Rolladen-Schneider LS3

LS3
Role	15 metre-class sailplane
National origin	Germany
Manufacturer	Rolladen-Schneider
First flight	4 February 1976
Number built	429

The Rolladen-Schneider LS00390 is a 15 metre single-seat glider produced by Rolladen-Schneider from 1976 to 1983.

The LS3 was developed as Rolladen-Schneider's first entry to the new 15 meter competition class created in 1974 by the International Gliding Commission of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. Building upon previous experience with the LS1 and LS2, chief designer Wolf Lemke developed a new fuselage with a larger cockpit and more generous horizontal and vertical stabilisers.

Lemke elected a relatively thick profile developed in 1967 by University of Stuttgart Professor Franz Xavier Wortmann, the FX 67-K-170, which offered the structural economy made possible by a tall spar - an important consideration as glass fibre was still the only affordable reinforcement material - as well as good performance for the time.

This profile and its sister profile FX 67-K-150 are among the most prolific in the history of gliding, as they were employed also in the Nimbus-2, Mini-Nimbus, DG-200 and DG-400, PIK-20 and PIK-30, Kestrel, Mosquito, Vega, Jantar and LAK-12 among other types.

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