News

Repainting the fs25

We have good news regarding the fs25. A few months ago, we told you that the fuselage of the fs25 is to be repainted. Now we can show you the progress we’ve made. After hours of work, we finally got the fuselage ready for repainting. We then brought it to Heubach, where it would at…
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Progress on fs35 Flight Testing

Last week we told you that flight testing on the fs35 was to resume shortly. Now, we can tell you a bit about the progress we’ve made so far. We’ve worked on two separate fields: crosswind test and airspeed indicator calibration. In a crosswind test, the airplane is flown with crosswinds up to a certain…
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The fs35 Takes to the Skies Again

Last Friday, after a long winter break, the fs35 finally took off again. Just as during its first flight, our little harpy impressed us with its stunning flight performance. This is the first time that the fs35 flew after its ferry flight from Schwäbisch Hall back in September and it is also the first time…
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Progress on FEM Calculations for the fs36

Even though we still aren’t allowed to hang around our workshop, we’re still working intensively on our fs36 project. One section that had a lot of work put into it were the interface between strength verification and load calculation, along with the FEM model. These will be explained in more detail here. In the past…
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Progress on the Winter Maintenance – G109

Last season, our G109 finally hit 3000 flying hours and thus, it requires a service life extension program. To this end, we started a crowdfunding campaign for the overhaul of our G109, during which we earned more than 3500€. We would like to heartily thank all those who donated. The G109 is getting a new…
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Progress on the Winter Maintenance – fs25

The fs25 is our oldest still flying prototype and of course, we wouldn’t forget about or old girl. This year, the fs25 is going to get a new coat of paint! To this end, we spent hours sanding off the old layers of paint. Since we found one or two damaged areas, we also took…
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Progress on the Winter Maintenance – Twin III

This time around, we decided to mount detachable canards onto our Twin III. This would allow heavier pilots to spin the sailplane better, which in turn lets more pilots do spin practices on the Twin. Besides that we also did the usual winter maintenance work, and the plane got new brake pads and a new…
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Impacts of the Corona-Pandemic on our activities

Dear friends and supporters, the Akaflieg Stuttgart is affected by the measures to combat the Corona-Pandemic too. Therefore the University of Stuttgart decided to close the premises of the Akaflieg until further notice. We also postponed the beginning of our flying season 2020. This means that there is currently no one in the Akaflieg workshop…
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Operation of the fs36’s Flaps

Our newest project, the fs36, will be a fly-by-wire sailplane with Fowler flaps, an idea first attempted by the Akaflieg Stuttgart with the fs34 Albatross. Generally, sailplanes with a variable wing area are designed to achieve an advantage in thermalling by increasing their wing area, while during high speed flight, the flaps are raised, giving…
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Numerical Analysis of Wing-Fuselage Joints for the fs36

Just last summer, Caroline, as part of her Bachelor thesis, ran some tests on a reference configuration of a wing-fuselage joint for the fs36. Said configuration didn’t use any specially designed joint. A CAD model for the joint with the flaps raised and lowered respectively were created. Nets were generated and both Euler and RANS…
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