the thirties, the interest for gliding started in Sweden. In 1933, the
first Swedish sailplane, a Grunau ESG-31 was registered as SE-ADP. It
belonged to the aircraft designer Edmund Sparrmann. 1941 was a
significant year. The new Soaring Centre at Ålleberg was opened.
It is still an important centre for gliding in Sweden, with its
airfield, school, workshop and museum.
Air Force supported at an early stage the civil gliding movement. The
sailplane activity was a good base of recruitment for future Air Force
pilots. When the need for pilots increased in the years of WWII, this
became still more important.
the beginning of the forties, the Air Force started sailplane activities
of its own. The target group was the non-flying personnel. Many of them
had naturally a great interest in aviation. This group now got the
chance to fly themselves, and talented pilots could be discovered for
further training to ”real pilot”. All this was obtained for a
reasonable sum of money and without wasting much valuable fuel. The
activities were held at off-duty hours at evenings and weekends.
Air Force wings were provided with one or two training gliders and some
real soaring sailplanes. Most of the aircraft were delivered as building
kits and were assembled during the winters by the sailplane fliers
the fifties, the Air Force phased out the sailplane activities. The
aircraft were handed over to the civil clubs.
note the Lg 105 in the list below - a Swedish transport glider
than never went into service.
Please click on the thumbnails for pictures and information
101 - Schulgleiter SG 38 (1943-1953)
105 - AB Flygindustri Fi-3
|Se 102 - Grunau Baby IIB-2 (1942-1953)|
|Se 103 - DFS Kranich (1943-1953)|
104 - DFS Weihe
|© 2002 Lars Henriksson, Ljungskile, Sweden||Updated: 2002-02-06|