The RS-15 is a
Richard Schreder
Richard E. Schreder (25 September 1915 – 2 August 2002) was an United States, American naval aviator and sailplane developer, responsible for design and development of the HP/RS-series kit sailplanes marketed from 1962 until about 1982. Sch ...
-designed metal
Racing Class sailplane
A glider or sailplane is a type of glider aircraft used in the leisure activity and sport of gliding (also called soaring). This unpowered aircraft can use naturally occurring currents of rising air in the atmosphere to gain altitude. Sailplan ...
that was offered as a kit for
homebuilding during the 1970s and 1980s.
[Said, Bob: ''1983 Sailplane Directory, Soaring Magazine'', page 20. Soaring Society of America, November 1983. USPS 499-920]
Unlike Schreder's other designs, which are all designated ''HP'' (for ''High Performance''), the RS-15 takes its nomenclature from the designer's initials and its wingspan in metres.
Design and development
The dominating aesthetic feature of the RS-15 is its pod-and-boom
fuselage
The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...
. The forward fuselage is a composite molding, and the aft portion is a 6" diameter aluminum tube. The
V-tail
The V-tail or ''vee-tail'' (sometimes called a butterfly tail or Rudlicki's V-tailGudmundsson S. (2013). "General Aviation Aircraft Design: Applied Methods and Procedures" (Reprint). Butterworth-Heinemann. p. 489. , 9780123973290) of an aircraf ...
is essentially the same as on other contemporary Schreder sailplanes, differing only in detail design from that of the
HP-18
The HP-18 is a Richard Schreder-designed metal Racing Class sailplane that was offered as a kit for homebuilding during the 1970s and 1980s.
Design and development
The HP-18 is a flapped (15-meter) sailplane featuring a V-tail and 90-degre ...
.
Unlike Schreder's HP-series gliders, the RS-15 was intended to achieve more modest performance, sacrificing performance for a shortened build time.
Early RS-15 models featured wings that were essentially the same as the
HP-16, and using the same one-piece machined aluminum I-beam wing spar. Later units were supplied with wing kits nearly identical to those of the HP-18, using that ship's riveted aluminum box spar. Unlike the HP-18, however, RS-15 examples usually lack the flap/aileron interconnect that adjusts the neutral aileron deflection to match that of the flap in the range of -10 to +10 flap deflection. Some of these sailplanes with the updated HP-18 wings have -10 to +90 degrees flap deflection.
Major features:
*Pod-and-boom fuselage with relatively deep cockpit
*V-tail that folds upwards for easy storage
*Wing structure composed of spars with caps pre-machined from solid aluminium plate and aluminium wing skins bonded to closely spaced foam ribs
*Fiberglass fuselage pod, wing tip skids and tail fairings
*Tubular aluminum aft fuselage
*Winglets added by some homebuilders
*Water ballast carried inside the hollow aluminium wing spars
*Typical Schreder trailing edge flaps/airbrakes
Specifications
See also
References
Schreder Designs webpageSailplane Directory
{{Schreder Sailplanes
1970s United States sailplanes
Glider aircraft
Schreder aircraft
V-tail aircraft