#373 Falcon Walmart

This was an off day. I met with Kevin on the corner of Woodman & Markscheffel, it was too wet and muddy so we went to his 2nd choice which they call Falcon Walmart. I’m sure it was a better site a year ago but the construction has continued and the field we selected wasn’t that big. No problem for foot launch but a little tight for me. The field has recently been cut but the cuttings were still there and perfect little chunks of tangle weed.

The wind was fresh from the South and while we set up it shifted slightly to the east. My first launch was aborted when the throttle cable snagged a line and I couldn’t get it free…even with the wing mostly loaded. There wasn’t alot of room to fool around so I aborted before I got too far down the runway. While I reset Kevin took off and soon I was ready for
#2 This was a mess…The wing came up fine but my acceleration was poor and it fell back. I tried to save the launch. Big mistake… The PPS will not come back up unless you have control of the A’s. I’ve been thinking of reinstalling the A assists and this would have been the perfect time to have them. I would have probably got the wing back overhead but what happened instead was …the wing fell back and caught in the propwash, it pulled the buggy back and turtled. Fortunately I was able to kill the engine quickly. The cage was tweaked a bit but the spinner and soft damp earth saved the prop.

Kevin landed and encouraged me to try again. I wasn’t too keen after two bad launches but the air was good. So…I started the motor to be sure the prop was still balanced and tracking clear of the cage. The motor came up to 3600 but I couldn’t get any more.
#3…The wing came up clean and started to overshoot but I added some brake and accelerated. The run out was long and I barely had enough room but eventually I got up and started circling the field. Climb rate was lousy and I noticed that the RPM’s had dropped to 3400. After several laps I started to get some altitude. The air was good with just the slightest currents. After 10 or 15 minutes I did a fly-by and landed. It was a nice landing, with a low & slow turn just before final and a 3/4 throttle gentle landing.
Kevin…thanks for the ear plugs!

Today I dressed for cold weather but didn’t need to. The gloves I selected were not nearly as supple as I thought, it hard to handle the lines and when I had to reset twice I was clumsy and hot in the “snow suit”. Next time …set up the wing ….test fill it … then put on the heavy clothes.

To Dos…
1)Add washers to the cruise control nob. DONE
2)Check the PPS for snags and debris…check the mallions on both wings
3)See about pulling the cage back into round.
4) Rig the A assists for winter flying
5)Check pitch of the props

#371 & #372 Goodbye to Titan …Again

Taking down the windsock for the “last time” at Titan

Greg and I met at Titan, we watched Steve Alley launch from his house shortly after. I thought he was going see us and land but he turned North West and that was the last we saw of him. Later I found out that he had flown to work. “Lucky guy” to have an LZ right next to the fire station.

Before we were able to set-up and launch the fellow from RUSH Soccer came along and told us we couldn’t fly from there. He let us go today… but “NO MORE”. He claims to still own the land but also said that he was not going to build a soccer field because of some zoning issues. So… for the time being Titan is closed… Steve and I have to check on some issues with Douglas County Zoning and the ownership of Titan…perhaps something can be arranged so that area will still be open to us.

Two flights, the first was 30+ minutes. I flew over to the balloon port and checked out the corn maze. Both times I crossed over the inlet to Chatfield ..it was bumpy. I’ll never forget that place because it was the site of my worst collapse. I tried it at 1000 feet on the way in and 500 feet on the way out, no difference…bumpy as hell but worth it because I was able to check out the balloon. It hovered close to the ground for a long time and eventually climbed to about 1500. The air over the port was pretty calm but it was a fresh Easterly closer to the hogbacks. My hands were really getting cold so I landed and put on the heated gloves. They are a pain in the ass and bulky as hell but my hands were warm.

The second flight was shorter. Lots of sinking air on takeoff and getting whacked shortly after liftoff kinda took the joy out of the flight. I lapped the field a couple of times ….went North to find smoother air and when it was looked like the conditions were deteriorating, I landed back at the truck. For awhile the winds picked up and a few small gusts blew through but to mellowed and I was wishing that I had not put the rig away while waiting for Greg to land. He got in a marvelous flight, well over an hour and a half. Got behind the hogbacks and covered lots of ground.

I’m thinking about talking with John Fetz about putting winglets on the prop blades, He seems to think it will ad significant thrust it will be interesting to hear what Terry thoughts are.

#370 Snowflake

(Photos by Mike Bennett)
Moderate Easterly Breeze…Greg Mike Mark Marek and Myself. PPSting 250 Nice air for boating around.

Garmin C-176c if starting to loose it. Shutting down for no reason

Plenty of thrust good climb…maybe the Atmospheric Density is helping me. It was 50+ degrees.
I missed out on the cross country out to Aurora Airport …I’ll pay attention next time!

//www.youtube.com/get_player

Video by Mike Bennett

# 369 Chatfield

Another good day. John Sieb was climbing heading East when I arrived. The wind was light from the East. I launched quicky to lots of lift all the way to Chatfield. It was smooth most of the flight but on return to the LZ it started to get bumpy and I landed after probably only 20 minutes and John was down 10 minutes later. He had gone to 8000 and mentioned that it was getting rowdy for him as well. I was going to say that this was one of those exceptional uneventful flights where absolutly everything worked as advertised. … but…when I got home and downloaded the video….It stopped recording 10 seconds before the landing…Will I ever get it right?
Everytime I land at Chatfield without getting hasseled I smile because it means I have at least one more flight before it’s closed to me forever.

"The Gathering at Monument Valley 2009

Fly the Holy Grail Of PPG
October 9-10-11 2009

 

Pictures of Second Annual

Thanks to:
Faith Wesstrom

Beery Miller
Chad Bastian
Pictures from the first Annual…Thanks to:
Texas Wingnuts
&
Pikes Peak Poweredparagliding Club
http://www.uswingnuts.com/Texas/PPG/Pictures0064/myalbum_frame.htm
http://www.poweredparaglidingcolorado.com/gallery.php?year=2008
———————————————————————————–
For More Information
Go to:

Monument Valley 09 Wrap-UP #363 to #367

This is one pilots blog of the event… In reverse order 🙂

Sunday


It was a strange morning, the wind was coming over the mesa from the west but it didn’t look or feel bad. The forecast was for light winds in the morning building to 20 plus after noon. I set off several helium balloons that acted different every time.

Final Briefing

One took off to the Southeast and the next went straight up. At the north end of the apron it was a little more consistant with the balloons tracking southeast. Few pilots were serious about launching and everybody seems a little spooked. Finally, John Black launched in his quad and I decided to check it out for myself.
I walked the buggy to the far end of the runway where Sue and her boyfriend were packing up. Her gut was telling her to stay on the ground and wisely chose not to chance it. I on the other hand still thought it was flyable and was determined to give it a go. My first attempt was aborted when the PowerPlay fell back but on the second it came up clean and I launched quickly. It was smooth for the first 200 feet but started to get bumpy and increased as I climbed. I came down 50 feet and flew away from the mesa where I encountered the bumps a bit lower than before. I figured that it was the winds curling off the mesa and it would be a bumpy ride at leadt till I got far enough to the east to get out of the rotor and then It would be a rowdy upwind ride home. Since I had already had 4 good flights and there was no chance of getting back to the park I turned back and made a clean landing with a minimum of power.

Mexican Hat

That was it…the 2nd Annual Gathering at Monument Valley was over. John and I wasted no time packing up our gear and policing the area. I said my good-byes and headed for home.

Old Town

Due to the severe storm up north I went home via Pagosa Springs and Salida. It’s been a long time and I forgot how beautiful this area is. Next summer I’m going to make it a point to visit Paul Dillon.

Flights #363 to #367

Monument Valley 09 Saturday

Mo made it in late last night and gave the briefing…thanks Mo…

Conditions were wonderful, light breezes made for easy take-offs. I launched from halfway down the runway to avoid yesterday’s mistake…and I switched to the PowerPlay Sting. What a difference! The climb was much better; I locked the throttle at 80%, hooked up the foot steering and headed over to the park. The rig was climbing at 130 ft/min and with a strong tailwind …moving fast. I figured that if I had a hard time penetrating on the way home, I would go low and if that wasn’t enough, I could land out and hitch a ride back.

Jeff and the Boys (Ivan Mo Uri Mark)

Photo by Faith Wesstrom
There were wings all over the place, some were heading into the valley and others were coming from the North after visiting the seven sisters and possibly rounding Brigham’s Tomb. After clearing Gouldings, I flew south along the highway and crossed over Wetherill Mesa into the Valley of the Gods, three miles south of the visitors center. It was spectacular. I was surrounded by a labyrinth of massive buttes and delicate spires towering a thousand feet above the desert floor. After doing a couple of big slow circles I turned North past the Camel and Elephant Buttes until I reached the West Mitten where I turned back towards Gouldings. At 2500AGL the best speed was 5 mph at 2000AGL it was up to 10mph and at 500ft I was clipping along at 18mph.

Photo by Faith Wesstrom

When I got back to the field there was a plane circling the LZ waiting for everybody to clear the runway. I positioned myself at 500 ft just north of the airstrip so that I would be well inside of the flight pattern and out of the way. There was a truck sitting right in the middle and I was hoping that he knew there was a plane waiting to land. It took entirely too long, with the foot steering engaged and the throttle set to cruise I circled for at least 15 minutes. Eventually the runway was cleared and I landed with a long low and slow run up the runway. This was the best flight so far.

Photo by Faith Wesstrom

After Lunch a bunch of us piled into the pick-up and went for a tour of Navajo Tribal Park. We had a great time stopping at the various outlooks and pointing out places where we had been and planned to go and taking the obligatory,“We were there”, pictures. All of us agreed that the monuments looked allot bigger from the ground but scarier from the air. I was astounded when Jeff told me that he was anxious flying close to these massive and unchanging structures because I felt the same way. We both knew that they couldn’t “suck you in” but at the same time it took force of will to fly right up to the wall of something so huge and unsympathetic.

Csaba Lemak

Seeing the monuments from the ground was a real eye opener. For one thing, I realized that if I were ever forced to make an emergency landing, I had better be able to glide to a road, because it would be almost impossible find smooth patch amidst all the skree. Not to mention the difficulty in pushing the Rig to a place where I could be picked up.

Faith and Ola Wesstrom

That evening we met at Gouldings for the Big Dinner.

Into the truck and down the hill we went. Ola looked very comfortable sitting in the buggy and Faith was riding shotgun as the token lady but I worried that I was going to lose either Ivan or Uri off the back, fortunately I remembered the speed bumps and we made it without incident. At dinner I had the ribs which I wish I’d tried sooner because it was by far the best dish on the menu. Sitting with Johnny Fetz, Chad and Greg Bishop, we talked about next year and things we wanted to do. I really hadn’t thought about “non-organizing” it again but listening to the gang …it sounds like allot of people are talking about coming back and doing it again.
After the meal I got up and said a very few words, thanking everybody and inviting them to come back next year. Someday I’m going to surprise them and prepare a real speech but for now the minimalist thing was working for me. One thing for sure it was much more satisfying that the last time when I had a pilot down and no one knew his condition.
After dinner we hung for about an hour and told hanger stories. It was a hoot to see Jeff sitting with John Black and Mo. The atmosphere was celebratory, just about everyone got one “EPIC” flight and no one was injured.
Eventually it broke up into lots of little parties. I made the rounds and visited a couple of them; the campfire discussion was in full swing with Russ, Faith, Ola, Ivan, Johnny, Uri, Chad and a few others. Tonight’s topic was wing design, what’s new, what’s being developed… and… Government interference in the Ultraflight World, the good bad and ugly. Russ had an abundance of firewood so the fire was high and accommodated the large group nicely.

Down at the Bachelor’s Quarters there was a rowdy game of Texas hold-em. Csaba and John Black were going at it hard and heavy while the guys who had donated to the cause looked on with great big smiles. The happiest guy was Jim King who had seen god earlier in the day when he got pinned to the earth by a running paramotor. Story is, that Jerry had fixed him a couple of Margaritas before dinner and he was feeling no pain. At Bob’s RV the “Acro Film Festival” was winding down. I was almost bowled over by Ivan when he staggered out of the RV… heading to bed…too tuckered for any more carousing.

Monument Valley 09 Friday

Friday Johnny Fetz & his “Junk Buggy”

The “Epic Flight”

The first take-off was difficult. I set-up at the North East part of the runway by the hanger. It was an uphill take off and my climb was just barely enough to overcome the the grade of the runway. I cleared the fence at the end of the runway by two feet and turned North where I skimmed the surface for 100 yards before starting to climb. The go…no go point came after lift-off when I was climbing ok, then I hit some sink and and my climb went to hell. Aborting would have been “absolutely bad”, I was committed and had to fly it out, even if I was just going to fly to the crash site. I felt sure that I that I would clear the fence but the terrain West was not a good place to touch down and I was “puckered” to the buggy for awhile. At 1200 ft. the air calmed down and I set off for the Monuments. When I arrived at “lookout point” I turned to Sentinel Mesa and made a slow turn to take some pictures. Absolutely beautiful! I could look into the Valley of the Gods to the South, across to Brigham’s Tomb to the North and back to Gouldings in the West. Later when I was back over the field I resisted landing and loitered over the field for a long time watching the activity below.
That morning and through the afternoon the whole gang showed, Jeff Goin had the top RV spot and Carlos Segnini with his crew were down the hill just south of us. Luc and the Russians were on top and Ola and Faith were in a cabin on the edge. We spent the afternoon hanging around the campsite talking PPG. It was all about Jeff’s upcoming video on Mastering PPG and John Fetz new kevlar prop, where we had flown and where we would like to go. I sat there by my tent, taking it all in and watched my wind indicator as it danced to all four points of the compass. The sky was filled with big puffy clouds that were tinged red on the bottom, reflecting the color of the earth below. It was a great relaxing afternoon.
The evening flights were bumpy but good. I launched during a calm moment between the puffs and only flew for a short time staying close to the LZ. Anyway, it was much more entertaining at the airstrip. Chad was demonstrating the his new ultralite wing, it weighs 5 pounds and kites like nothing I’ve ever seen. Chad was playing it up big, strolling around and occasionally reaching out to tug on a riser making like he wasn’t paying any attention to the wing at all. The hook-in is designed low and the risers are very different, like braided kevlar lines rather than conventional webbing with mallions. I would have loved to fly it but it’s far too small for my rig.


Toward the end we had some excitement, one trike was flipped launching in a puff and another fellow got dumped when he was whacked coming in on final with power off landing. The last part of the video was Beery getting dumped by a rotor at the same place I had a hard time climbing out.

//www.youtube.com/get_player

Video by Fait Wesstrom

Other pilots showed considerable skill and patience waiting for the right moment to set down. I was really impressed by Perry Molter who made several passes before he committed and landed on the runway with an amazingly clean and swift flare. There was other carnage that I didn’t see, but heard about later. Fortunately no one was seriously hurt for which I’m thankful. Much like last year, the LZ was a free for all, but everybody seemed to be a bit more aware of the conditions and respected the site.


That evening Johnny and I shared dinner, his shredded pork and my Italian sausage, it was “wolf camping” at its best. Several of us sat around the campfire talking propeller design. Csaba Lemak of Electric PPG fame joined us and talked about some new products he is working on including a high quality composite prop that could be produced for a fraction of current manufacturing costs. Ivan kept things light trading jabs with Stann Honey and Mark Latham. Mark seems to be a much happier and healthier guy than the last time I saw him. I enjoyed his story of flying a glider up to 24,000ft riding the mountain wave.