Using Plasma Rope For Winch Tows

The club, 'DJK' in Landau in der Pfalz, Germany, had
many GREAT winch operators! The only instrument, I
think (hey, this was from 1983 till 1986), was a tach
and maybe a engine coolant temperature gauge. I think
they operated mainly by sight and sound. Yep, they
were great operators! I think their rules stipulated
at least 100 operations with an instructor before they
could operate solo.

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA
(who misses winch launching in the Land of Aero Tows)

At 13:48 12 August 2003, Bill Daniels wrote:
Let me add that if the winch driver provides the right
acceleration, the
pilot of a K-8, or any similar glider, will be unaware
of the pitch-up
tendency. Ray, you were blessed with the services
of a good winch driver.
Bill Daniels

'Jonathan Gogan' wrote in message
...
Ray;
Ka8 well known for pitch-up on winch-launch with
lighter (ladies or small/medim men) pilots but still
well within W&B
limits.
I have no such problem being f*t g*t but that is not
altogether a good
thing
;-)
J.


'Ray Lovinggood' wrote in message
...
I have flown a K8 from a winch launch several dozen
times and never experienced a 'pitch up' as you describe.
I was trained for winch launching on a Ka-7 and then
was moved into the K8. I loved it! The winch, a
Tost
unit, I think, was powered by a General Motors V-8
gasoline engine which was mounted on an ancient Mercedes
truck of maybe 5 ton capacity.

The winch was great for launching the single-seaters.
My best altitude at release height was 700 meters
in the K8. The winch could have used a bit more grunt
for launching the Grob 103, but it still managed to
get to 400 meters or so.

Could the weight and balance been out of limits on
the K8 you were launching?

I wish our club had a winch! Then, I would get to
drive the 'Lepo' again!

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA
LS-1d, 'W8'

At 12:06 11 August 2003, Chris Reed wrote:
'Andreas Maurer' wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 7 Aug 2003 07:52:53 -0600, 'Bill Daniels'
wrote:



The boundary on the high side of acceleration is
the
tendency of some
gliders with high CG's, low hooks and limited down
elevator authority to
pitch-up uncontrollably when a threshold acceleration
is exceeded.

Please tell me the names of these gliders. I have
NOT heard of a
single one yet that showed this behaviour. Not one.

In my experience the K8 pitch-up was near uncontrollable
when winching. If
you had winched it previously you learnt the theoretically
correct
procedure, which was:

a. Stick back to get the nose skid up.

b. Stick central to run on the main wheel; and then

c. (*Immediately the main wheel left the ground) Knuckles
hard into the
instrument panel and wait for the pitch to become
controllable.

On anything but the softest of take-ups (a) and (b)
disappeared, as the
glider was flying before you could react, so the *real*
procedure was stick
full forwards as soon as the glider moved.

Once full pitch control was re-established the rest
of the launch was fine,
but the first two seconds were only semi-controlled,
and that only if you
knew what to expect. I never saw a first flight in
the K8 where the pilot
reacted in time to prevent an uncontrolled pitch-up
as soon as the main
wheel left the ground. And our winch was not any kind
of high-powered
monster.

All the glass gliders I've seen winching behaved well,
but the K8 was ...
interesting.