Puts a new light on microlights ...

[bexrbetter]

Some great flying...

 

 

 

[eightyknots]

Lovely seat-of-the-pants flying.

 

 

[pmccarthy]

If I get a Dragonfly will I be able to fly like that?

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

That's Bob Bailey flying it. For those who might not know, he's the designer of many aircraft including this one. The Moyes/Bailey Dragonfly was designed to tow hang-gliders aloft, consequently it has exceptional low speed handling due to having huge control surfaces. For hang-glider towing it has to be fully controllable whilst also being able to fly very slowly, IIRC its stall speed is around 18kts. It's a delight to fly and consequently there's never a shortage of pilots offering to act as tow pilot on competition days. Not quite so popular is the ferry flying of it between events - with an efficient cruise speed of something like 35kts it takes a while to get anywhere, particularly if there's a headwind ...

 

For those who enjoy videoing their flights there's a nice tidbit on show at various parts of the above video where Bob is towing a camera close behind the plane. He has it rigged with a 'J' shaped frame attached to the towline so that the towline isn't in shot and a small drogue chute to stabilise it. The drogue is probably tethered off-centre to make the camera fly out to one side of the tailplane. It makes for some great close-up shots that appear to be filmed by another plane flying in very close formation. It's something those of you who built your own planes, or are permitted to modify them, could experiment with if you wished. You could have the system arranged so that you can reel it in and out from the tail to avoid damage to the camera during ground operations. Important - if you try this make sure you use a weak-link in the towline - a piece of cord that will break at perhaps 15kg or so should do it - in case you snag the tow on a fence or similar.

 

 

[Guernsey]

I learned to fly straight and level better than he can.

 

Alan.

 

 

[DingerPPC]

Awesome little machine ,great video.