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Wills
Wing Frequently Asked Questions : Hang Gliders
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Hang Gliders : 7
Question:
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I really like my old WW hang glider. The glider's frame is in great shape, but the sail is worn out. Can you make me a replacement sail?
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| Answer: |
The sail on a hang glider is about 2/3 of the value of the glider. In order to ease the burden on pilots who accidentally damage their sail on a relatively new glider, we offer replacement sails for current production gliders at a discount - at a price of 1/2 the price of the glider. If we had the ability to make a replacement sail for an out of production glider, the retail price would be between $1500 and $3000 (1/2 the price of the equivalent model in our current product line). Since you can buy complete gliders on the used market for less than $1500, selling replacement sails for these older gliders doesn't make economic sense.
In reality, we can't make sails for gliders that have been out of production for very long. (This is true for the same reason that NASA could no longer make a Saturn V rocket if they wanted to.) Even though we have all the documentation now that we had then, there is too much knowledge about how to make the sail that resides only in the minds of the sailmakers (exactly how to tension and register this panel to that one, etc.) and once the sail is out of production, this knowledge is lost.
The other thing to consider is that when you say you 'really like' your glider, you have to remember that what it is that you really like mostly resides in the sail, not the airframe. If you put a different sail on that frame, you'd have a different glider - it would still be the same model, but it wouldn't be your good ol' wing.
The easiest thing to do if you think your sail is worn out is to find a better condition used one of the same model and buy that and fly it, and use your old glider as a source of replacement frame parts.
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