North-Up versus Direction-Up?

Procreation: face down
Flying: Course Up

Driving: North Up



Jack

On Dec 18, 11:30*am, Bill Bullimore
wrote:
Procreation: face down



Flying: Course Up

Driving: North Up

Jack- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Or face wherever :}

North-up's the only way to go. I tried heading-up the other day on my
SN-10 as I was going south..................took me the better part of
5 minutes to identify things. Switched back to north up and everything
fell right in place. Guess it comes from 2000 hours in the baker five
two where the scope was oriented north-up. Strip maps are OK till you
get wayyyy off course, ever try attacking a target from the north on a
east facing strip map? Yep, your flying in from the left side of the
map............screws my head right off.
JJ

"JJ Sinclair" wrote in message
...
North-up's the only way to go. I tried heading-up the other day on my
SN-10 as I was going south..................took me the better part of
5 minutes to identify things. Switched back to north up and everything
fell right in place. Guess it comes from 2000 hours in the baker five
two where the scope was oriented north-up. Strip maps are OK till you
get wayyyy off course, ever try attacking a target from the north on a
east facing strip map? Yep, your flying in from the left side of the
map............screws my head right off.
JJ

I guess it comes down to what you are use to. All my 2000+ scope time was
in aircraft where the scope was oriented with the front of the aircraft. I
didn't find changing the approach of an attack from the orientation of my
chart bothersome. Maybe this is just a Navy vs Air Force thing.

Wayne
A-3B Skywarrior, A-6A Intruder

On Dec 18, 7:18*am, "Wayne Paul" wrote:
"JJ Sinclair" wrote in message

...

North-up's the only way to go. I tried heading-up the other day on my
SN-10 as I was going south..................took me the better part of
5 minutes to identify things. Switched back to north up and everything
fell right in place. Guess it comes from 2000 hours in the baker five
two where the scope was oriented north-up. Strip maps are OK till you
get wayyyy off course, ever try attacking a target from the north on a
east facing strip map? Yep, your flying in from the left side of the
map............screws my head right off.
JJ

I guess it comes down to what you are use to. *All my 2000+ scope time was
in aircraft where the scope was oriented with the front of the aircraft. I
didn't find changing the approach of an attack from the orientation of my
chart bothersome. *Maybe this is just a Navy vs Air Force thing.

Wayne
A-3B Skywarrior, A-6A Intruder

As many have said, it's really a matter of personal preference. I
don't fly with 'terrain on' in XCXoar. 99% of what I want the 'puter
to tell me is which known good runways I have in range, and the
direction and strength of wind. I get the rest of the information I
need by looking out. Sometimes on long blue glides I'll look at my 'L/
D Cruise' and adjust my airspeed, but that's mostly because I can't
remember the words to most songs I'd care to sing (except "Rocky
Racoon", and my rendition leaves a lot to be desired). I also wear a
round 'chute though.

Uncle Fuzzy wrote:
3B Skywarrior, A-6A Intruder

As many have said, it's really a matter of personal preference. I
don't fly with 'terrain on' in XCXoar. 99% of what I want the 'puter
to tell me is which known good runways I have in range, and the
direction and strength of wind. I get the rest of the information I
need by looking out.

Ah, the simple life! I want a lot mo

* airport location and facility information (runway width, length,
frequencies)
* wind at several heights
* arrival heights at the airports
* airspace depiction
* Terrain with airports (in the mountains only)
* Thermalling assistant
* marking lift (thermals and wave) and track (wave)
* marking airstrips and fields not in the database
* task (record or contest)
* sunset time, OLC distance and path

Unfortunately, none of this can be found by looking out, except the wind
can be guessed at by watching drift of the glider or the cloud shadows.
Still, looking out is most of what I do. Without the PDA, I'd spend less
time looking out.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

* Updated! "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* New Jan '08 - sections on Mode S, TPAS, ADS-B, Flarm, more

* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org

Obviously from this discussion it is just a matter of preference or
what you used to. But one advantage to North Up which I didn't see
mentioned so far is that your moving map does not move around all the
time, especially when thermaling. Even with the north up thermaling
option Paul mentioned, it means the map will switch back and forth
between north up and track up when thermaling, which must be more
confusing then having a constant orientation.

Ramy (always North Up)

On Dec 17, 8:40*am, "Paul Remde" wrote:
Hi John,

I talk to a lot of U.S. glider pilots about soaring software. Most
(including myself) seem to prefer track up when cruising and North up when
circling. * I like the map to correspond to what I see out the window while
cruising. *However, while thermalling I like the map position fixed rather
than rotating. *I like that SeeYou Mobile and other software programs can
make the switch automatically.

Good Soaring,

Paul Remde
Cumulus Soaring, Inc.http://www.cumulus-soaring.com

"ContestID67" wrote in message

...



It is winter here and the only soaring we are doing in Chicago is in
the hangar . During an energetic discussion on the pros and cons of
various soaring programs, I mentioned I fly "Direction-Up", rather
than "North-Up".

WHOA! You would have thought that I had said I was going to give up
soaring to fly helicopters by the dirty looks that I received.

Now, to be fair, with every GPS device I use (car, boat, GA), I
*ALWAYS* orient the map as north-up, and prefer it overall...except,
that is, when soaring. * I started using north-up at first, but soon
found that a direction-up display was much better in letting me
anticipate the timing of rolling out of a thermal and heading towards
the next turn point. *Attempting to coordinate the rotating glider
icon on a stationary north-up map, with the view outside and/or
compass, all while centering a thermal, is a bit like patting my head
and rubbing my stomach at the same time. *Maybe this is unique to a
thermal-only soaring climate. * *NOTE: I am not directionally
challanged.

Anyway, I wondered what others use relative to the type of soaring
they do.

Thanks, John- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Ramy wrote:
Obviously from this discussion it is just a matter of preference or
what you used to. But one advantage to North Up which I didn't see
mentioned so far is that your moving map does not move around all the
time, especially when thermaling. Even with the north up thermaling
option Paul mentioned, it means the map will switch back and forth
between north up and track up when thermaling, which must be more
confusing then having a constant orientation.

Ramy (always North Up)

Odd thing is, in my glider when I look outside while thermalling the
world appears to be moving around.

Seriously, I totally agree it's all a matter of preference or more
precisely what you have trained your brain to do.

I remember when I first started flying R/C gliders. While standing on
the ground and looking up at the glider and trying to instantly
translate glider turn left/right into the correct actions with my
fingers/thumbs seemed impossible. Meanwhile here were all of these
guys, many 20-30 years older than me, that were having no trouble at
all. Talk about humbling experiences. But I kept practicing and that
is the key. It took a certain amount of time for my brain to "re-wire"
itself. Before long my fingers simply did the right thing instantly
without me having to "think" about it. The brain is an amazing organ.

I believe that with practice one could "re-wire" one's brain to use most
any combination of PDA settings and be able to quickly translate between
PDA screen and the wind screen.

Regards,

-Doug

Ramy wrote:
Obviously from this discussion it is just a matter of preference or
what you used to. But one advantage to North Up which I didn't see
mentioned so far is that your moving map does not move around all the
time, especially when thermaling. Even with the north up thermaling
option Paul mentioned, it means the map will switch back and forth
between north up and track up when thermaling, which must be more
confusing then having a constant orientation.

I and most pilots are very familiar with the North up map, because it's
the way we look at maps most of the time for most of our lives. The PDA
map also has a the goal line on it, so it's obvious which way the flight
is going, even in North up. So, North up isn't confusing.

Track Up when flying isn't confusing, because what I can see on the map
is what I see out the window. Easy.

If you haven't flown with a Track up map, it will likely be confusing
for a few flights. It will take a while for your brain to stop
translating what it sees as a North Up map, but it'll learn.

I didn't choose Track up because it was easier to identify what was
ahead (though it is). There wasn't much to identify with the early units
- just circles for the airports, no rivers, etc. I initially did it
because I wanted the maximum amount of real estate displayed ahead of
the glider on the small PDA screen.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

* Updated! "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* New Jan '08 - sections on Mode S, TPAS, ADS-B, Flarm, more

* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org