Lippisch Wien
| Wien | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Robert Kronfeld with the Wien in 1931 | |
| Role | High performance sailplane |
| National origin | Germany |
| Manufacturer | Gerhard Fiesler Werke |
| Designer | Alexander Lippisch |
| First flight | 1929 |
| Primary user | Robert Kronfeld |
| Number built | 1 |
| Developed from | RRG Professor |
The Lippisch Wien was a high performance glider designed by Alexander Lippisch in Germany in 1929. Owned and flown by Robert Kronfeld, it was one of the first sailplanes intended to exploit thermals. It set world records both for distance and altitude and demonstrated the practicality of long distance cross country flights.
Robert Kronfield was the overall winner of the 1928 Rhön Gliding Competition flying the RSG (Rhon-Rossitten-Gesellschaft) Professor. To remain competitive with the latest designs coming from the German universities he asked Alexander Lippisch, the Professor's designer, for an improved version with better performance and handling. Lippisch's response was an elegant sailplane that Kronfeld named Wien after his home town. The Wien kept the layout of the Professor, with pylon mounted single spar wings braced with faired struts but the span was increased by 3.0 m (9 ft 10 in), raising the aspect ratio from 14 to 19.6. The fuselage was redesigned to have a smooth ovoid section, finer aft than on the Professor and fitted with a more aerodynamically refined fin and rudder.
Both designs used a plywood covered D-box forward of the spar, with fabric covering behind, and their 2.50 m (8 ft 2 in) half span, parallel chord inner wing panels were similar, though close to the fuselage the Wien's wing was strengthened with full chord plywood skin. The V-form bracing struts linked the extremes of these panels to the lower fuselage. The extra span of the Wien was in the double straight tapered outer panels, which continued out to finer, rounded tips. Ailerons occupied the whole trailing edge of these sections.
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