PEEL GLIDER BOAT

The Peel Glider-Boat Company designed the Glider Boat to be a low cost glider that would appeal to individuals who couldn’t afford to buy an airplane, but were still caught up in the flying fever that swept America following Charles Lindbergh’s epic 1927 flight.

The Glider Boat was a biplane glider with a stepped flying boat hull and wingtip floats. Two people could sit tandem in the Glider Boat’s open cockpit, which had conventional dual controls, but no instruments. The Glider Boat hull was built entirely of duralumin of two step hydroplane design and had fabric covered, wood wings.

The Glider Boat was designed to be towed aloft behind a speed boat cruising at 25 miles per hour. The tow rope was joined to a bridle which attached to either side of the nose outside the front cockpit. Once the Glider Boat reached 1000 feet altitude, or the maximum height the tow rope would allow, the rope was cut loose and the aircraft would glide to a gentle landing on the water. At a glide ratio of 18 to 1, the Glider Boat was capable of traveling about three and a half miles with a thousand foot tow line.

Beginning in 1930, a total of 30 Peel Glider Boats were built before the company folded due to the Depression.

• Peel Glider Boat Specifications