Hi Robert, Why are you saying the AOA would be so small? There shouldn't be anything to stop the pilot from raising the nose and increasing the AOA, as far as I see it. Do sailplanes have a "best climb" speed? I thought that was for powered airplanes only, as a compromise between engine power, lift, and drag. AFAIK, a sailplane cannot perform a sustained climb relative to the air around it, so technically there is no such thing as a sustained climb for a sailplane. A thermal just means that the air around the sailplane is rising faster than the sailplane is falling in it. Sean At 09:57 AM 1/28/2003 -0700, you wrote: >From: "Benjamin Bromilow" > > A sailplane at 200mph??? > > Whats the max speed on most sailplanes?? > > I would have thought most would not enjoy 200mph for very long.... > >Nope, they wouldn't. Most of them won't do more than 150. With the fairly >negligable thrust produced by a pulsejet standing still, it would be >necessary to launch them with a winch or auto tow. Also, most sailplanes >spend the majority of their time thermalling at speeds from 50-60 mph. >I'm not sure if a sailplane flying at 150 would climb at all, either, both >because best climb speed is usually near 60 mph and because the angle of >attack would be so low at that speed that the sailplane would be dropping >like a rock already and hardly producing any lift. With the pulse jet, it >might be able to maintain altitude, but I doubt it would be able to climb. > >-- >http://www.piclist.com hint: The list server can filter out subtopics >(like ads or off topics) for you. See http://www.piclist.com/#topics -- http://www.piclist.com hint: The list server can filter out subtopics (like ads or off topics) for you. See http://www.piclist.com/#topics