Maybe.
But I also fear we really do shield everyone from too much risk.
Wont be long and we will need a PTI to do drill or something akin… or a special drill qual (and I dont mean the theory side).
Such a shame.
Good idea 
Wow!
Great stuff. I would love to see that.
Might make a visit.
This looks awesome
3 Likes
It does, but there was still an instructor in the back. What always confused me about the old cadet gliders was the lack of dual control. So you go straight from theory to practice with no middle ground in between.
Yes but the grasshopper wasnt designed as a glider as we think of one.
It was to ‘grass hop’, so never get more than a couple of meters up and only glide for 10 seconds or so.
Its weight and design were deliberate for safety, sturdiness and to keep it ‘grounded’.
What it did provide was practical aviation training, albeit in a limited fashion.
There was however a photo on the internet a few years back showing the grasshopper much higher and being launched from a hill. So…
But I cant find that anymore.
If anyone has more info, tech specs, photos or a manual of some kind I would be very interested.
Cunning…
Modern glider.
Downslope.
Hill to fly off.
20kts head wind.
Defo gonna make a visit.
I did my gliding proficiency in a TMk3 which had an open cockpit. No helmets or parachutes in those days.
2 Likes
They have such a great ridge there, which they sit nicely on top of, that my son did circuits in a glider there last year. Not quite to touchdown - but stow the airbrakes on short final and there was enough lift to get back into the circuit again!
1 Like
That was at the Long Mynd in Shropshire.
When the RAFGSA was based at Bicester, the ‘Grasshopper’ was instrumented and regularly aerotowed.
It’s also worth pointing out that, aside fro the bungee ‘hops’ on, for eg, a school playing field, the Grasshopper could be fitted to a stand via a sort of universal joint thus allowing the glider to be ‘flown’ stationary in a suitable wind.
1 Like
This must be the photos I have seen before.
Aero towed… wow! 
The section of original training pamphlet I have seen only makes reference to flights upto 24 feet in altitude!
Circuits in a grasshopper!
V impressive.
This I had no idea of.
Any further info?
Intersting.
thread drift - which glider was it that was towed behind a Landy??
Am i recalling those “war stories” correctly?
A bit like what @Sniper indicated about being flown in a suitable wind - such wind “made” by driving down the runway/across a field with a tow line long enough to get the aircraft airborne while short enough the “instructor” sat in the back could shout instructors to the student in the pilots seat…
a bit like this…
I was aerotowed in the RAFGSA Grasshopper many years ago. It didn’t half creak going up the climb!
When I released it seemed to have the gliding capabilities of a house-brick!
It made the Kirby Cadet MkIII look like a competetive sailplane!
1 Like
I’m looking for photo’s on the web but not found any so far.
When I was at school the RAF Section of the CCF had a Grasshopper, hence me knowing about the ‘stand’.
This is almost as insane as Glider Snatching
It’s worth remembering for many much lauded pilots from WW2 a hop of a few feet would have been their first experience of flying. Probably not very long, given the original Air Cadets started at 16, before they were doing the real thing.
I reckon cadets would be up for this, while the MoD sort their nuts wrt cadet gliding. Do you really need more than a few feet to get a feel for the controls? Might not fit with highfalutin ideas, but we need something quickly. It would be so much better than flight sims.
Anecdotally, a small proportion of CCF(RAF) cadets when launched pulled back on the stick and froze, causing them to stall; and there were some significant injuries. (That’s from the account of the Grasshopper given to me by an old and bold CCF officer who had been OC RAF section when they were still in service.) Mostly you had a choice of height or distance.
A photo of the Grasshopper at Henlow on the tripod stand:
2 Likes