People with an interest in commercial aviation might congregate at Farnborough, near London, every year and friends of military aviation at Le Bourget, near Paris, but sports aviation enthusiasts meet regularly at Friedrichshafen in southern Germany.
AERO TRADE By Bernard Eckey
This lovely city is situated on the shores of Lake Constance and has long been the host of the AERO trade fair. Hobby aviators from around the world make a bee line to Friedrichshafen to keep up to date with the latest developments and look at everything from paragliders to ultralights, and from radio controlled models to small business jets. In the past, the show was staged every two years but some time ago, the organisers elected to hold it every year. All major glider manufacturers felt that the cost burden was far too high and decided to exhibit at AERO only at the original two year interval. Here is a short review of new and interesting products on offer this year. Lange Aviation seems to have recovered from their financial woes and introduced their electrically powered Antares with 23 metre wingspan for the first time at Friedrichshafen. They also exhibited their original 20 metre model but with a two-stroke sustainer engine. Schempp Hirth had the new Arcus in two different
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versions on display, as well as a very early prototype of the open class Quintus. It is clearly not ready for prying eyes and was therefore suspended under the ceiling. Obviously the Antares and Quintus wings come from the same mould, but in typical Schempp Hirth fashion, the Quintus will get a kinked-up wingtip. Schleicher displayed three of their latest models. Next to their ASG 29 best seller, they exhibited the ASH 31 self-launcher with 18/21 metre wingspan. Their new open class two-seater ASH 30 Mi proved by far to be the biggest crowd pleaser and was constantly surrounded by glider pilots from around the globe. Diamond Aircraft surprised everyone with a tail dragger version of the Super Dimona motor glider. This year DG had by far the smallest display of all glider manufacturers and was only showing the fuselage of an electrically powered sustainer version of the DG 1000. The two-stroke engine of the DG 1000 M was displayed on a trestle. Even the trailer manufacturers Komet, Cobra and Avionic were present. All of them had their latest trailer versions on display, but Komet was showing their new rapid stabilisation system and
