Dustin's building a Skylark!

[DustinI]

I forgot about the stab/fin bridge (or w/e it's called ). So, I built it and covered it.

[DustinI]

Tail covered, fin installed.

[DustinI]

I've been busy doing all the little things you have to do to finish a sailplane like this one. Today I have something I'd like to share. I've finished painting the front of the fuselage. It's been covered with fiberglass cloth and painted with spray paint. I really like the way it looks.

[DustinI]

The Skylark has been successfully flown! Thanks to everybody who's helped me get this thing built and flown. gunny11, lenb , and JimD were at the field today and helped me with the final adjustments, and JimD has answered many of my questions during the build process.

[Sinkhappens86]

Congrats Dustin! Looks great!

[DustinI]

I need to tell you all about an unfortunate incident with the Skylark. It was getting aerotowed for the first time when there was a catastrophic failure of the wing spar in the center of the wing. As you can imagine, there was little to do but to release from tow and watch.

I feel terrible because this is a beautiful airplane and very well designed. The fault was all mine. Examining the wing spar, there was insufficient epoxy in the wing spar area. This caused the top and bottom wing spar to separate from the wing joiner when it was put under the stress of aerotowing.

If your reading this and you're a new to large sailplanes like me, please take note and make sure to add copious amounts of epoxy to your wing joins. It's also been recommended to me to add a filler to your epoxy in wing joining applications.

While most of the Skylark's fuselage is destroyed, the wings are not in terrible shape. I'll need to re-sheet much of the wing and rejoin the wing center section, but it appears that the hardwood in the wings is fine. Good thing it's getting close to building season .

[Soarntz]

Sorry for your loss, enjoy the re-build

[Tom]

The fault was all mine. Examining the wing spar, there was insufficient epoxy in the wing spar area. This caused the top and bottom wing spar to separate from the wing joiner when it was put under the stress of aerotowing.

If your reading this and you're a new to large sailplanes like me, please take note and make sure to add copious amounts of epoxy to your wing joins. It's also been recommended to me to add a filler to your epoxy in wing joining applications.

Extra epoxy will only add weight.......wing joiner boxes need to be fully boxed/infilled with wood around the joiner itself......once that is done then 1/8” plywood needs to be added to the outside of the joiner area tying the top spar cap to the bottom cap all done using epoxy....thickened if you have voids in your blocking.......the absolute key to making sure your wing stays together is to then wrap the joiner assembly with Kevlar thread.....the thread will “hold” all of the parts together and reduce the chance of them blowing apart.

[horsefeetky]

sad news i know how nice these fly and worthy of fixing for another day... see you next year on the hill with skylark madness in the air.

[gunny11]

sorry to hear that Dustin...

[Sinkhappens86]

I'd have a conversation with your tow pilot, he was obviously towing you way too fast!

Watch out for that Dolly guy...