Best performing Vario?

On 9/28/2012 2:22 AM, Tobias Bieniek wrote:
we are talking about http://www.winpilot.com/images4/PRO_1.gif
right?

actually the xcsoar representation is quite similar, only that the
climb values are not drawn in a 3D way, but using a polar diagram.
The arrow that WinPilot shows is also available in XCSoar, just not
as emphasized and it will get larger once the suggestion to recenter
gets stronger. could you elaborate on what exactly you think is
better in the WinPilot representation?

SeeYou Mobile uses circles of differing size and color around the
thermal circle to show the thermal strength. It also has an arrow
suggesting the direction to move, and an audio alert when you should
level your wings to move the circle. The circles and arrow can be
assessed in a glance, or the audio alone can be used to avoid even the
need for a glance, all of which seem at least as useful as Winpilot's
depiction.

Mobile doesn't have the chart of lift versus time. How is this useful?

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)

On Friday, September 28, 2012 9:36:01 AM UTC-7, Eric Greenwell wrote:
On 9/28/2012 2:22 AM, Tobias Bieniek wrote:

we are talking about http://www.winpilot.com/images4/PRO_1.gif

right?



actually the xcsoar representation is quite similar, only that the

climb values are not drawn in a 3D way, but using a polar diagram.

The arrow that WinPilot shows is also available in XCSoar, just not

as emphasized and it will get larger once the suggestion to recenter

gets stronger. could you elaborate on what exactly you think is

better in the WinPilot representation?



SeeYou Mobile uses circles of differing size and color around the

thermal circle to show the thermal strength. It also has an arrow

suggesting the direction to move, and an audio alert when you should

level your wings to move the circle. The circles and arrow can be

assessed in a glance, or the audio alone can be used to avoid even the

need for a glance, all of which seem at least as useful as Winpilot's

depiction.



Mobile doesn't have the chart of lift versus time. How is this useful?



--

Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to

email me)

The circles used by SYM are very coarse and do not convey much information, nor are they as easily interpreted at a glance. The arrow on SYM does not change length in any meaningful way. In contrast, the Winplot arrow will go from a dot (centered) to a huge thing all across the screen (you are WAY off!), conveying much more instantly. The graph of thermal strength is not useful for centering the thermal, but is useful in deciding when to leave.

On XCSoar, I think the current polar chart is much better than the proposed solutions. The polar chart gives about the same info as the Winpilot cylinder graph, though perhaps not quite as intuitive (up should after all be up, not out....). The arrow though is key, the computer is much fairer at integrating the climb around the circle than your butt or your eyes on a needle. Especially true of a whacky thermal or when your TE is messed up from prop wash. Just make sure the arrow changes length very obviously with lift asymmetry.

Eric,

I have flown with with both SYM and WinPilot. The 3D graphic, auto start and sound are much better in WP than SYM. I wish SYM would offer a near duplicate of WP climb maximizer. Right now SYM takes two turns to start where WP starts after about 90 degrees. WP's graphic is much better in weak conditions. I have tried both of SYM option, both work OK, but why make so so software when there is better examples out there?

The history graph is extremely helpful. It provides a quick glance at the history to tell if the thermal is maintaining strength or slowly getting weaker. In thermals that are hard to really core you get a sinusoidal curve that helps to decide if you can adjust to find the core or leave the thermal. Again, SYM should add this as an option.

I sure hope that the ClearNav folks are gathering input here about the benefit of a good climb maximizer feature. I am in agreement with the posters here who think that only WinPilot has gotten it right so far. I do wish that the ClearNav software would include an emulation of the WinPilot climb maximizer so that I can finally ditch the damn PDA from my panel. The zoom-in feature that the ClearNav offers now is nowhere nears as good. As Tim has noted, the maximizer should come on automatically and quickly, then quickly go off when you leave the thermal. The WinPilot continuous graph is way more effective than lift dots.

One characteristic that is also important and not yet mentioned here is the matter of time delay. WinPilot has no discernable delay; whereas other systems, including ClearNav, have a time delay in the display that makes it very difficult to interpret what's really going on when trying to reposition in a thermal.

On Saturday, September 29, 2012 4:08:26 PM UTC-4, Steve Koerner wrote:
I sure hope that the ClearNav folks are gathering input here about the benefit of a good climb maximizer feature.

Noted.

T8 for ClearNav

On Sep 29, 3:08*pm, Steve Koerner wrote:
I sure hope that the ClearNav folks are gathering input here about the benefit of a good climb maximizer feature. *I am in agreement with the posters here who think that only WinPilot has gotten it right so far. * I do wish that the ClearNav software would include an emulation of the WinPilot climb maximizer so that I can finally ditch the damn PDA from my panel. *The zoom-in feature that the ClearNav offers now is nowhere nears as good. *As Tim has noted, the maximizer should come on automatically and quickly, then quickly go off when you leave the thermal. *The WinPilot continuous graph is way more effective than lift dots.

One characteristic that is also important and not yet mentioned here is the matter of time delay. *WinPilot has no discernable delay; whereas other systems, including ClearNav, have a time delay in the display that makes it very difficult to interpret what's really going on when trying to reposition in a thermal.

Simple suggestions for CN maximizer improvement:
1) Automatic on as you start thermaling!
2) Drift the dots with the wind.
3) include a N arrow to help deal with screen refresh delay
4) anticipate the screen refresh time -- paint the screen rotated in
the direction of turn so that by the time the screen is refreshed it's
pointing where you want to go.
5) blank dots more than 10 circles old -- or keep them as track only
but not dots (useful to find old thermals, but the dots all merge to a
green mess otherwise)

Even in its current form the CN display is very useful. I was out
thrashing around in broken up blue thermals all weekend; when you try
some big maneuver that doesn't work out it's very easy to lose track
of where that last good gust was. Even in wind, I got back to several
cores that I had lost with CN.
I also find it useful when you find a big tight core and you're full
of water. The big zoomie and turn leaves you several diameters away
from the original core. Keeping track of the effect of speed on
thermaling moves is hard.
But... don't forget to look outside for birds, corn stalks, other
gliders, etc. ... still better than any maximizer!

John Cochane

Hey John:

How about we all look outside for things we would prefer not to midair?

The nature and volume of discussion regarding "climb maximizer" screens suggests that many pilots are seriously focused "head-down" while thermaling.

I know everyone will soundly proclaim that this is absolutely not the case and that they are maintaining an appropriate traffic scan and situational awareness while simultaneously checking the maximizer screen but I do not believe it.

Are glider pilots becoming the airborne equivalent of the modern teen-ager who walks into the shopping mall fountain, head-down while staring at their electronic devices? I tend to believe this is true which leaves me horrified.

The solution? FLARM, of course!

Addictions come in many flavors.

On Monday, October 1, 2012 10:43:12 PM UTC-7, (unknown) wrote:
Hey John: How about we all look outside for things we would prefer not to midair? The nature and volume of discussion regarding "climb maximizer" screens suggests that many pilots are seriously focused "head-down" while thermaling. I know everyone will soundly proclaim that this is absolutely not the case and that they are maintaining an appropriate traffic scan and situational awareness while simultaneously checking the maximizer screen but I do not believe it. Are glider pilots becoming the airborne equivalent of the modern teen-ager who walks into the shopping mall fountain, head-down while staring at their electronic devices? I tend to believe this is true which leaves me horrified. The solution? FLARM, of course! Addictions come in many flavors.

Unknowen. You are certainly not wrong here but not correct either.
Looking, glancing and referring to a "climb maximizer" is NO DIFFERENT than looking, glancing and referring to a vario. I read statements previously in this thread that one should only fly by the sound of an audio and the seat of the pants but I would very much doubt if anyone actually consistently does this. After all I can't remember the last time, if ever I seen a sailplane without a visual vario. The matter affect why would anyone spend in some cases thousands of dollars on a vario if not to use it?! I for one would glance at the vario OR climb maximizer once or twice in a turn and I'm sure this takes away very little from my situational awareness.
6PK

On Oct 2, 1:43*am, wrote:
Hey John:

How about we all look outside for things we would prefer not to midair?

The nature and volume of discussion regarding "climb maximizer" screens suggests that many pilots are seriously focused "head-down" while thermaling..

I know everyone will soundly proclaim that this is absolutely not the case and that they are maintaining an appropriate traffic scan and situational awareness while simultaneously checking the maximizer screen but I do not believe it.

Are glider pilots becoming the airborne equivalent of the modern teen-ager who walks into the shopping mall fountain, head-down while staring at their electronic devices? *I tend to believe this is true which leaves me horrified.

The solution? *FLARM, of course!

Addictions come in many flavors.

I am sympathetic to Mark's worry. It gets worse (for me) when I
consider how many of YOU want real time wx in the cockpit, flarm radar
with glide slope to the best gaggle and goodness know what else. I
think many instrument makers are breeding very nearsighted video ga...
er, "pilots".

The WP optimizer is worthy of a comment because it was reasonably well
designed for minimum pilot fuss. It told you when to roll wings level
to center the thermal and as these things go, didn't require much
attention. I did feel like I needed to go shower after using it, but
as I've said elsewhere, my problem was actually a buggy vario.

The XCSoar optimizer I thought was a joke. What XCSoar did that I
thought really handy was calculate the center of lift and display this
on the map, drifted for calculated wind. This saved my ass a couple
of times when trying to dig out at the end of the day. You know the
scenario: planning your landing, oops here's a thermal, three turns
going up, start to relax a little and whoa!, where'd the little
stinker go? If it hadn't dissipated, XCSoar generally knew where the
center was. Obviously, one had to be zoomed in, real close, for this
to be effective.

The track function in CN sort of works for optimizing when zoomed all
the way in, though it becomes much less useful in direct proportion to
wind because it simply reports lift vs your (2d) gps location
history. I hope people are not over using this. To the extent that
we need a thermal centering tool in CN, I hope we can come up with
something better (it's not the top priority). Imo the current
presentation isn't "efficient" enough. The whole strength of CN is
hitting you with all the info you need at any given instant, at a
glance. We want your eyeballs pointed outside the cockpit.

T8

Mr Unknown and other concerned parties may not be aware that the Winpilot optimizer provides a beep tone when it thinks you should open up your circle to recenter your thermal. It does a pretty good job of helping out if your attention drifts and you are no longer doing your thermalling work just right. In crowded circumstancs the WP optimizer can be used without looking down at all.

This audio tone feature is part of the WP Optimizer functionality that CN should be emulating. I'm happy to hear that the CN code is being actively improved but please don't relegate this to low priority.