On Thursday, April 23, 2015 at 4:50:55 PM UTC-7, wrote:
I have given a lot of thought as to what I would do in my Ventus b given such circumstances and my conclusion is one that I have tried in the ventus but not in any other glider. I would ask Kirk to try it in his ls6 and report back.

Thinking of what breaks gliders up and it always comes down to speed. Over speed and something breaks off. So for the Ventus B the only way to be able to control only the speed, I would say here that the other two axis have to be at the stops so that the only thing I am controlling is pitch and therefore speed, BEFORE losing spacial awareness, I get it as dirty as I can. Full dive brakes, gear down. I don't have to worry about flaps as when the dive brakes our fully open the flaps are down, but if I have time I would put then down as well as it puts the ailerons down a bit as well. Then cross control to full deflection of the stick and depression of the rudder, doesn't matter which direction as long as you go to full deflection. Once the stick is at the aileron stop the only movement is pitch and that I focus on the airspeed indicator and keep it between 60-90 knots.

Now in the ventus this gives me a slow turning (30-45 second) spiral dive that is fairly stable and even in turbulence is easy enough to maintain 60-90 kts. This allows me to concentrate on only one thing airspeed. This is also giving me about a 2000 fpm descent rate usually enough to come out the bottom of most any cloud.

Any way, I would like to see if that would work in almost any glider or is it unique to the ventus. Flame shields on!

CH

I will make a point to try this in my Ventus C next time I have lots of altitude, and report back.

Matt