Icaro 2000 is constantly committed to giving its customers products of ever-increasing quality.
This means better performance, more enjoyment in flying, and greater safety.
Of course, the pilots’ attitude and behaviour are essential in ensuring safety.
For this reason, we encourage all owners of an Icaro 2000 hang glider to have their glider thoroughly checked and serviced regularly (at least once every two years).
This service can be requested from your Icaro 2000 dealer or directly from Icaro 2000.
The period of once every two years is sufficient when the hang glider has been used correctly. This means:
- Transportation using appropriate systems for supporting and fastening the packed hang glider
- Following the correct procedure for assembly and disassembly (above all with regard to the correct treatment of bracing wires)
- Complying with the glider’s structural limitations in flight
- Landings without direct or violent contact of the glider with the ground or other obstacles
- Correct storage of the glider, in a dry location, protected from sunlight
If one or more of these conditions is not fulfilled, it may be necessary to review the glider before the two-year period has elapsed. Examples of events requiring immediate service are:
- A violent contact of the nose with the ground on landing (nose-over).
This may cause the partial or complete fracture of the leading-edge tube even if this does not strike the ground directly.
A partial fracture of the tube is difficult to see without removing the sail.
- Violent contact of the control bar with the ground, during a “vertical descent” landing, can cause damage to the keel in the area in which it is in contact with the central crossbar block sliders, and distortion of the top A-frame bolt. As in the previous example, even if no damage is seen (usually the downtubes do not bend or break), the event may have caused structural problems.
In about half of the servicing operations that we perform on hang gliders, we discover that the top A-frame bolt is bent.
This means that all too often, hang gliders are not serviced sufficiently often, and above all they are not serviced after heavy landings.
In addition, it is important to remember that the lower side wires are constantly stressed during flight.
It is fundamentally important to ensure that they are in good condition, and they should be replaced at least every two years or every 100 hours of flight.
For pilots who fly hang gliders with a competition A-frame, the lower side wires should be replaced every year or every 70 hours flight, considering their smaller cross-section and greater rigidity.
Icaro 2000 and its dealers can provide maintenance services for its customers in most countries of the world, and they can despatch spare parts anywhere.
However, if the parts requested are for a hang glider over ten years old, Icaro 2000 prefers to examine the entire hang glider and replace parts if necessary using its own technicians, in order to ascertain the glider’s conformity with the latest standards of quality, therefore ensuring pilot safety.
The standard revision includes:
- Removal of the sail
- Complete examination of the frame
- Check of the profile of all battens
- Crossbar load test
- Checks for any signs of tube oxidation
- Checks on bolts and the respective threaded holes
- Replacement of lower side wires (and front and rear wires in the case of a competition control frame)
- Reassembly of the hang glider
- Check of glider adjustments
- Final checks
The prices for standard periodical maintenance services are as follows:
- Laminar with competition control frame & RX Bip € 430
- Laminar & MastR € 390
- Orbiter & RX2 € 350
- Old models Easy, Relax & Mars € 350
Important:
If we discover that extra parts have to be replaced with respect to the components replaced as part of the standard maintenance service, and their value exceeds € 50, we will contact the customer before completing the servicing operations.
At the end of the work, the customer will receive the maintenance service report detailing all the checks made.
Repairs
Before performing a repair job, we will give the customer a detailed estimate.
If the hang glider is more than 2 years old and was last serviced more than 2 years ago, the glider will be serviced during the repair operations.
In this case, the customer will pay just the price of the repairs, plus the parts that are replaced.
Flight test
After extensive repairs, or if five years have elapsed from the preceding service, we recommend a flight test performed by one of our test pilots. The cost of this is € 85 (inclusive of VAT). Safety is priceless!
All maintenance and repair operations are performed by appointment.
Documentation
After maintenance servicing, the customer is provided with a declaration of airworthiness for the hang glider, which includes a list of all the operations performed.
