I love Twitter.  Not necessarily for the hours of timesuck that it has represented over the course of the three an a half years and 10,000+ tweets.  I love it because every once in awhile, you tweet that you’re getting a haircut and you end up getting to fly a really cool aircraft.

Yesterday, I tweeted that I was heading downtown Saturday morning to get a haircut from Vic, a commercial pilot who’s also my barber of some 15 years.  John Harte responded, suggesting that he might be able to get me up in a motorglider if I could make it over to Detroit City Airport while I was downtown.

The motorglider in question is a Schweizer SGM 2-37, registered under tail number N26AF.  Only 12 were made, nine (including this one) of which went to the US Air Force Academy under the designation T-G 7A and flew at the academy until 2003.

Schweizer designed the aircraft at the request of the USAF to allow flight training in both powered and glider roles.  For that reason, it’s a bit of a mutt. The nose, cowling, and engine installation are adapted from the Piper PA-38 Tomahawk.  The wings are adapted from the Schweizer SGS 1-36 Sprite, including extensions that stretch the wings to 59.5 feet and leading edge cuffs to make it spin-resistant.  Those who know and love the Schweizer SGS 2-32 will recognize the tail section.

6AF, like all nine of the USAFA models, has aLycoming O-235-L2C four-cylinder engine that puts out 112 hp and gets the 1,850 MTOW aircraft up into the air with reasonable aplomb and allows the aircraft to cruise somewhere around 110 KIAS. [Read more...]