Might be worth contacting the tc-holder to ask what glue they used. They usually are pretty quick to respond. From what I have seen up to now, Scheibe is one of the manufacturers thas has had little or no problems… Great glider BTW, an SF27M.

I really hope the german LBA will not disable the whole Schleicher and Scheibe fleet from the sixties. You can imagine what happens if they are waking up.

LBA does not have that authority. EASA now. They are Part M aircraft. Regardless, I would like an AD that mandates glue joint inspections. The problem is serious, is widespread and will not go away on its own…

Anyway, not all were built with Kaurit. So an AD is unlikely to permanently ground a type.

Good to see you’re enjoying the thread.

G-ASEA: yes I hope the next Kite will be airborne soon. Dagling next? THAT would be rare as hen’s teeth to see in the air!
ZRX61: Ten Kay seems to capture the costs involved in running warbirds. Never ceases to amaze me how much work they require to just keep tidy, let alone restore. Great thing about wooden frames is that materials come relatively cheap. Not so great thing is that the work involved tends to be quite time consuming (but fun!).

As a bonus to the thread a picture of a major rebuild of an A-frame for a primary glider. We had a visitor drop by one day who was really into vintage aircraft. When giving him a quick tour of the shop, he dutifully recorded every aircraft in his little book but never noticed that the big wooden frame in the corner was actually an aircraft too… Just goes to show some rebuilds start with such a dismantling job that aircraft are no longer recognizable as aircraft!

Which just leaves trial fitting (pfew, it still fits!), and covering it. Oh yes, and the doping, basing, spraying, weight & balance and a mountain of paperwork….

From here on it was time to put all the new bits in. A new spar web was spliced in on a custom-built jig. Sounds fancy, but we just made this to ensure it came out straight after the repairs. Then it was time to replace the two D-nose ribs that were beyond saving. And put all of them back onto the new spar web and properly conserve the wood with yellow dope.

In order to keep some structural integrity in the rudder before starting the major surgery bit, the trailing edge needed to be repaired. A straightforward job, splicing in a web of ply, with laminated longerons on both sides (preformed of course). Some issues with trailing edge gussets and a rib were then also rectified… That was the easy fix done. Now for the hard bit.