Hi... and some questions from a beginner

On Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 2:53:01 PM UTC-4, Johnny T wrote:

I still don't understand why an AH is disallowed for contests?

This was the mechanism by which the cloud flying prohibition was enforced in contests for about a half a century. Obviously, in the age of smart phones with gyros and AH apps, the prohibition on AH instruments is no longer enforceable.

Oh, and btw: you aren't "supposed to stay out of clouds", you are supposed to stay VFR. Big difference! If you make an honest effort to stay VFR and are willing to park when you can't, I predict you'll never get enveloped in cloud.

T8

Good on you for doing 5 straight days of training flights. You are already thinking like a good pilot.

K-21 to 2-33 is akin to stepping down from a BMW 5 series to a Volvo station wagon with no power steering. You will be fine.
Learning to soar on a 2-33 is a unique American experience and should not be missed.

On Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 12:53:01 PM UTC-6, Johnny T wrote:
On Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 5:54:29 AM UTC-7, BobW wrote:
On 5/18/2015 11:34 PM, Johnny T wrote:

Informative background stuff snipped...
Congrats on reaching a point in life where your soaring itch needs scratching
again. I hope it's a blast!

1) Here is the thing... my local club (back on the east coast) uses a 2-33
as their trainer. I am a little uneasy about the transition from the K-21
back to the 2-33. I mean, I do hold some sentimental value with the 2-33,
but I kinda want to move on. The club also has a Grob 103 Twin II -
however, they no longer use this for training. Hmmm... Advice on this
transition would be very helpful.
It's unclear to me to which transition you're referring, 2-33-K-21 or K-21 to
2-33. Minden's advice should-oughta be adequate for the former, while
muscle-memory (and a good dose of reflective rationalization!) will prolly
work for the latter. Obtaining your license (and the "informal but real
outside respect" accompanying it will presumably go a long way toward reducing
your club's access-restriction on G-103 training (though I'm curious why
they've evolved from where they apparently used to be in this regard...I hope
it's not because of the experience-demolished antediluvian attitude having to
do with "difficulty of teaching/learning" much more common 20 years ago in the
U.S. than now). In any event, you gotta fly what you've access to, and
maintaining a healthy philosophical attitude will be better than mentally
bemoaning the absence of perceived perfection.


The transition I am most worried about is K-21-2-33. Being that my previous gliding experience was 20 years ago, I am not really counting any of that experience. I feel like I am starting from scratch with maybe a little bit of head-start.

I guess it will all depend on how much I progress during my week in Minden and whether I can find any instructors at my local willing to teach on the Grob. We'll see, and I will update once this becomes more clear.


3) What is the European equivalent of the SSA?
SSE? (Joke attempt, people!!!)

Not really a joke... Is there no promotional / liaison organization in Europe like the SSA? Would that be FAI?

I am simply interested in checking out how things are promoted in other areas besides the US.



Something to the effect of "Note: The artificial horizon feature is not
allowed for contest soaring".


I still don't understand why an AH is disallowed for contests?

Bob W.

Thanks for the feedback. My brain is currently in sponge mode absorbing everything it can find.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...g_associations

Permissible cloud flying in gliders and competitions has varied by country for several years. Banning A/H or even Bohli compasses is required for comps in some regions. https://www.ssa.org/files/member/1972%20WGC.pdf is one report on the 1972 WGC, one mid-air and one fatal. Cloud flying in WGC contests was banned after this. You can fly IFR in gliders if you are rated, current, and properly equipped, just not in contests.

Frank Whiteley

On Tue, 19 May 2015 18:29:01 -0700, PBA wrote:

Good on you for doing 5 straight days of training flights. You are
already thinking like a good pilot.

K-21 to 2-33 is akin to stepping down from a BMW 5 series to a Volvo
station wagon with no power steering. You will be fine.
Learning to soar on a 2-33 is a unique American experience and should
not be missed.

I learned to fly in an all-glass fleet (ASK-21, Grob G103 Acro II,
Puchacz) on a winch. I only got my aero tow sign-off a year after I'd
soloed shortly before visiting the USAian right side, getting my US
license grandfathered in at Denver and doing the biannual checks at
Boulder. I had no trouble with flying a 2-33 at Avenal, though its
possible that some familiarity with our club's Slingsby T21b may have
helped.

Flying the 2-33 was certainly a unique experience, just a bit different
from the gliders I was used to, especially its 'interesting' cockpit
ergonomics.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

On Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 1:34:18 AM UTC-4, Johnny T wrote:

So I have decided to give myself a dream vacation. I have 6 straight days of lessons at Minden in a ASK-21 - it's ok if you are jealous! Is this the right way to do it? I don't know... but being super busy, I feel like finally getting the vacation of my dreams is something I can't turn down.

1) Here is the thing... my local club (back on the east coast) uses a 2-33 as their trainer. I am a little uneasy about the transition from the K-21 back to the 2-33. I mean, I do hold some sentimental value with the 2-33, but I kinda want to move on. The club also has a Grob 103 Twin II - however, they no longer use this for training. Hmmm... Advice on this transition would be very helpful.

i've done most of my glider training in multi-day trips as well (including Minden, which is outstanding), in the K-21, Grob-103, and LET-23, but finished up and took the commercial checkride in the 2-33. All of the checkride flying will be very close to the airport, so glide ratio/performance isn't much of a consideration. That being said, the examiner asked me to make back-to-back left and right 720 steep turns, the last of which left me below where I needed to enter the pattern, so shame on me, but he didn't bust me for it because I called it out (even though I should not have made the last 360). The moral is, even if you're within easy gliding distance of the airport, you still have watch the sink in a low-performance plane.

--b

On Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 1:34:18 AM UTC-4, Johnny T wrote:

I am a little uneasy about the transition from the K-21 back to the 2-33. I mean, I do hold some sentimental value with the 2-33, but I kinda want to move on.

Some insurance underwriters quantify in dollars the risk of transitioning from a low performance to high performance glider and vice-versa (from a high performance to low performance). Gliders are classified high/low by the glide ratio (above/below 35 or so).

If for example, you have all of your flights in a low performance club glider, and then you want to buy and insure a high performance glider, you will pay an increased premium until you have logged a certain number of hours in high performance gliders.

But the curious thing is that transitioning from high to low, you may pay an extra premium until you log enough hours in the low performance glider.

While the premium differential was symmetrical (for dollar of insured value_ when I got my insurance quote, some of the risks are different. For example, when transitioning from low to high, you might land long. Whereas transitioning from high to low, you might land short.

Neither one of these transitions is especially difficult as long as you obtain a CFI briefing on the plane and take the time to adapt.

On Friday, May 22, 2015 at 1:50:15 AM UTC+3, son_of_flubber wrote:
While the premium differential was symmetrical (for dollar of insured value_ when I got my insurance quote, some of the risks are different. For example, when transitioning from low to high, you might land long. Whereas transitioning from high to low, you might land short.

That really shouldn't happen! Not make it back to the field at all, perhaps, but land short on finals? How?

We don't teach or think about the actual angle when flying ("that looks about right") but I'd guess that most zero wind approaches in a glider would be around an 8:1 - 10:1 glide angle. I don't know of any training glider with a worse performance than that with airbrakes closed, and every high performance glider ever certified can come down steeper than that with full airbrakes.

On Sunday, May 24, 2015 at 7:02:23 AM UTC-4, Bruce Hoult wrote:
On Friday, May 22, 2015 at 1:50:15 AM UTC+3, son_of_flubber wrote:
Whereas transitioning from high to low, you might land short.

That really shouldn't happen! Not make it back to the field at all, perhaps, but land short on finals? How?

Last year a friend, an extremely experienced pilot (in both high and low performance gliders) who flies a Ventus or the tow plane most of the time, went up in a 2-33 with a friend in the front seat. Strong headwind on landing.. Landed short in a brush cut 'safety zone'. The SGS 2-33 is infamous for poor penetration.

I agree that fundamental piloting errors should not happen. Many of the people that make them are not idiots and their experience does not inoculate them.

Don't worry about the technology, worry about the private certificate first.. You don't need any technology to get that and when you return from Minden, you'll be in the final stretch. Concentrate on the flying. (If you can't resist, buy Condor and work it out there before introducing a distraction in the cockpit)

My club teaches primary in the 2-33, then you move on to the ASK-21. As a mostly ASK-21 pilot these days, I often worry that I will 'forget' the performance difference between the two when I fly the 2-33. I haven't found it to be an issue, and doubt you will, either. Just heed the advice not to get downwind from the airport in it (it simply doesn't penetrate well) and you'll be fine.

Taking lessons in Minden in the ASK-21 will prepare you for your club's Grob when you are ready and the transition will likely be a non-issue. Going back to learning in the 2-33 isn't going to 'undo' anything you learned in the ASK-21 - both require your brain to be engaged prior to takeoff.

Welcome back and have a blast!

So I am back from my trip to Minden and it was all I could have asked for. I plan on writing up some thoughts on the experience in the coming week - what it is like getting back into flying after a 20 year break... what it is like transitioning from a 2-33 to an ASK-21... what it is like learning to fly in a tiny field vs a crazy place like Minden, etc....

For now, enjoy a couple of before/after pics:

What it was like when I arrived at Minden:

http://i.imgur.com/pkjbi5N.jpg

What it was like after a week of my east coast humidity wearing off:

http://i.imgur.com/G2upo4c.jpg