February 26, Training

On Saturday the Ohio Flyers club had their annual meeting. So I drove out to Columbus Bolton Airfield and met a number of other area pilots that I haven't met at the field yet. The meeting consisted of socializing, talking about membership, site upkeep, and other club business. Many people also repacked their parachutes.

Sunday looked good to fly so a number of us students showed up for another day of towing. Another pilot named Ken was also there to fly his brand new Wills Wing U2. He unboxed it and set it up to fly in the afternoon. It was cool to see a brand new shiny hang glider fresh from the factory. While drooling over the glider I was surprised how loose the sail on the U2 is when the VG is off (Variable Geometry is a setting that can be adjusted in flight that changes the shape of the wing). On the U2 VG does an amazing job taking the sail from loose and billowy to drum tight. My Horizon has VG too but the difference between VG full on and full off is much smaller. At least visually in the looseness of the sail. However, now that I've had a few more days flying on the glider I'm starting to get a better understanding of the differences the VG makes while flying. What I haven't learned is when to use VG in order to take advantage of the performance changes. Do I use VG while thermaling? Should I use VG while towing, while landing, etc. Most people that I've talked to say this will eventually become a feel thing, or personal preference and I'll just use what "feels good" without "over-thinking" it or trying to calculate the absolute optimum VG setting for the situation.

I had 7 tows on Sunday. The winds were 6-12 mph and 20 or so aloft. So on the ground it was certainly an exercise in ground handling in strong conditions. The tows tended to be turbulent when you were towed up through gradients or rising air but otherwise it was sunny and warm and the air was buoyant with small pieces of lift to be found. I had a few good landings but I mostly I felt like I struggled. Most everyone flying also had some troubles so maybe I can blame it on conditions. Regardless I think I should be able to fix a number of things in order to improve my consistency later. A couple times I made poor approaches and ended up with wings not quite level during round out. This meant I was fighting to keep the glider under control when I flared and once I put my feet on the ground. The ground effect and the difference between wind speed down low and higher up meant that my glide along the ground was changing on approach. So at the top of my approach, it looked like I was right on track to land at the target cone. But as soon as you pass through the gradient and into ground effect your speed along the ground is suddenly much greater. So I tended to overshoot most landings by a little bit. And in one case a lot.

My 7 tows puts my total to 54 scooter tows since H2 for a total of 3 hours 30 minutes of flight time.I recorded all 7 flights but (as usual) I haven't looked over the footage or edited it together yet but I'll do that later today and post the finished product here.

February 5th, Scooter towing and SOARING!

After the illuminating discussion on Landings at the Oz Report, I went out to the field figuring I would try out a number of the techniques Jim Rooney talked about as well as working on spot landings some more. But I got a little sidetracked when instead of getting a bunch of short sled rides from the top of the tow to the landing target, I instead got a 10 minute and a 15 minute soaring flight. My first ever!!

Shortly after leaving the cart on the second tow.

The sky was clear, it was sunny with a calm wind 4-5 from the North or NNE. This let us make full length tows which dropped us off at about 900 or 1000 feet. One of the other H2's there today was Matt Gethers he took the first tow and came down absolutely grinning after feeling his very first piece of lift. He said he made a few turns through the lift and gained 100 feet or so and the feeling of the climb was fantastic. On my first tow at about 1:30pm I didn't find any of that lift, maybe a beep or two on the vario, but I didn't pursue it. I glided from one end of the field to the other, setup my landing and tried for the spot. I overshot by 30 feet or so. I still don't have a really good ability to judge my height, glide and also distance to a specific landing target.

On my second flight, as I topped out the tow, Willie (the man on the winch) back off the tension, but I was still feeling strong pulls from rough (or rising!) air. I got off the tow and felt the glider immediately want to turn, I went with it and saw that the vario was still beeping away the whole time. I got delivered right to a nice thermal and climbed from 900 to 1000 feet! The thermal became weaker so I slowed my turn a little and tried to keep the beeping going. At this point I noticed I was naturally drifting down wind but was apparently still in the rising air. This was first time I've gotten to experience the shape of that energetic and invisible column of rising air that gets pushed down wind as it rises. It's the same effect that you see on the billowing steam cloud rising from a cooling tower at a power plant or manufacturing plant. Except in the case of thermal activity my understanding is that it's much larger and rises much farther and can take a glider many thousands of feet up above the ground. Anyway, back to my flight. As I drifted down wind, circling all the while I ended up at 1350 feet and not far from right over everyone else lining up to start their scooter tows. While I was struggling to keep in what little lift was left I saw John, my instructor, start his scooter tow. After watching so many tows from the ground it is absolutely incredible seeing a glider climb on tow from high above him!

At 1800 ft. double the height of the tow!

I think I might have lost my concentration watching John tow up because I lost what little lift I had. While I was trying to find it again, John flew my direction and passed under me by about 200 feet. He flew a bit further down wind but even at his altitude of about 500 feet or so he found a good piece of lift and after two or three turns was above me! At this point I resigned to the fact that I was getting too low to be likely to find the lift again and I was already at a good spot to setup the landing, so I unzipped, opened the doors and aimed for the target. On the way in I found a significant piece of sinking air or even a small rotor from a nearby tree line that dropped me 100 feet or so very quickly. This reinforced with me the need for excellent speed while on approach in order to keep the wing flying when you encounter conditions like that or alternately to try and anticipate terrain features that encourage that kind of rotor and avoid them altogether. I ended up landing 60 feet in front of the target and flared poorly but still stayed on my feet and caught the glider on my shoulder.

Meanwhile John made a few more turns but ended up landing only a few minutes later. He guessed that the strong lift he felt was more like a bubble that lifted him up but didn't persist at all after the big mass of rising air passed by.

First landing of the day.

And unbelievably my third flight went even better! Again I was lucky enough to get off tow right in lift. This time the lift was stronger and even larger in area. I found I could make a few turns and at some point I would feel (and hear on the vario) that the lift was especially strong. If I stopped my turn at that point and leveled out I would climb 75-100 feet in 5 or 6 seconds and could resume turning when I felt my climb slowing. In total I got off tow at 900 feet and climbed to about 1800 feet! I couldn't believe I doubled my height off tow! Also, this third flight was later in the day and there was less wind so I didn't end up drifting almost at all. I stayed right above the tow which position and climbed as much as I could. Eventually I fell out or it died off, I have no idea which, and headed back for the landing target. I made a few more turns each time I flew through another piece of lift but didn't gain anything more. I landed pretty close to the target but in my effort to avoid making an approach near any tree lines or possible rotor locations, my up wind landing put me 25 feet or so to the left of the target. But this time my judgment of distance was pretty much right on.

In total 3 tows for 29 minutes of flight time, an enormous difference when compared to my previous best day.

I filmed my 3 flights from a camera on my control bar but I haven't edited the video yet. I don't know how the camera angle will turn out but I'll do that this evening after work and post the video here when I do!