the aircraft flew for the first time, piloted by Wolf Lemke, on 28 March 1964 at ...
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Schleicher ASW 12
The ASW 12, initially known as the AS 12, is a single-seat Sailplane of glass composite construction. The wing is shoulder mounted and it has a T-tail. It is essentially a developed production version of the Akaflieg Darmstadt D-36. History In 1965 Gerhard Waibel left the Technical University of Darmstadt to enter Alexander Schleicher GmbH & Co as a designer. His first project for his new employer was the ASW 12. This sailplane achieved numerous records and victories in national and international competitions. The exploits of Hans-Werner Grosse in an ASW 12 are legendary, e.g. the 1,461 km flight of April 25, 1972 from Lübeck to Biarritz which stood for thirty years as the absolute World Free Distance Record. Previously, on July 26, 1970, Ben Greene and Wally Scott co-set a World Free Distance Record by flying separate ASW-12 sailplanes a distance of from Odessa, TX to Columbus, NE. The ASW12 was succeeded by the ASW17. Construction The fuselage of the ASW 12 was ...
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Schleicher ASW 28
The ASW 28 is a Standard Class glider with a fifteen-metre span Span may refer to: Science, technology and engineering * Span (unit), the width of a human hand * Span (engineering), a section between two intermediate supports * Wingspan, the distance between the wingtips of a bird or aircraft * Sorbitan ester ... built of modern fibre reinforced composites. The manufacturer of the ASW-28 is Alexander Schleicher GmbH & Co. The 'W' indicates this is a design of the influential and prolific German designer Gerhard Waibel (engineer), Gerhard Waibel. Serial production started in 2000. Design and development The ASW 28 is a single-seat shoulder-winged composite construction sailplane with a T-shaped horizontal tailplane and 15 metre wingspan. The upper wing surface has Schempp-Hirth airbrakes. As all Standard Class sailplanes, the ASW-28 does not have Flap (aircraft), flaps or other lift-enhancing devices. It has tall Wingtip device, winglets, a retractable Landing gear, underca ...
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