Foam HLG

[neophyte]

Does somebody know any good sites about Foam Hand Launched Gliders? And, a newbie question...why does HLG have an ply horn on the tail? How does work a rubberband launch?

[Bob Chiang]

Hi Neophyte,

Hereis a link to a plan for a glider with a foam wing: http://www.mindspring.com/~thayer5/ffpages/plans/leftover.html

It is not especially high performance, but it does quite well.

I have a couple of documents that describe how to launch with a rubber band (called Catapult Launched Gliders or CLGs in the United States of America). One is an Adobe Acrobat file, the other is a Microsoft Word document. Let me know if you'd like a copy of them. Basically, a CLG has a hook (often wire, or plywood) mounted on the fuselage. The launcher is a loop of rubber tied to a stick. The free end of the rubber loop is fitted to the fuselage hook, and the glider is pulled back to stretch the rubber, and then released. They fly very fast off of the launcher.

I am not familiar with HLGs having a ply horn. Is it a sub-fin that also serves as a tail skid? Some CLGs have an extension of the fuselage behind the horizontal and vertical tail. It is used to grip the model when stretching the rubber band launcher.