The Politechnika Warszawska PW-4 Pelikan was a

motor-glider A motor glider is a fixed-wing aircraft that can be flown with or without engine power. The FAI Gliding Commission Sporting Code definition is: a fixed-wing aerodyne equipped with a means of propulsion (MoP), capable of sustained soaring flight ...

variant of the two seat

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...

PW-3 Bakcyl glider. Only one flew.

Design and development

The Pelikan's structure and general layout was based on that of the PW-3 Bakcyl trainer glider. Both had fibreglass-

epoxy Epoxy is the family of basic components or cured end products of epoxy resins. Epoxy resins, also known as polyepoxides, are a class of reactive prepolymers and polymers which contain epoxide groups. The epoxide functional group is also coll ...

structures, with a

high wing A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing confi ...

, a tailboom with a conventional tail and a forward fuselage with two seats in tandem under a long canopy. Their differences stemmed from the

pusher engine A bank engine (United Kingdom/Australia) (colloquially a banker), banking engine, helper engine or pusher engine (North America) is a railway locomotive that temporarily assists a train that requires additional power or traction to climb a grad ...

and its

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 ...

, together with new

landing gear Landing gear is the undercarriage of an aircraft or spacecraft that is used for takeoff or landing. For aircraft it is generally needed for both. It was also formerly called ''alighting gear'' by some manufacturers, such as the Glenn L. Martin ...

to enable self-powered take-offs. Both aircraft had two-part wings built around a single spar with a glassfibre-covered D-box ahead of it and fabric covering behind. Unlike the Bakcyl, no forward sweep was necessary because the weight of the engine moved the

centre of gravity In physics, the center of mass of a distribution of mass in space (sometimes referred to as the balance point) is the unique point where the weighted relative position of the distributed mass sums to zero. This is the point to which a force may ...

rearwards to the passenger's seat, allowing the Pelikan to be flown with that seat occupied or empty, so the central section of the wing was rectangular in plan and the long tips straight-tapered on both

leading In typography, leading ( ) is the space between adjacent lines of type; the exact definition varies. In hand typesetting, leading is the thin strips of lead (or aluminium) that were inserted between lines of type in the composing stick to incre ...

and trailing edges. As on the Bakcyl, ailerons were on the outer sections and spoilers inboard, just behind the spars. The wings were braced from the lower fuselage with a single, faired strut to the spar on each side. Forward of the wing the two aircraft were similar but the pod of the Pelikan ended ahead of the trailing edge of the wing. Its flat four, air-cooled,

Limbach L2000 The Limbach L2000 is a series of German piston aero-engines designed and built by Limbach Flugmotoren. They are four-cylinder, four-stroke, air-cooled horizontally opposed, piston engines with a power output of . Variants ;L2000 DA :Certified ...

engine was mounted on the wing and drove a pusher propeller, requiring the slender, rounded tailboom to be lowered from the wing, on the Bakcyl, to the bottom of the pod. The tail was similar to that of the Bakcyl, with a tall, broad

fin A fin is a thin component or appendage attached to a larger body or structure. Fins typically function as foils that produce lift or thrust, or provide the ability to steer or stabilize motion while traveling in water, air, or other fluids. Fin ...

and smaller, fabric covered

rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, aircraft, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (generally aircraft, air or watercraft, water). On an aircraft the rudder is used primarily to ...

, together trapezoidal in profile, and a smaller, low set, fin-mounted, rectangular plan horizontal tail at the extreme end of the tailboom, its one-piece

elevator An elevator or lift is a wire rope, cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or deck (building), decks of a building, watercraft, ...

aft of the rudder. The Pelikan had fixed

tricycle gear Tricycle gear is a type of aircraft undercarriage, or ''landing gear'', arranged in a tricycle fashion. The tricycle arrangement has a single nose wheel in the front, and two or more main wheels slightly aft of the center of gravity. Tricycle g ...

with mainwheels, equipped with brakes, on arched, cantilever, fibreglass-epoxy/spring legs from the lower fuselage (though one photograph shows an additional drag strut) and a smaller, steerable nosewheel. Two airframes were built but only one flew, with the other used for stress-testing. The first flight was on 23 December 1990.

Operational history

A very long series of testing followed, only concluding on 29 July 1995. It was decided that the Pelikan would not sell well, so no more were built. The prototype was operated by the Institute of Aeronautics and Applied Mechanics of Warsaw University of Technology. It displayed at the 16th Meeting of Amateur Aviation Structures in Oleśnica in June 1997 and remained active until seriously damaged in an accident on 11 November 2012. In that period it logged 800 hours of flight. It never flew again but was restored to display condition by 2015 and can be seen in the Polish Aviation Museum,

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Specifications

References

{{reflist, refs= {{cite book , title= Jane's All the World's Aircraft 1990-1991, last= Lambert , first=M. , year=1990, publisher= Jane's Information Group, location= London, isbn=07106 0908 6, pages=644–5 {{cite web , url=http://www.samolotypolskie.pl/samoloty/2166/126/PW-4-Pelikan2 , title=PW-4 Pelikan, 1990 , access-date=8 December 2019 {{cite web , url=http://www.piotrp.de/SZYBOWCE/ppw4.htm, title=PW-4 Pelikan, access-date=8 December 2019 {{cite web , url=http://muzeumlotnictwa.pl/zbiory_sz.php?ido=312&w=p, title=PW-4 Pelikan, access-date=10 December 2019 Single-engined pusher aircraft Motor gliders Aircraft first flown in 1990 1990s Polish ultralight aircraft High-wing aircraft