Brditschka HB-3

Last updated
HB-3, HB-21, and HB-23
HB Brditschka HB 23 2400-1.JPG
Brditschka HB-23
General information
TypeMotorglider
Manufacturer HB-Flugtechnik
Designer
History
First flight23 June 1971 [1]

The Brditschka HB-3, HB-21 and HB-23 are a family of motor gliders of unorthodox configuration developed in Austria in the early 1970s.

Contents

Design and development

The unusual design was based on work done by Fritz Raab  [ de ] in Germany in the 1960s. The pilot and passengers sit in a fuselage pod with the engine and propeller behind them. The pod also carries the fixed tricycle undercarriage and the high cantilever wing. The tail is carried on a pair of booms that emerge from the top and bottom of the fuselage pod, the upper of which passes through the propeller hub. The HB-21 has a conventional tail and has two seats in tandem accessed by a sidewards-hinged canopy, while the HB-23 has a T-tail and side-by-side seating accessed via gull-wing doors in the canopy.

The Militky MB-E1 was a modified HB-3 with an 8-10 kW (11-13 hp) Bosch KM77 electric motor. It was the first full-sized, manned aircraft to be solely electrically powered. Flights of 12 minutes duration at up to an altitude of 380 m (1,247 ft) were just within the Ni-Cd battery's capacity. Its first flight was on 23 October 1973. [2]

Variants

Brditschka HB-3
Single seat powered sailplane, powered by 31 kW (42 hp) Rotax 642 engine, 12.00 m (39 ft 4 in) wingspan. [1]
HB-Flugtechnik HB 21
Tandem two-seat derivative of HB-3 with longer span (16.24 m (53 ft 3 in)) wings. [3]
HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400
HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 B
HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 V1
HB-Flugtechnik HB 21/2400 V2
HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400
HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 SP
HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 Scanliner
Observation version of HB-23 with bubble canopy and provision to carry FLIR or LLTV pods under the wings. [4]
HB-Flugtechnik HB 23/2400 V2
Militky MB-E1
electrically powered version. [2]

Specifications (HB-23/2400 Hobbyliner)

Data from Jane's All The World's Aircraft 1990 [4]

General characteristics

Performance

See also

Related development

Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era

References

  1. 1 2 Taylor 1976, p. 548.
  2. 1 2 Taylor 1974 p.573
  3. Taylor 1976, p. 549.
  4. 1 2 Lambert 1990, p. 8.