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In the future


matt_k

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Whats stopping wings being inflated like a kitesurf, ?

Perhaps the consequences of a small puncture, that you don't notice until an hour into an XC at a few thousand feet ..... :shock:

Having a wing that can collapse is actually a good safety feature. There will continue to be small improvements to performance (mainly by reducing drag) and Ozone have produced a single skin wing, but each advance always comes with some drawbacks - unsheathed lines, 3 (or 2) liners and plastic inserts in the leading edge all tend to make collapses more dynamic and recovery more 'interesting' ....

Maybe something new will come out, but if not I'm quite happy with whats currently available - as I've not yet reached the limit of what the Nucleon can do ..... :wink:

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Where can you see wing design going over the next decade even over the next couple of years!

I have only been flying for a couple of years and seen some changes

Non woven fabrication- moisture resistant wings, with CNC welded seams. (Patent applied :? )

If the production/manufacture processes are right, should be a fraction of the cost of current wings.

GD

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During the Coupe Icare, which took place in St Hilaire, France, Mathieu Rouanet tried paramotoring with Ozone's single surface paraglider the XXLite. The wing has no bottom surface, weighs only 1.35kg and is at the moment purely a concept wing.

When asked how it was to fly, Mathieu said "It's super easy to launch and I was surprised at the amount of lift it produced, especially as we are at nearly 1000m above sea level here."

As far as I can see from the pix, it has an inflatable leading edge.

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The Ozone XX-Lite does not have an inflatable leading edge, but does have "special" handling characteristics according to the brave test pilots ... :lol:

A fully inflatable wing has been flown at the Coupe Icaire:

download.php?id=9670

and there are others in production such as the Woopy Fly : http://fly.woopyjump.com/index.php/fr/media.html

For paragliding / motoring the biggest problem is that a semi of fully rigid (inflatable) wing becomes lethal if it enters a negative angle of attack .... instead of simply collapsing and re-opening. Second problem is adjusting the internal pressure with altitude, so some sort of compressor would need to be carried.

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this is almost a reconstruction of another post on this forum......... :?

so I will say it again I asked nearly 10 years ago this question to a leading paraglider producer ago

Why dont paragliders have a inflatable leading edge as to me (not having a clue at that stage anything about the dark art of paragliding) it just seemed a good idea .....to cut a long story short I was laughed at and told it wouldnt work as it would make the wing far to dynamic when all goes wrong and it would be totally uncontrolable .........if it collapsed :( my responce was that if it has a inflatable edge it might not collapse in the first place :P .........I was rather rudely ignored and he went away to somebody who was waving a fiver at him (big money in those days) .....and yet here we go somebody has actually made a wing with a inflatable leading edge ...............Have I got a vision of the future :shock:

:lol: if so watch this space as solid wings and helium inflated wings or at least parts of the wings will become helium inflated so we can all take off without ever having a failed takeoff again :coptor:

For I have seen the Future :idea:

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When I had my Carbon company, we were commissioned to produce a 'Wing' made with a single layer of Carbon and some special resin which had a tiny rubber nozzle which was to be filled with Helium for a Porsche GT3 !!

It never took off LOL

SW :D

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