The Carbon Dragon was intended to take advantage of the US
FAR 103 Ultralight Vehicles regulations that classify unpowered aircraft with empty weights of or less as
hang gliders and thus allow them to be flown without a pilot license,
Federal Aviation Administration aircraft registration or a
Certificate of Airworthiness. The Carbon Dragon's standard empty weight is and the aircraft has a gross weight of , giving a payload of . The designer said "The philosophy behind its development was to try to bring foot launch soaring performance up into the lower performance range of sailplanes." The Carbon Dragon was intended to be similar in concept to the
Hall Vector 1. The Carbon Dragon was designed to be launched by foot-launch,
aero-tow,
winch-launch,
auto-tow or
bungee launch. In October 1988 Maupin reported that the prototype had been flown by ten different pilots ranging in weight from , had achieved a 100 fpm (0.51 m/s) sink rate and had been launched by auto-tow, aero-tow and bungee, but had not been foot-launched. In October 1988 Maupin estimated that building a Carbon Dragon would cost US$2000 and take 1000–1500 hours of construction time. When they were available the plans consisted of 23 sheets of 2' X 4' (61 X 122 cm) blueprints and sold for US$150. At least one Carbon Dragon was modified to include a cockpit roof-mounted pentagonal
spoiler, similar to that used on the
Maupin Windrose. ==Operational history==