“Buying Trip” to Prague

Bill Field had sold his Grob 115 to a group in Leicester early last year, with the intention of buying one of the new “ultralight” aeroplanes, and recruiting a flying group around it.  After careful examination of the options and a trip up to Leicester to view the only UK example, he fell in love with a carbon fibre/glass fibre creation, the “TL Ultralight Sting”.

  It was designed and is built in the Czech Republic, so it was decided that Bill and Ron Clarke would make the trip to the manufacturer, just to check them over before parting with money.

  Also, the Leicester based model was going through certification checks, so the opportunity to fly it was not available.

An Easyjet flight took us from Bristol to Prague, and then a rented car got us to the town of Hradec Kralove, a picturesque medieval town 50 miles east of Prague. One of the features of the old town centre, where we were staying, was that the cobbled town square has a clock tower, with a clock that chimes every fifteen minutes – right through the night! Apparently you don’t hear the clock, unless you are tuned into it, after about ten years of residence. We heard every chime!

Next morning, slightly bleary eyed from sleep deprivation, we were picked up by Barbera, the commercial director, who transported us to the factory. This turned out to be a very modern, quality building, on a huge military airfield.  The airfield had been abandoned by the military, and turned over to small industrial units like our aircraft builder TL, and there were hardened hangars everywhere with nearly two miles of runway!

We were given a tour of the factory by David, the sales and marketing director, and had all the processes of designing and building in glass and carbon fibre explained to us.

It appeared that the factory was completely self sufficient in the manufacture of all the necessary components for the “Sting” but of course the engine, a 100 hp Rotax, was sourced from the manufacturer.  The weather had been pretty murky all day, and our chances of a test flight were diminishing as time went by.  Happily,  it did improve and the owner of the company himself, gave each of us a 15 minute flight into the neighbouring countryside.  Apparently the 500’ rule does not apply (or is ignored) for a lot of the test flying was done at treetop level – very exhilarating!

We were well satisfied with what we had seen; even though we were far from being experts in glass and carbon fibre construction, they seemed to have well documented processes and quality management. 

 On the return trip we spoke about nothing else but the “Sting” for there were still lots of outstanding issues – like what will be the cockpit fit, how will it be financed, how will we do our 51% share of the build (a mandatory UK requirement), and a whole lot more questions. 

Flying members will know that Bill still does not have his “Sting”, nor even the kit to start the build.  We found that the UK agent had underestimated the complexity of achieving LAA (Light Aviation Association) certification, so here we are in May 2009, nearly a year since we visited the factory, still not having placed an order as we await certification.  We have up to now believed the “Sting” is worth waiting for but patience is running out, the summer is here, so thoughts are turning to selecting another ultralight aircraft (already certified) to provide our regular aviating “fix”.  In the meantime we will just have to continue to fly club aircraft and see what comes first, the “Sting” or its alternative.