December 17

We had a half day today at Wes/Mar. It was cold and overcast with a chance of some precipitation. On my way there I saw some light snow falling but when I pulled up Noel, Matt, and Mike were all there setting up gliders to fly. I got out the Northwing Horizon again and flew it for the second time.

I do like that glider. I think it looks amazing with Red, Yellow and Blue underside and White top. It also feels great in the air. Now that I've been seriously considering buying a glider I've started thinking about how to actually make a decision. I've done some reading on a few different gliders that I figured would be in my skill range and pretty much across the board the reviews are good. I didn't really see much difference in customer reviews between the Northwing Horizion, Airborne Sting, or the Wills Wing Sport 2. And anyways I don't think reading reviews is nearly enough to make a decision. I want to see and feel and fly the glider I'm buying. So I think I've gotten pretty lucky with this Horizon being for sale at the training field. I've gotten the chance to fly the glider and I know exactly what I'm getting. So this has easily brought this glider to the top of my list. Add to that the good looks of the glider and I'm pretty much ready to buy it now. I enjoy flying it and find it easy to handle and land and figure I'll be able to stick with this glider for quite a while.

So I ended up with another 5 tows totaling some 25 minutes! Not much flight time compared to any veteran pilots average day but it was far more than my previous few days averaging only a minute or two per flight. The weather made this day particularly interesting too. It was overcast and cold and even snowing lightly while we were flying! But the air was unstable and there were cumulus clouds showing signs of thermal activity. It might have been a soaring day if any of us had the skill (and luck) to find the good lift. I did find some very light lift that let me make 3 or 4 full 360 degree turns without loosing any altitude at all. I was able to watch the vario and saw myself stay right around 715 feet the whole time (45 seconds or so). I wonder what kind of difference I would have seen if I had made larger radius turns, or tried flying a little slower etc. I think learning how to take full advantage of the invisible and unpredictable currents of rising air is something that will only come with lots of experience but I did get a small taste!

 

I think I've still got some bad habbits with my landing flare. Sometimes my weak or poorly timed flare still results in a decent landing but I find myself off balance or with wings not level. I'll have to work on this better next time I get out there.

I think these videos are also getting a little boring. I'm glad I have them to look over and learn from but as the flight time increases it becomes less and less interesting to include the whole flight in the video. Maybe next time I'll start editing the videos more to show just the highlights or something.