Warsztaty Szybowcowe Mewa

Last updated
Mewa
RoleHigh performance two seat sailplane
National origin Poland
ManufacturerWarsztaty Szybowcowe
DesignerSzczepan Grzeszczyk and Antoni Kocjan
First flightEarly 1936
Number builtat least 8

The Warsztaty Szybowcowe Mewa was a Polish, high performance, two seat sailplane flown in 1936 and built in small numbers.

Contents

Design and development

In 1935, Szczepan Grzeszczyk and Antoni Kocjan collaborated in the design of the Mewa, an aerodynamically clean, high performance, two seat sailplane. Its first flights were made early in the following year, though it was not ready for competition until 1937. [1]

The Mewa was a wooden aircraft with a two-part, cantilever, shoulder-mounted gull wing. Each part was built around a single spar which acted as the rear member of a torsion-resistant D-box formed with plywood surfacing around the leading edge. Behind the spar, which was assisted by an internal diagonal drag strut to the fuselage, the wing was fabric-covered. The high dihedral, inner part of the wing was rectangular in plan but the outer wing was trapezoidal, tapering to rounded tips. The outer wings carried long, narrow-chord, differential Frise ailerons outboard with mid-chord, upper-surface air brakes inboard. [1] [2]

The Mewa's fuselage was an oval-section, semi-monocoque, plywood structure. The two crew sat in tandem, with dual controls, under a long, multi-part transparency. This extended rearwards over the wing, allowing the second seat to be positioned over the centre of gravity to avoid re-trimming when occupied. A broad, semi-elliptical, balanced rudder, fabric-covered except on its balance, was mounted on a small fin which was part of the fuselage structure. Close to its root, the fin carried an all-flying tail, fitted with Flettner tabs and also largely fabric-covered. [1] [2]

The landing gear consisted of an under-fuselage, pneumatically sprung skid, assisted by a tailskid under the rudder. [1] [2]

Operational history

Its first significant competition was the Fifth National Glider Contest held at Ustianowa in June-July 1937 where the prototype, flown by Mieczysław Urban, came third. In 1938 a production batch of five was built, the first flying in the spring. Four took part in the Sixth National Glider Contest, held at Inowrocław, though the best only reached ninth place. The production Mewas went to clubs, where one was for used for blind flying training as well as the usual high performance instruction. They set national duration and distance records for two seat gliders: in April 1939 J. Pietrow and W. Dziergas flew for 11 h 2 min and in May Pietrow and J. Jakubiec covered 302 km (188 mi; 163 nmi). [1] [3]

Mewas were also built under licence in Estonia and in Yugoslavia, where one remained in use into the 1950s. [1]

Specifications

Data from J. Cynk, 1971 [1] unless noted

General characteristics

Performance

Related Research Articles

The Kirigamine Mita is a training glider, seating two in tandem, designed in Japan in the early 1960s. A modified version, first flown in 1966, was produced in modest numbers.

DFS Rhönsperber German single seat competition glider, 1937

The DFS Rhönsperber, otherwise known as the Schweyer Rhönsperber or Jacobs Rhönsperber was a single seat competition glider designed in Germany by Hans Jacobs and first flown in 1935. For several years it was regarded as the best German sailplane and about one hundred were built.

The IIL IS-11 was an aerobatic, single seat glider, designed and built in Romania in 1959. It was built in small numbers.

The IIL IS-12 was a two-seat glider, designed and built in Romania in 1960. It had a wooden wing but a metal fuselage and was constructed in parallel with the all-wood IS-13 for comparative tests. It was later followed by the IS-13a, a version with an all-metal wing.

Czerwiński CW IV Type of aircraft

The one-off, experimental Czerwiński CW IV was a Polish high performance glider and the nation's first two-seater. It set several national records and influenced later Polish designs.

Blaicher B.1

The Blaicher B.1 was a Polish glider first flown in 1934. It was intended to fill an intermediate trainer role, but offered no advance on existing aircraft and only the prototype was completed.

Czerwiński CW 7 Type of aircraft

The Czerwiński CW 7 was a Polish aerobatic glider first flown in 1934. Despite a structural weakness that prevented inverted flight, a small batch of CW 7s were used by several aeroclubs until the start of World War II.

Czerwiński CW 8

The Czerwiński CW 8 was a mid-1930s Polish open-frame basic training glider. Its design was advanced and its price low, but its stalling characteristics were too dangerous for beginners, so the thirty-plus examples completed were rapidly withdrawn from use. Two were subsequently modified, one with greater span and the other with a small engine.

ITS-IVB

The ITS-IVB was a 1930s Polish two seat research sailplane designed to gather meteorological and airframe stress data. The sole example remained in service up to outbreak of World War II.

PWS-102 Rekin

The PWS-102 Rekin was a progressive development of the PWS-101, intended for cross-country flights. The prototype flew in an international contest in 1939 and the first of a projected production series was flown before the start of World War II.

The PWS-103 was a high performance, Polish 15 m span sailplane developed from the longer-span PWS-102 just before World War II.

WS Czajka Polish secondary training glider

The Czajka (transl. Lapwing) or Kocjan Czajka after its designer was a Polish secondary training glider which was in continuous production from 1931 to the start of World War II. More than 160 were completed in Warsztaty Szybowcowe in Warsaw.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe SG-21 Lwów

The D.W.L. SG-21 Lwów was a Polish high performance sailplane built for the Polish government. Though both it and a development, the SG-28, were one-offs, they set several national records and led to the batch-produced Warsztaty Szybowcowe SG-3.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe SG-3

The Grzeszczyk SG-3 was a Polish single-seat, high performance sailplane first flown in 1933. Between 1934 and 1937 it was Poland's most successful competitor and record setter; about twenty-five were completed.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe Wrona

The Warsztaty Szybowcowe Wrona, or Kocjan Wrona after its designer, was the most numerous and widely used Polish pre-war primary glider.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe Sroka

The Warsztaty Szybowcowe Sroka, or Kocjan Sroka after its designer, was a Polish intermediate training glider. About sixty were built between 1934 and 1939.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe Sokół

The Warsztaty Szybowcowe Sokół was a 1930s Polish aerobatic sailplane. Ten were built and flown by Polish aeroclubs, participating in national and international events, until the outbreak of the Second World War.

Warsztaty Szybowcowe SG-7

The Warsztaty Szybowcowe SG-7 was a Polish high performance, single seat sailplane. Two prototypes flew in 1937 but, outperformed by their contemporaries, no more were built.

The Jancsó-Szokolay M22 was a Hungarian single-seat sailplane first flown in 1937. Twenty were built and the type set several national records. Some remained in service up to about 1953.

Kocjan Komar

The single-seat Kocjan Komar (Gnat) intermediate trainer, designed in 1932, was the leading and most produced sailplane in pre-war Poland. Production was resumed after World War II as the IS-B Komar and it remained in use until 1965.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Cynk, Jerzy (1971). Polish Aircraft 1893-1939 . London: Putnam Publishing. p.  719-20. ISBN   0 370 00085 4.
  2. 1 2 3 "Kocjan-Grzeszczyk Mewa". j2mcl-planeurs.net. Retrieved 3 January 2019.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Mewa, 1936". samolotypolskie.pl. Retrieved 3 January 2019.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.