VGC News/Newsletters - Lakes Gliding Club

In October 1997 a highlight was two flights made at
Booker airfield in the presence of Roy Scott and VGC Presi·
dent, Chris Wills, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of her first
flight at Balado with Donalcl CampbeU so many years ago. In
the tradition of Ken Fripp, who was happy to aUow other
pilots to experience the joys of flying the Htitter for the sheer
fun of flying an unusual vintage gMer; some thir'ty different
pilots have also had the opportunity during this time to share
the same delightful experience notching up an average flight
time of almost 30 mil1utes from both aerotow and winch
launches. The Hutter has I'ecently enjoyed the longest flights
of her life climbing from the winch to over 6,000 feet and
stay,ing up nearly three hours using thermals over flat countryside
- a far cry from the Austrian Alps and not bad for a
diminutive open cockpit glider with a glide angle of only 17 to
I ! Nick Newloll January 2000
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A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE PROTOTYPE KADETT
GLIDER AS BUILT BY SLINGSBY SAILPLANES IN
1935-36 RELATED BY HAROLD HOLDSWORTH in
November 1994 (just before the death of John Sproule.)
The history, data, performance and "what might have been" of
that machine has been disputed at length; the designer, Mr.
John S. Sproll'le, and I are still friends bUI still cannot agree,
neither can convince the other.
The basic idea w.as to build a machine for the stage of
glider training between the open primary and the far more
advanced machines like the German Professor or English
Cloudcraft Phantom but nobody succeeded!! The nearest was
the German Falke but i,t was far too expensive and had too
limited a view during a l:lanked turn. Eventually, after World
War 11 when the use of winch and aeroplane towing had
become routine and relalively safe., dual instruction in two seat
machines became the nonn.
The Prototype Kadent was built at great speed in late 1935
at Slingsby's on the next bench to th~ one occupied by myself
as a guest rebuilding a Hols der Teufel which we in the Yorshire
Club had built ourselves during 1932-1933-
When the Kadett was ready for test flight, Fred Slingsby was
confined to bed with severe influenza or history might have
been different. The first two circuit flights, launched by winch,
were carried out by its designer, JohJ! S Sproule at the Yorkshire
Gliding Club in calm smooth winter air, very late 1935,
exact date unknown. John reported that the machine felt
"queer' in the air, .as if it was about to stall, so no further flying
was attempted, but the Kadett returned to the works at Kirbymoorside
where the works diagnosis was tailplane trimming
needed, which was speedily carried out. Test flying was then
carried out at Major Shaw's private landing ground at
We'lburn, where I was invited to take part, partly for flying but
basically to be winch driver on Fred Slingsby's private winch,
an American straight eight c~linder Auburan car converted
with drum and rollers which, unfortunately, had wire spoked
wheels which made accurate positioning of the drum very difficult.
In fact it was slightly OFF centre which made the winch
tow a series of rugs and not very pleasant. I was also to instruct
Slingsby's driver, a Mr. Pittaway, on the basics of winch
driving, Set up the winch with back to wind, pull out cab'le
steadil.y to avoid tangle On the given signals, engage top gear,
tighten cable gently and then full power and adjust speed as
the glider climbs and the cable builds up on the drum. The
latter part and adjusting for wind speed and different g'lider
stalling speed was lost on Pittaway, he simply tightened .rhe
cable and then kept his foot hard down, but still, it was none
of my business.
I have a log entry for my two winch circuits at WelbufR. the
first cable slipped off, duration 30 seconds; second fl,ight
height 400 ft. duration one minute. The machine did not have
any instruments at all but appeared to be a bit faster than the
Falcon I. I did not attempt any stalling tests; in the flat calm
Winter air of4.1.36 the controls were barely needed but something
surprised me, when about to flare out for landing, the
Kadett changed direction without any movement of the controls.
A more experienced pilot would have taken notice, but I
did not and learned the hard way.
A little later, the Kadett was taken to the Yorkshire Gliding
Club to await suitable soaring weather which arrived mid
week when a small party which included myself as winch
driver, Pittaway ditto under supervision, Major Shaw himself,
his private pilot Mr. MacMurdo, possibly a Works boy but certainly
NOT either Slingsby or Sproule. The original plan was
for MacMurdo to fly the Kadett with me on the winch, but at
the last minute, Major Shaw wanted me to fly with Pittaway
on the winch, an invitation I could hardly refuse, so I was duly
launched into a strong soaring wind where the Kadett gained
height fast but with me struggling with lateral control.
What was taking place was "reversing aiilerons", the wings as
a wl10le were weak in torsion in spite of the lift struts. When
aileron was app:lied, the wings outboard of the struts moved
under the pressure al1d: so became a huge aileron itself making
the Kadett bank even more the wrong way - an alarming situation.
The big trouble was that it was NOT predictable; gentle
stick and it might bank in the direction required or it might just
be the opposite, full aileron and it would have been almost
sure to have done that, but that was not possible wearing
flying clothes, as part of a bulkhead was in the way.
With hindsight, perhaps it was a good thing, Ithe WINGS
MAY have failed. I seriously considered landing in tile bottom
where there would be less tmbulence but that would have been
very inconvenient as there was no car present equipped for
towing. After 20 minutes and the wind dropping a little, I flew
a very wide circuit on rudder .alone and landed safely .Olil the
landing ground; if [ had failed to reach it, it would not have
mattered as the area then was ,quite open. After an explanation,
MacMufdo was launched and was soon back on the landing
ground where he explained to Major Shaw what was wrong.
MacMurdo was a sk,j\led professional B licence aeroplane
pilot who was aware of reversing ailerons and knew about the
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