Ikarus Meteor

The Meteor was designed by the same duo, Boris Cijan and Stanko Obad, who had produced the Orao glider which had achieved third place in the 1950 WGC.

"[1] In 1955 almost all gliders had wooden structures, with perhaps a few unstressed GRP parts; in contrast the Meteor was all-metal, with a large, 20 m (65 ft 7 in) span and an aspect ratio of 25, values beyond the reach of wood.

[1] The Meteor was one of a group of mid-1950s gliders to use the NACA 6 series laminar flow airfoil first adopted by the Ross-Johnson RJ-5, which required careful attention to profile control and surface finish.

Completely metal-skinned, the wing is built around a box spar within which the thickened skin is internally stiffened with span-wise stringers.

The high aspect ratio, straight tapered tailplane is mounted above the fuselage on the fillet forward of the fin's leading edge.

During that time glider construction moved decisively from wood to composites, but the open class metal Meteor was not out-classed.