Rebell | |
---|---|
Role | Motor glider |
National origin | Germany |
Designer | Gerhard Blessing |
First flight | 3 June 1973 |
Number built | 1 |
The Blessing Rebell was a one/two seat motorglider designed for amateur construction in Germany. Only one was built, flying for the first time in 1973 in a pusher configuration. It was later modified and flew in 1980 as a tractor aircraft.
The Rebell was designed by Gerhard Blessing [1] as a self-launching glider suitable for amateur builders, even those working in confined workspaces. To allow this, the wing could be built in one, two or three parts and no individual component was more than 3.5 m (11 ft 6 in) long. [2] [3]
The Rebell had low-mid set wings built around a single wooden spar and wood covered. They had dihedral only on the outer panels, each 3.75 m (12 ft 4 in) long and foldable for storage. The fuselage was a steel tube structure, wood covered and had a roughly rectangular cross-section. The canopy was quite long and normally enclosed just a single seat, but there was space to place a second seat in tandem behind the first. The engine, originally a 40 kW (54 hp) Hirth M28 twin cylinder unit, was placed over the wing behind the cockpit with the propeller shaft at the top of the fuselage, locating the propeller just behind the trailing edge of the wing. Aft, the fuselage became a low-set boom, bearing wooden tail surfaces including a swept, straight edged vertical tail with a long dorsal fillet. The Rebell had a recessed monowheel undercarriage assisted by a tailwheel and two stabilizing wheels mounted at the extreme inner wing panels. [2] [3]
The first flight was made on 3 June 1973. In 1974 the Hirth company went into liquidation and an alternative engine was needed; in the Summer of 1975 the Rebell prototype was flying with a modified Volkswagen motor. Further testing in this form led to a major power plant/fuselage rebuild, started in 1976. The result, renamed the Staff Rebell, had a tractor configuration Limbach SL1700 engine in the nose. The fuselage, its wooden covering replaced with Dacron, became deeper behind the cockpit and no longer a boom; the dorsal fillet was removed. The canopy was also re-shaped, curving down to rather than merging horizontally into the dorsal line. [2] [3]
The Staff Rebell first flew in August 1980. [3]
The sole Rebell/Staff Rebell D-KEBO was no longer on the German civil register in 2010. [4]
Data from Jane's All the World's Aircraft 1976-77 [2]
General characteristics
Performance
The Göppingen Gö 9 was a German experimental aircraft built to investigate the practicalities of powering a plane using a pusher propeller located far from the engine and turned by a long driveshaft.
In aeronautical and naval engineering, pusher configuration is the term used to describe a drivetrain of air- or watercraft with propulsion device(s) after the engine(s). This is in contrast to the more conventional tractor configuration, which places them in front.
The SZD-45 Ogar (Hound) is a T-tailed cantilever high-wing monoplane of wooden, aluminium and fibreglass construction designed and manufactured in Poland.
The Janowski J1 Prząśniczka ("Distaff"), later named the Don Kichot was an ultralight aircraft designed in Poland and marketed for homebuilding in the 1970s. Designed by Jarosław Janowski in 1967 and built with the help of some friends, it flew three years later. It had an unusual design, with a high, strut-braced wing and a pusher propeller mounted behind it. The pilot had a fully enclosed cabin, and the undercarriage was of fixed, tailwheel type. Original prototype was flown with Saturn engine design by Mr Janowski. This engine was made out of two motorcycle engines (MZ250). J1 was also flown with Trabant engine (29HP) and VW conversion (48BPH) made by Christine Aero Engines in Donlands - California.
The Valentin Taifun is a two-seat self-launching sailplane designed and built by Valentin Flugzeugbau GmbH of Hasfurt, Germany.
The Scheibe SF-25 Falke is a German touring motor glider developed from the earlier Bergfalke glider by Scheibe Flugzeugbau. Since May 2006 the business has been run by Scheibe Aircraft GmbH.
The Boulton & Paul P.12 Bodmin was an experimental British twin-engined biplane bomber with its engines mounted in a fuselage engine room and with tandem pairs of tractor and pusher airscrews mounted between the wings. The two Bodmins built flew in 1924, proving the concept but the layout was not developed to production.
The Iannotta I-66L San Francesco is a 1960s Italian ultralight designed to be homebuilt from plans. It has been powered by several flat-four engines in the 65-100 hp range and built in both single and two-seat tandem configurations. Only small numbers have been completed.
The LO 120 S is a German parasol-wing, pusher configuration, open-cockpit, two-seats in tandem motor glider that was designed and produced by LO-Fluggerätebau. When it was available it was supplied as a kit for amateur construction and meets European microlight rules.
The Ameur Altania was a single-engine light aircraft of pusher configuration with side-by-side seats for two and a V-tail, designed in France in the 1990s. Several prototypes were built and flown, including a 15 m span motorglider version; the final prototype was constructed from carbon composites rather than glass fibre. Another version, the UCA Carbon Bird has been built by Universal Composite Aviation after the bankruptcy of Ameur Aviation.
The Tisserand Hydroplum is a small amphibious aircraft with a single, pusher engine, built in France in the 1980s. Originally a single-seat, high-wing monoplane, it was developed into a two-seat biplane for production in kit form as the SMAN Pétrel.
The Savoia-Marchetti SM.80 is a two-seat monoplane amphibian tourer, with a single, tractor engine mounted above the wing, designed in Italy in the early 1930s. The SM.80bis is a four-seat variant, powered by two pusher engines.
The Hirth Hi 20 MoSe was a German motor glider designed in the late 1930s. Based on the Göppingen Gö 4 side-by-side seat training glider, it had a foldaway propeller, column-mounted above the fuselage and shaft-driven by a small internal piston engine.
The Pasotti F.9 Sparviero was a four-seat, low-wing touring aircraft, built in Italy in the 1950s. Designed by Stelio Frati, it was a single-engine version of his earlier twin-engined Airone. Only one was built.
The Starck AS-37 is a two-seat biplane with unconventional wing and propulsion layouts. It was designed in France in the 1970s; though three were built and more than twenty sets of plans sold for home building, no AS-37s are active in 2012.
The Briffaud GB-10 Pou-Push was a Mignet style tandem wing single seat aircraft with a pusher configuration single engine. The sole example was built in France in the 1980s.
The Kortenbach & Rauh Kora 1 was an unusual twin boom, pusher configuration motor glider, designed and built in Germany in the 1970s and intended as a training aircraft.
The Pocino PJ.1A Toucan is a French, single seat, twin boom light aircraft of pusher configuration which first flew in 1989. The single example remained active until at least 2007.
The Payen Arbalète was a small, pusher configuration, experimental French tailless aircraft, designed by Nicolas Roland Payen, and first flown in 1965.
The Politechnika Warszawska PW-4 Pelikan was a motor-glider variant of the two seat Polish PW-3 Bakcyl glider. Only one flew.