[OSCAR]

Sounds good to me, this is what I do,If there's no wind I hold the glider up with a grapevine grip strap tight ,grip firm just enough to hold up the glider,and as I feel the glider pulling me up I gradually release my grip to get some feed back from the glider but I wont change grips until I'm away from the mountain.now in turbulence ,I'll let the glider fly up to launch before I'm hooked in just to feel things out .but once I'm hooked in I'll keep the hang strap tight and My grip tight ,wings level I don't let the glider fly where it wants to.It's to easy to blow a launch .I also keep the same grip in the same place well into my launch .I won't Hand transition until I'm out of the danger Zone and in clear air .There's lots of Different techniques.Mine works for me.

[AIRTHUG]

[Wingspan34]

[Paul H]

Your wings should be balanced which will not necessarily mean they will be level.

[gluesniffer]

ryan said

[AIRTHUG]

to each his own I guess... my opinion is stated... readers can pick and choose for themselves what they see/believe/practice...

[day dreamer]

YOu know guys, I like the discussion my vid created. I will say that I agree with Oscar,and Jspin. In LOW WIND situations. I haven't been flying with this harness too long, so I will keep what you guys are saying in mind. But I also agree with Wingspan in the fact that at least at McClure, if there is little or no wind, I just don't like the risk of what could happen if I didn't get off that hill. I chose to fly because I thought it would be good to have experience to be able to do a launch in such conditions there. Don't wan't to make it a regular thing, but if I'm feeling froggy. Now at a place like edlevin, I don't think I would be so apprehensive about doing such a launch. I am trying to find the best out of this harness, and trying to make it as comfortable as my Z-4 was. And I will try to pay better attention to my AoA if that is what is seen. I still can't get past that part where my strap goes tight, and the glider does dive a bit. But to me it looks like to AoA was affected because of that. I did think my AoA was correct for the conditions. I also think that the back plate is another thing I have to get used to as well. But it's all good!! I got the next two years before the end of the world to get it right!! By then my samurai will need sharpening! And I have got some of the best mentors around me to help.

[OSCAR]

[gluesniffer]

you guys lifting your wings up must have arms like popeye. LIft all you want, you will feel less when you do however, but then guys built like popeye don't care about stinkin feelings

[OSCAR]

Thats right ,We just muscle that wing around and put it where we want it....Right .

[GuitarPilot]

I don't see the nose pop or a dip. God that scares me if I'm not seeing something that is there. That looked like a very controlled and solid launch. Head and shoulders through the control frame. Could he have been pulled in anymore? Doesn't look like it. What am I not seeing? Maybe some one could give me a time lapse number ( example 0:31). If there is something wrong with this launch then I'm concerned about my launches. If your afraid of being rude PM me about it.

[AIRTHUG]

Perhaps this will help those that don't see what I'm talking about...

In the first image, I drew a line along the slope of the hill, and along the keel of the glider. The angle formed between these two lines represents his angle of attack, since he is running down that slope, that is the relative direction of airflow over the wing.

It might not look too bad, until you look at the second image, which I rotated until the ground angle is 'flat'. Now you can see that, if he were running on flat ground, that's a pretty high nose angle. There's a whole intricate explanation of how lower performing (single surface) gliders can have a high nose angle (measured at the keel), because they have more reflex. But this is a U2, not a very high-twist glider...

In the last image, taken just after he took his last step and he's flying (mushing) away... look at his arm extension. Look at the angle of his hang strap (this is where the glider feels his weight). He is pushing out to get off the hill.

Now watch the launch again, and focus on the part where he 'dives' away after running. He's not pulling in That is the glider diving to pick up speed because it is mushing (due to the high AofA).

Now obviously his AofA wasn't "TOO" high, or he wouldn't have made it off the hill. But I feel it was higher than appropriate, and if that exact same launch were performed in less wind, on a shallower slope with less room, and/or at higher altitude, it may not have looked so pretty.

I know my tone doesn't always come across the way I mean it to on the splinternet, but I'm trying to help and educate here (and apparently it's a lesson a lot more people need to learn, before they learn it the hard way)

[Paul H]

Those pics are a perfect illustration for what we often try to explain to out of town pilots when they come here to fly at Slide Mt. Too many pilots just don't get it. They think the nose of their glider is really low when its even with or slightly above the horizon, but they are launching down a very steep slope and they end up running much further than they should have to. The horizon is not a good reference point for setting the pitch or bank angles of a glider when launching. The angle of the launch and the wind are the proper determining factors.

[Wingspan34]

Ryan,

I read your last post (above) and thought "Good point." But then, I thought some more.

It doesn't really make sense to rotate the image - because the air was barely moving. It's upslope velocity was trivial.

There was hardly any air flow at all. Most of the air flow was generated by DD's efforts to accelerate the glider forward.

So, if it were possible to do so from the limited perspective of a single-point-of-view video, what you'd actually need to do is analyze DD's own forward "thrust vector" as it related to a mainly stationary air mass. Of course you may want to factor in the tiny effect that a 1 - 2 mph in/upward breeze would create.

So, in actuality, it was DD's own forward motion that created the greatest movement of air over his wing - not some nearly non-existent, parallel-to-the-slope-of-the-hill wind.

Yes, he might have been mushing the glider into the air, but not because it was nearly stalled (because of improper nose angle) but because he could barely run fast enough to create an adequate flow of air over the wing to produce ample lift to get himself and the glider into the air. He was playing the game of Russian Roulette which I previously mentioned.

Also -

Even with a stronger up hill breeze, the motion of the air EFFECTIVELY changes by some degree relative to the direction and speed of the combined pilot/wing's own direction of forward motion.

The closer the wind is to the glider's minimum air speed, the more important it is to have the wing properly set to the correct angle of attack - as pilot and glider proceed into that air flow. 1) Because the wing will create stronger forces more quickly as you begin moving forward, and 2) The direction of the glider/pilot combination never becomes fast enough to moderate any misalignment of AOA (since the forward speed needed to achieve lift off is so small).

Things to realize:

- When the wind is light or dead, the pilot's ability to adequately accelerate the glider to flying speed is the most critical issue - granting that s/he has a proper AOA relative to the pilot/wing's forward motion into the (calm) air.

- When the wind is in the 15 - 18 mph range (or above), the pilot's ability to properly set the AOA is the most critical issue - granting that s/he will not have any difficulty moving the glider forward into the existing air flow and accelerating it up to flying speed.

- When the wind is above 18 mph, AOA between the wing and relative oncoming (uphill) airflow becomes super critical. Adequate forward acceleration of the pilot/wing (as initiated by the pilot) becomes relatively unimportant.
[One should note however, that in high wind conditions, once leaving the ground - and while negotiating a safe exit from the immediate terrain near launch (including any associated obstacles) - forward speed, relative to the ground, can be important.]

[AIRTHUG]

[gluesniffer]

ryan - you say dreamer is pushing out on his last step, however his hands are still in the grapevine as he is leaving the ground as can be seen in the last frame of your post The grapevine pulls the nose down, not push it out. If he did push out and mush himself off the mountain, there is no alttitude loss afterward the "supposed pushout". He only has a smooth flight away from the mountain. If someone is pushing out it will result in a drop eventually, yet there isn't one here.


Dreamer- you suck- put your wing on craigslist and buy some rollerblades

[AIRTHUG]

If he's not pushing out, why are his arms extended, and his hang strap angled back behind his hang loop?

[Wingspan34]

[AIRTHUG]

[Wingspan34]