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Avian Hang Gliders

@avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business

The UK's only hang glider manufacturer. We build hang gliders from sky floaters to high performance competition wings and wings for sub-70 nanolight trikes.
To support the latest in hang glider development please see my Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/hgdev
To find out more about the sport of hanggliding please check out:
https://www.hanggliding.co.uk
For our online shop for gliders, parts and accessories please visit:
https://www.avianonline.co.uk

#hanggliding
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45 Followers

56 Following

18 Posts

Joined January 26, 2023

#hanggliding:

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Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Mar 06, 2026

A lot of engineering design is about trade-offs, and hang gliders are no exception. Sometimes though, it is possible to do things differently and better. We're really pleased to announce the Dynamic Cross Link (DXL) concept, the Puma is set to be the first glider to benefit, but more will follow. There's a full video which will Premiere on YouTube tomorrow morning (Saturday 7th, 10am UK time), please tune in for that, for the moment, there's a quick trailer on there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGanSCcUdk4

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Mar 06, 2026

Replying to @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business

@freecad@social.freecad.org If anyone has suggestions for the Appearance settings to make the X look more metallic then please let me know. The logo is supposed to visually echo the noseplates.

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Mar 06, 2026

This #freecadfriday I've been finding @freecad@social.freecad.org useful for designing a logo for our new Dynamic Cross Link (DXL) system. I know something like #blender would probably be a more suitable tool for this sort of thing, but I'm so much more competent in FreeCAD that I could knock up a 3D logo and animate it for my video in about half an hour instead of having to (re)learn Blender. I like the effect.

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Feb 11, 2026

@matthewcroughan@social.defenestrate.it @neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk Something of a paradox here. If you found a religion that would make you a prophet making organisation....

social.defenestrate.it

defenestrate.it

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Feb 10, 2026

@matthewcroughan@social.defenestrate.it @neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk I don't know, I haven't seriously looked at it (as I say, I'm happy with Quickfile and I don't have the time to change systems without a really good reason), but it appears from a cursory inspection that ERP GAP (I don't know who they are) are offering the connector that they say connects Odoo (including "Community edition", so presumably self hosted) to MTD. 5 minutes web searching will put you ahead of me on this! If you do go this route I'll be interested how it works.

social.defenestrate.it

defenestrate.it

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Feb 10, 2026

@matthewcroughan@social.defenestrate.it @neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk it came in a few (5 or 6?) years ago for VAT registered businesses, why I switched to Quickfile. I've been happy with Quickfile, yes it's SaaS, but it's given me good service at a fair price. Someone recently pointed me to this: https://www.odoo.com/ Open Source enterprise software. Looks like it does have an MTD connector. Full blown enterprise software, so a bit overkill for Avian and even more so for a sole trader, but interesting, didn't exist when I chose Quickfile

social.defenestrate.it

defenestrate.it

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Feb 01, 2026

Replying to on chaos.social

@cccpresser@chaos.social you don't need to build it yourself! Just go to https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD/releases and you can download pre built executables for Linux, Mac or Windows. There's the v1.1 Release Candidate there and also even more cutting edge weekly builds.

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 30, 2026

Replying to on piaille.fr

@Acionna@piaille.fr @FreeCAD@fosstodon.org yes, although I'd like to be able to do the meshing, case setup, and visualisation within FreeCAD (as already implemented for Calculix). I want to use Code Aster as it's better for shells (I need composites). I haven't used Code Saturne much, I mostly use OpenFOAM for full field CFD, through the excellent CfdOF workbench which does all the preproc. I still mostly postproc with Paraview. What are you using Code Saturne for?

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 30, 2026

Replying to on piaille.fr

@Acionna@piaille.fr @FreeCAD@fosstodon.org Brilliant! For some time I've been trying to integrate Code Aster into FreeCAD, although not getting as far with it as I'd like: https://github.com/AMRC-Composites/FreeCAD-CodeAster/tree/main

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 30, 2026

Continuing my series of posts on the development work we've been doing so far, this one is about the frame and how it works to give good handling: https://www.patreon.com/posts/149280801

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 16, 2026

@anne_twain@theblower.au @pluralistic@mamot.fr another example of "even if you're paying you're still the product" is how much crap the software companies push into 'business productivity' software. Having used mainly Linux for several years I'm always shocked to see Windows (on a corporate managed system) pushing so many clickbait news story notifications. A company is paying for Windows and yet Microsoft is actively trying to distract that company's workers, all for a few fractions of a penny click through revenue.

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 10, 2026

@perthwolfman@aus.social the bloody thing attacks hang gliders also!

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 09, 2026

A big thank you to everyone that's sponsoring my development efforts through Patreon (www.patreon.com/hgdev). We're making progress, so I'm writing up a summary of what we've achieved so far, the first section is here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/hows-it-going-1-147742037

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 09, 2026

@bert_hubert@eupolicy.social @concretedog@mastodon.social I think this ties is your question about why OSS engineering software isn't used in academia (and also in engineering companies, academia isn't really different to a corporation in this respect). "Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" works just as well if you substitute CATIA/Creo/NX for IBM. People say they are "industry standard" (despite conforming to no "standard" in an accurate sense of the word), what they mean is "I can't be blamed for what they do/don't do".

eupolicy.social

bert hubert 🇺🇦🇪🇺🇺🇦 (@bert_hubert@eupolicy.social) - EUpolicy.social - A Mastodon server for the EU bubb

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 08, 2026

Used @FreeCAD@fosstodon.org to design the moulds for the winglet. So printing the patterns (Prusa XL) to make moulds from which eventually the carbon parts will be made from. There's a pair of winglets, each mould is in 2 halves (plus some small loose pieces), the pattern for each half is printed in two sections and the print takes nearly 2 days. So about 2 weeks of solid 3D printing time to do the full set.

fosstodon.org

FreeCAD (@FreeCAD@fosstodon.org) - Fosstodon

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 06, 2026

@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social @concretedog@mastodon.social yes, actually as correction I shouldn't say just academia increasingly filled with bean counters, the same also goes for government and also for most large businesses!

mastodon.social

Koen Hufkens, PhD (@koen_hufkens@mastodon.social) - Mastodon

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 06, 2026

@concretedog@mastodon.social @koen_hufkens@mastodon.social also measurement fallacy. Academia increasingly filled with bean counters. Bean counters need beans to count.

Avian Hang Gliders @avian__dup_35650@mstdn.business · Jan 06, 2026

@concretedog@mastodon.social one way to approach this might be to contact the "Value Added Resellers". One reason SolidWorks became so popular is the VAR network they built up.
https://www.solidworks.com/how-to-buy/find-solidworks-reseller/
Potentially these might see a good business in selling support and customisation for FreeCAD. Paying for engineering software is something that all engineering companies expect, but then they expect a level of service too. You or I aren't going to give them that, but these guys might.

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bert hubert 🇺🇦🇪🇺🇺🇦 (@bert_hubert@eupolicy.social) - EUpolicy.social - A Mastodon server for the EU bubb

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