The Brditschka HB-3, HB-21 and HB-23 are a family of
motor gliders of unorthodox configuration developed in
Austria in the early 1970s.
Design and development
The unusual design was based on work done by
Fritz Raab in
Germany in the 1960s. The pilot and passengers sit in a
fuselage pod with the
engine and
propeller
A propeller (colloquially often called a screw if on a ship or an airscrew if on an aircraft) is a device with a rotating hub and radiating blades that are set at a pitch to form a helical spiral which, when rotated, exerts linear thrust upon ...
behind them. The pod also carries the fixed tricycle
undercarriage
Undercarriage is the part of a moving vehicle that is underneath the main body of the vehicle. The term originally applied to this part of a horse-drawn carriage, and usage has since broadened to include:
*The landing gear of an aircraft.
*The ch ...
and the high
cantilever wing. The tail is carried on a pair of booms that emerge from the top and bottom of the fuselage pod, the upper of which passes through the propeller hub. The HB-21 has a conventional
tail and has two seats in tandem accessed by a sidewards-hinged
canopy, while the HB-23 has a
T-tail and side-by-side seating accessed via gull-wing doors in the canopy.
The Militky MB-E1 was a modified HB-3 with an 8-10 kW (11-13 hp) Bosch KM77 electric motor. It was the first full-sized, manned aircraft to be solely electrically powered. Flights of 12 minutes duration at up to an altitude of were just within the Ni-Cd battery's capacity. Its first flight was on 23 October 1973.
[Taylor 1974 p.573]
Variants
;Brditschka HB-3:Single seat powered sailplane, powered by Rotax 642 engine, wingspan.
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 21:Tandem two-seat derivative of HB-3 with longer span () wings.
[Taylor 1976, p. 549.]
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 B:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 V1:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 V2:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 SP:
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 Scanliner: Observation version of HB-23 with bubble canopy and provision to carry
FLIR or
LLTV
The Bell Aerosystems Lunar Landing Research Vehicle (LLRV, nicknamed the Flying Bedstead) was a Project Apollo era program to build a simulator for the Moon landings. The LLRVs were used by the FRC, now known as the NASA Armstrong Flight Resea ...
pods under the wings.
;HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 V2:
;Militky MB-E1: electrically powered version.
Specifications (HB-23/2400 Hobbyliner)
See also
References
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External links
fsg-grimming.atwww.lokh.at - HB23 Daten
{{HB-Flugtechnik aircraft
1970s Austrian sailplanes
HB-3
High-wing aircraft
Mid-engined aircraft
Single-engined pusher aircraft
Motor gliders
Aircraft first flown in 1971