Apologies for the apparent abandonment of the website. We suffered several hacker attacks and lost some more recent posts in the recovery.

We are still in business and have several new and revised products.

Firstly, we have a new LOW DRAG Total Energy probe we have named miniTE

There has been some discussion that a normal 6mm or 1/4″ diameter Irving type probe has a not completely inconsequential effect on glider drag, particularly at higher speeds. This can be in the 0.5% of rest of airframe drag range at 100 knots Indicated.

Pitot – Static electronic compensation introduces some installation problems as the pitot and static signals must arrive at the instrument at the same time. If the signals are out of phase quite large transient errors can occur. This problem is entirely absent with the Irving type TE probe.

A prototype was fabricated and the pressure coefficient was measured in flight at various airspeeds and the 3mm diameter probe was in no way inferior to the normal 6mm diameter probe. It is half scale version which results in one quarter the drag, which then becomes very small (about 0.125 % the airframe drag at 100 knots Indicated).

The business end of the probe is in thin wall stainless steel 3 mm in diameter with CNC machined holes, 5mm diameter carbon shaft and a CNC machined aluminium fitting to plug into the standard 8mm fin fitting. For older gliders with different diameter fin fittings we will fabricate to special order.

The miniTE was extensively tested on our powered aircraft (BD-4) wingtip and on a Nimbus 3DM. The Total Energy compensation is as good as a pressure vario TE gets at much reduced drag.

The easiest way to improve your glider performance without buying a new glider!

Dynamis Variometer System

The first production batch was sold in 2019 and is flying successfully.

Unfortunately the prime sensor (GPS) became unavailable and the replacement from the same manufacturer was totally uneconomic so we were forced to find a new source and happily the new sensor (GNSS with 4 constellation simultaneous tracking) is a great improvement. It did take a while to go through several firmware upgrades of the sensor and even longer to finally eliminate the software bugs that resulted in the variometer processor. At the same time a couple of bugs in the variometer were identified and eliminated and the GCD display pages were tidied up and a new font used.

The new sensor and firmware have been tested at first in our BD-4 and then in the Nimbus 3DM. All appears to be working perfectly including the vector wind calculation. This can be filtered to the pilot’s personal preference.

NO effects from horizontal gusts and perfect Total Energy. You’ll never want to fly with just a pressure variometer again!

See Dynamis in action here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiSCU84mCng

Note the very smooth, steady but fast response of Dynamis compared to the pressure vario and the way the pressure vario moves around more in high speed flight because of the effects of horizontal gusts encountered.

We have re-designated the B700/B900 variometers as B-ONE available in logarithmic or linear scales and 57mm or 80mm size with the usual provision for 4 x AA alkaline standby power battery pack.

The B300 and B400 will still be available but we recommend you consider the B-ONE which gives considerably enhanced functionality at small cost increment.

The B600/B800 have been re-designated B-TWO available in logarithmic or linear scales and 57mm or 80mm size.

The B-TWO has new firmware as a result of the Dynamis development program and the same enhanced GCD page display.

If you have a B-TWO it can be upgraded to Dynamis with the addition of the Dynamis sensors. This will require a factory visit.

A low cost and simple Cross Country variometer system consists of a B-TWO Basic which is just the variometer part of the system plus a Bluetooth Blade. No GCD or dedicated GPS. Combine with an Oudie and the Oudie controls MacCready, bugs and ballast on the vario and the vario sends airspeed, vario and other data to the Oudie.

We will endeavor to keep the website updated in future.