Elastic Launched Glider

General
Elastic Launched Glider was a 2012 Division C trial event at the National Tournament. It is planned to become a full event for 2013.

The 2012 rules may be found here.

This event is a building event consisting of two parts: a glider made to be launched by the pulling and releasing of a rubber loop, which can be constructed based on plans of the competitor, or from a kit, and a flight log similar to that of other aviation events.

Materials
The glider is allowed to be built from any plan, published, student-devised, or otherwise. It can be built from wood, car bon fiber, glue, paper, and plastic flim only, with any non-metal malleable substance able to be used as ballast.

Basics
In competition, the glider is launched with the elastic loop, fly upwards balistically until it reaches the ceiling (it is an indoor-only event), and transition into a circular glide which maximizes the time taken to descend to the floor; thus, the glider has to be built to be able to do this. Firstly, it has to be able to withstand the initial jolt of the launch, which means the contruction, particularly of the wings, is significantly different from that of the other aviation events. The glider as a whole has to be much more durable but just as aerodynamic as the wings/rotors of the devices of Helicopter and Wright Stuff.

Incidence
A very major part of the construction of the elastic launch glider is the "incidence". In this senario, the angle of incidence is the angle between the plane of the wings and the plane of the elevator (also know as the horizontal stab). Ideally, these two planes would be parallel, having an incidence of 0-0; a negative incidence (when the wings are at a negative angle of attack) leads to the glider taking a nose dive and a positive incidence (when the wings are at a positive angle of attack) leads to the glider flying back to the earth in an inside loop. However, it is incredibly hard to build the glider with enough precision to have the perfect incidence initially; thus, it is best to be able to adust the incidence. The best way to do this is to make sure you glue the elevator to the fuse with CA glue so that it can be dissolved with acetone and reglued at a better angle after having been tested.

Resources
One incredibly helpful website which covers almost all aspects of this event can be found here. The 2012 Forum thread which can be found here lays down much groundwork for the event. Also, when searching for videos for this type of glider, be sure to try searching "Catapult Launch Glider", which is another name for this project.