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Novation

Feeling the Air

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A couple from XP11 with xEnviro and Blu FX. Over Ortho with GB Pro.

ccf870eaccab2dde0554c7cac4735310.jpg

I've no idea what I'm doing with a glider :bengong: but it looks nice.

604c6887cef5c7e7903a88f16462d35b.jpg

 

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Sail Planes very popular...lovely captures!

HLJAMES

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Couple of very nice shots!  The sky is beautiful.


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17 hours ago, Novation said:

A couple from XP11 with xEnviro and Blu FX. Over Ortho with GB Pro.

ccf870eaccab2dde0554c7cac4735310.jpg

I've no idea what I'm doing with a glider :bengong: but it looks nice.

604c6887cef5c7e7903a88f16462d35b.jpg

 

If you want some advice on gliders, ask Chock.  As I remember from years ago, he was pretty heavy into it RW and had a ton of knowledge.


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Different and very Cool:biggrin:


100%75%50%d8a34be0e82d98b5a45ff4336cd0dddc

0D8701AB-1210-4FF8-BD6C-309792740F81.gif

Patrick

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19 hours ago, Novation said:

Ive no idea what I'm doing with a glider :bengong: but it looks nice.

Simple in theory. Look for sources of lift: (Thermal lift: there will be rising air under cumulous clouds, since those clouds are formed when rising air cools and moisture condenses to form a cloud, although bear in mind that the lift below it will be somewhat upwind of where the cloud actually is. If you are clever, you can look upwind of where the cloud is and work out what the source of the thermal lift is, buildings with heat coming out of them, ploughed fields with the sun on them, large areas of tarmac etc, these are all good sources of thermals. This is why you see cumulous clouds forming in lines, called thermal streets, since thermals are always going to drift downwind from their source. Ridge lift: found on the side of hills with the wind blowing toward the hill, so the air is going up over the hill, if you fly in that rising air, you will go up with it even when your aircrft is descending, because the air it is descending through is going up faster than your rate of descent).

There is also standing wave lift, which is rarer and usually only found in undulating or mountainous terrain. It is essentially very similar to ridge lift in how it starts out, but then it gets into a repeating oscillating cycle of going up and down over the undulating terrain and as a result, can end up stretching for miles and getting up to what glider pilots call 'diamond heights' (inamed after the FAI badge you get which has diamonds on it, and which is granted to you if you record a height gain of very many thousands of feet).

Unlike thermals and ridge lift, which can be quite turbulent, standing wave lift is incredibly smooth to fly in and can take you up to the kind of altitudes which airliners cruise at, but as with being on the wrong side of a ridge, being in the descending cycle of a standing wave can be dangerous, since you can find yourself in descending air which is dropping down at a rate which can far outweigh your aircraft's ability to climb, even powered aircraft have come to grief in that on occasion.

Depending on the glider type, it will have a variometer (the bent looking 'antenna' on the glider's tail is the variometer's air data probe). A vario will either have audio or simply be a gauge with a needle. When you see the needle go upwards, you are in rising air (and you may hear a high pitch tone), If the needle points down, you are in sinking air (and you may hear a low tone). Bear in mind however that the vario is an instrument with reads an average, so it isn't 'instantaneous' like a vertical speed indicator.

The basic concept of gliding is to fly slow in rising air and fly fast in sinking air (for obvious reasons).

So, if you hit a thermal, you circle around (in steep bank, i.e. much steeper than a typical GA aeroplane's turn) to stay in that lift, studying the vario readings will allow you to centre your aircraft in the thermal. When the thermal peters out (usually just under the cloud), you look for another cloud and perform a high speed dash to that new cloud and repeat the process.

With ridge lift, you essentially track backwards and forwards along the ridge in the lift by pointing your glider into the wind at about 45 degrees off the line of the ridge, then track along it flying as slowly as you can. At the end of each track, you turn away from the ridge and repeat the process going the other way along the ridge.

As with a real glider, keeping an eye out for potential sources of lift is the key, but also keeping an eye out for other gliders, since it is not uncommon to be in very close proximity to other gliders which are using the same thermal. That means mid air collision is a very real risk in gliders, which is why parachutes are worn. Even in a sim, you should get into the habit of always looking out before you commence any sort of turn, since that will reinforce a good habit which will stick with you if you ever fly a glider for real, which you should, because it is great fun and very challenging.

Another fun thing to note about gliders, is that unlike most GA aeroplanes, you will find most of them are stressed for aerobatics (usually +4/-2, but often more), so you will see many of them equipped with a G meter, and they are almost all cleared for spinning.

Anyway, nice pics.

 

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Alan Bradbury

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Thanks all :)

 

On 3/11/2017 at 2:50 PM, Chock said:

Simple in theory.

Hi Chock. Thank you very much you for all that. I will have to read through it a few times, but....

I'm going to dig in to this and try to get to grips with the art of gliding/sailing. There is something primal, and somehow deeply peaceful (no doubt quite stressful, and not really peaceful in real life) about this form of flying that greatly appeals.

Onwards and hopefully upwards, some of the time at least :biggrin:

 

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On ‎11‎.‎03‎.‎2017 at 3:50 PM, Chock said:

source of the thermal lift is, buildings with heat coming out of them, ploughed fields with the sun on them, large areas of tarmac etc, these are all good sources of thermals

Sitting in the nice vskylabs Phoenix U15 with the engine running, I wonder how much of that (and the other lift types) are simulated in X-Plane (11)? 

------------------------------

Ok, the Ridge lift at least seems to work. I turned Thermals on (max rate and coverage) in the weather setup. Wind coming from west. Then I took of from my lovely neighborhood glider field "Ohlstadt-Pömetsried" XED7O, climbed 3000 ft and then went for the mountain range that is directly east of the airport. And indeed, there were areas of lift, again and again. Continuing south along the mountains I could climb quite a bit and continuing that direction I managed to sail/glide (?) all the way to LOWI, Innsbruck. That was awesome! :-) Totally unexpected: Low in the valley, towards the runway there were again spots of lift which affected my glide path towards the runway. 

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Novation - if you get the opportunity, try gliding for real. It can be peaceful, especially with an instructor in the back keeping you alive :cool:

 

By the way - any reason you had the airbrakes out? You seemed quite high up and it would be a shame to dump all that height, unless you really wanted to! :)

 

AnsorgJ - you can get disturbances at low altitude in real life gliding too. Experienced it myself at my local club. One occasion was on the downwind leg (instructor was in control) we hit a thermal and he had to deploy the airbrakes briefly to kill the extra lift. Another time was when I had just turned on to the base leg and the glider started bouncing around - we'd gone through the rotor of air coming off the hill. At least my instructor knew it wasn't me faffing about with the stick!


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