This should make most power pilots have kittens...

Finally, we got a break in the weather this weekend (it's been lousy
here for a while, no flying...)

At our glider club, we can either use the tow plane or the winch to get
the gliders in the air. Not many power pilots have come across the idea
of flinging an aircraft airborne on the best part of a mile of steel
piano wire, but we do this crazy thing. [Power pilots - whenever you see
the glider port symbol on your chart, remember that there may be a winch
there. They are less common in the US than over here, but they are used
in the US, and the 1/8th inch steel cable will not be kind to you if you
run into it. Never directly overfly gliderports below 3000' without
talking to their radio operator].

Anyway, I made a short video of a winch launch at our club. The winch
itself is powered by an inline 6 double overhead cam engine taken from a
4.2 litre Jaguar XJ6. The engine and running gear is mounted on the back
of a truck. It powers a drum of steel cable, and the glider is attached
on the other end. The 4.2L Jag engine has lots of power which results in
spectacular acceleration of the glider.

The video clip is at:
http://www.alioth.net/Video/Winch-launch.mp4 (MPEG-4 format)

(If you don't have the right codec etc. either use QuickTime or download
the excellent free/open source VLC from http://www.videolan.org)

Our next winch will use synthetic rope which is a fraction of the weight
of steel cable (I think the entire run of synthetic rope will only weigh
around 20kg). It will also be powered by an electronic fuel injected Jaguar
V12 engine which came courtesy of last year's hurricane force storm
which collapsed a garage on top of the donor car, completely flattening
the roof and cabin area of the car, but leaving all the running gear
completely intact :-)

--
Dylan Smith, Port St Mary, Isle of Man
Flying: http://www.dylansmith.net
Oolite-Linux: an Elite tribute: http://oolite-linux.berlios.de
Frontier Elite Universe: http://www.alioth.net