View Poll Results: A poll
Program your Transmitter.
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Eat ice cream and wait for the wind.
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Ask someone to lend you a powerpod.
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Cry.
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Voters: 11. You may not vote on this poll
What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
04-14-2008, 09:49 AM
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What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
What do you do when there is no wind, you do not have an electric glider and the foamy guys are playing around, the electric glider people are flying and you are sitting down waiting for Mother Nature to send you a hurricane?
04-14-2008, 03:27 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Remember, even if you are on the slopes, its rarely more than 2 miles from good Ale in this civilised country - if it is you''re on the wrong site. As the converse of Sir Francis Chichester''s famous comment on his first round the world solo sailing trip - ''if it blows hard, go below, have a stiff Scotch, and the gale reduces to a Force 6''. 2 pints of good ale almost guanantees at least some breeze. More beer = more wind.
Daveosoar.
Daveosoar.
04-14-2008, 05:48 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Fly Thermal Duration or get out a glow plane and do some Towing. I still think the pub is a great idea too.
A little Pitch (hand launch) and catch?
A little Pitch (hand launch) and catch?
04-15-2008, 08:08 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Good advice everyone! I do like free flighters but have not had the time to buy or make one. About hotliners: they are expensive. This sounds like I''m poor, but my budget is very limited, and insufficient for electric models...
04-15-2008, 08:25 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Lol... That reminds me of a joke glider pilots at my slope say to foamy pilots and hotliner guys... They would say: come on, let me fly behind you so I can get some of that 11.5 volt wind! A guy actually tried flying with a Weasel behind a scale ASW, and he did fly a little with the other plane''s backwash, but as soon as the other plane started climbing the Weasel plummeted to its death...
04-21-2008, 10:49 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
The funny thing is that when this used to happen to me down at the Gorge I'd be standing there thinking "if only I'd brought along an RC model to play with until the wind comes back".
Zagiz, building free flight models is a form of therapy. And it doesn't need to be all that fancy stick and tissue stuff either. There's a sweet little model called the Zip that was made from about one sheet of 1/32x3. If you can't make two of them in an evening or two (allowing for glue drying here) then you should be forced to surrender your Xacto knife in shame.
Zagiz, building free flight models is a form of therapy. And it doesn't need to be all that fancy stick and tissue stuff either. There's a sweet little model called the Zip that was made from about one sheet of 1/32x3. If you can't make two of them in an evening or two (allowing for glue drying here) then you should be forced to surrender your Xacto knife in shame.
04-22-2008, 07:10 AM
#14
RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
I never go flying with less than 3 planes.
If I am at the slope, one is usually an e glider, one a light glider and one a heavy glider.
BTW, I did not select any of the choices offered in the survey as none of them fit. When I go to fly, I go prepared to fly in whatever conditions I find. Seems everyone else has a similar appoach as no one has replied to the survey as of this post.
About a month ago, we were forecast for good winds for slope soaring, but when we hit the hill, there was barely a breeze at all. So, just for fun, I pull out my Polecat XP-5 DLG. I tossed it out over the cliff and it stayed up rather nicely. There could not have been more than 1-2 mph breeze but it was enough to keep the DLG flying.
On another occasion we had 15 mph winds and headed for a beach with a high dune facing that direction. But there was some kind of construction going on there and they would not let us fly. So we went further down the beach. Biggest rise could not have been more than 4 feet, but we flew for hours. DLG, Easy Gliders and one fellow had a 100" TD glider that he was working at 6 feet off the beach.
Seems we always find something.
If I am at the slope, one is usually an e glider, one a light glider and one a heavy glider.
BTW, I did not select any of the choices offered in the survey as none of them fit. When I go to fly, I go prepared to fly in whatever conditions I find. Seems everyone else has a similar appoach as no one has replied to the survey as of this post.
About a month ago, we were forecast for good winds for slope soaring, but when we hit the hill, there was barely a breeze at all. So, just for fun, I pull out my Polecat XP-5 DLG. I tossed it out over the cliff and it stayed up rather nicely. There could not have been more than 1-2 mph breeze but it was enough to keep the DLG flying.
On another occasion we had 15 mph winds and headed for a beach with a high dune facing that direction. But there was some kind of construction going on there and they would not let us fly. So we went further down the beach. Biggest rise could not have been more than 4 feet, but we flew for hours. DLG, Easy Gliders and one fellow had a 100" TD glider that he was working at 6 feet off the beach.
Seems we always find something.
04-22-2008, 05:05 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Well, I have a website that gives me a good forecast of wind conditions here in Peru, but the measurement is from the airport which is a few miles from my slope. Half of the time I take all of my planes, (two Zagis, an elliptical wing, a Talon and a Ferox, which is a Peruvian design slope racer) just to find the wind sock hanging and fog covering the entire place. Then, while I go to the nearby store to eat or drink something, the trees start shaking and the wind raises. I run to the slope... too late, the wind is gone again. So then I stay at the slope all the time to see if the wind raises again... Guess what? even the tiny leaves of bushes on the slope stop moving. But then , there are the days that there is so much wind that you have to put a few ounces of lead in the nose to keep the plane from backflipping over and behind you and hitting someone or getting blown away. About hotliners or electric gliders: I have never had one except an electric Zagi, which I lost due to interference. I am a pure glider pilot and I am proud of it. Peace!
09-03-2008, 12:29 AM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
I can remember several guys hand launching 2 meter gliders and trying to touch a hay bale and still make it back to a hand catch.
well it looked easy!
well it looked easy!
09-03-2008, 03:15 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
An event at my slope when there is no wind (event as in doing whatever to avoid dying of boredom) was to launch a small glider such as a Fling and loop twice off the launch, then try to keep the plane up for more than a minute
09-04-2008, 11:28 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Walk to the parking area to fart.... if you have ever eaten the bratwursts at our field you would understand
09-05-2008, 06:59 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Well, after the saying that a plane could fly on rodent flatulence, OzMo, I wouldnt be surprised if someone tries to fly on the flatulence of a larger mammal (if you dont get it you might want to think of humans...)
09-05-2008, 11:09 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
some guys think glow fuel is hard to clean off Nice pics of a thermal Tall Paul. It is true the air seldom is totally still.
09-06-2008, 09:12 AM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Is that what a thermal looks like? Ive been researching about thermalling but have not started to do so because I dont really have a site so thermal that is close to where I live. I am also getting into DS, as I have found a site and am buying a JW-60.
09-06-2008, 08:13 PM
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RE: What do you do when the wind sock is hanging?
Yes it is what a thermal looks like when there is dust in it. Often this occurs with very little dust and is not noticed. The really good glider giders will notice even if there are just a minimum of stuff in it such as insects, floating seeds such as dandilion.
When there is a visable dust we often call them "Dust Devils". But it is created by rising, warmer than the ambient, air.... a thermal.
Big ones are also known as a hat suckers, there are many names but I can't recall any more. I believe this is caused towards the end of a mass of air rising off the warm ground. When the air on the ground is depleted there will still be a bubble of warm air rising and it is still a thermal. When you see one of these GO FOR IT! This air will go up quickly.
If we think about the non visable air around this we realize some it is being sucked down towards the bottom of this column.
Alex, if you have air you have thermals. The sun shines on us all. Air on the sunny side of a mountain will do it well. Air warmed by water does the same thing. An extreme example would be a water spout.
When there is a visable dust we often call them "Dust Devils". But it is created by rising, warmer than the ambient, air.... a thermal.
Big ones are also known as a hat suckers, there are many names but I can't recall any more. I believe this is caused towards the end of a mass of air rising off the warm ground. When the air on the ground is depleted there will still be a bubble of warm air rising and it is still a thermal. When you see one of these GO FOR IT! This air will go up quickly.
If we think about the non visable air around this we realize some it is being sucked down towards the bottom of this column.
Alex, if you have air you have thermals. The sun shines on us all. Air on the sunny side of a mountain will do it well. Air warmed by water does the same thing. An extreme example would be a water spout.
