Flair 18 by Günther Rochelt

The Flair 18 was a design developed by Günter Rochelt in 1987.

Featured on the cover of 'Drachenflieger' magazine in November 1987, The Flair was first conceived in 1984, but took some time to develop, with work on the fiberglass - Carbon - Kevlar airframe begun in Spring, 1987. After a few test flights, in which the performance was confirmed but the rudders were found to be somewhat ineffectual, Günter decided not to put the Flair into production, concluding that he could improve performance further with some changes to the design (which led to the Flair 30 , whose design goal was to reach a 30:1 glide ratio in a foot-launched aircraft.)

Specifications

Area 14.5 m^2
Span 11.47 m
Aspect Ratio 9
Double surface 100%
Nose angle 147°
Battens none
Weight The production model should be under 30 kg, considerably less than the overbuilt protoype
Packed size 4.4 m x 0.8 m x 0.25 m
Setup time Around 10 minutes
Min. pilot weight No lower limit
Max. pilot weight, for +/- 6g 165 kg
Max. pilot weight, for +/- 10g 100 kg
Vmin <30 km/h
Vmax >100 km/h
Min. sink rate & 35 km/h 0.6-0.7 m/s (120-140 ft/min)
Min. sink rate & 80 km/h 2.5-3.0 m/s (500-600 ft/min)
Max. Glide ratio 16-18:1 & 45 km/h
Price circa 15000 DM

Some Photos of the Flair

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