May 2019 Flight Log

[Bill Cummings]

[wingspan33]

May 21st Flight at Mt Washington, NY

I had my 4th flight on my Talon 140 5/21/19. I launched at 6:50 pm and landed at 7:41 pm for a total of 51 minutes of flight time. I was able to do a top landing so the walk back to my car wasn't from the valley LZ.

My max altitude gain was 2,329 ft. ASL with launch being at 1420 ft. ASL. So I gained out to 91 feet shy of 1000 over launch. This was the first flight with the Talon where I was able to thermal. It was nice to see how the glider reacted and responded to centering in a thermal core. There were 3-4 red tails out that also gave me some indications of where the base of the thermals might be. You've got to love the soaring raptors!

Once again I was the only pilot to show up to fly. I have gotten very critical of being SAFE when I launch by my self. I've probably launched solo 20 - 50 times but I don't let that influence the SAFETY part of the deal.

As the weather would have it, tomorrow (5/24/19) may be another good day at Mt Washington. Wind direction could be good from noon on till sunset. And wind speeds will be lower so NICE thermals could be had - with just over 1/2 sky cover (i.e., cummies!). That would make 5 flying days over the last 10. That's very good for our general area.

I also got some great video of the whole flight. But I have to do a few things before I can post an edited version to YouTube.

PS - I'm still learning how to do a good flaired landing with the Talon. It's one of those things that you think would be easy, but isn't.

[Bob Kuczewski]

Wow Scott!!

That's a whole lot of sky scribbling you did there!!!

Good flying.   

[wingspan33]

Wow Scott!!

That's a whole lot of sky scribbling you did there!!!

Good flying.   

Was I sky scribbling?

Today was another good day for flying at Mt. Washington. I drove up there with my glider and heavy duty field and brush mower. Why the mower, you may ask? Well, all the rain in April and early May has caused at least 1 foot for grass to spring up. So, "launch maintenance" was called for. That will be the topic of my next post.

[wingspan33]

Hello Everyone,

I didn'y fly today but not because the wind wasn't good. First off I had to do some work on my glider rack. Until that was done how do you carry a glider to go flying? But beyond that I also wanted to do some launch maintenance before I flew. That required that I load up my field and brush mower (that required that I prep my small trailer to carry the mower.

All in all, I did get up to launch and started with mowing. At the same time, I observed that the wind was very nice for soaring, and probably thermaling! But having my base tube drag through tall grass - and maybe interfere with a good launch - seemed to be something I wanted to avoid. So mow I did!

Besides launch, the land owner has a small cabin next to the lower launch (the other launch is higher! [obviously]) and that, as well, had un-mowed tall grass in it's front yard. So I decided that I would fix that situation as well. When done mowing it was too late to set up the glider since the wind had slowed somewhat and the sky had become overcast. I didn't need another sledder (with almost no "sky scribbling" involved ).

I did get some photos of my mowing efforts which you will see below -

Mowing not done yet

Set up area done!

Lower Launch is Done!

Looking Good!

BTW - The cabin can be rented short term for anyone who may like the idea of living right next to a launch site. It's also good for hunting in the fall! It's also a very peaceful place to hang out (when guys with loud mowers aren't within a hundred yards ) Let me know if you'd like more info about that.

I also mowed part of the upper launch. But I didn't take any photos up there.

[Bob Kuczewski]

That's some pretty fancy flying on your track log Scott:

GreatScott.png (347.03 KiB) Viewed 8239 times

How did you manage that?!?   

Also, very nice job on the mowing. It's great that you're volunteering to help out with the site. And speaking of that, how much is the cabin rent? It looks like a great vacation spot for my next visit.

[wingspan33]

Hey Bob, I have to ask, is that sky scribbling or ground scribbling in that graphic of yours?

As far as the cabin goes, here's a link to Bob Grant's web site with a dedicated page about the cabin and camping at launch up on Mt Washington -

< http://www.skydogsports.com/camp/ >

No prices are given (but Bob's had this up for many years so fees may have gone up) but contact info is given. There are many pictures included, so have a LOOK!

[wingspan33]

I got my 5th flight on my Talon 140 today. It was my best and longest flight so far. The length was 1 hour and 4 minutes. After launch I was above take off in less than 10 seconds. I climbed out to about 1,745 ft over launch, cored half a dozen thermals and flew with about that many red tail hawks. One of the red tails got very close and I heard it "scream" at me.

I was able, once again to top land. That makes car retrieval much easier! I also got 4k video of most of the flight, but when I landed the camera told me the SD card was full so I couldn't get any top LZ video. Hopefully I'll be able to put up some in air photos taken from the video. That'll be for the next post.

I'll include here 2 screen captures of my GPS track from Google Earth -

Some Sky Scribbling for Bob

G E Track of 5-31-19 Mt Wash Flight1.jpg (260.92 KiB) Viewed 8204 times

[JoeF]

Sooo fun! Thanks, Scott, for caring share!

[wingspan33]

I got some pictures from my video of my last flight on 5/31. My Go Pro clone filled the micro SD card before the flight was over so no coming-in-to-land images. But one really cool moment happened when a red tail hawk flew within 5 feet of my LEs. Two other red tails are in the same brief sequence. BTW - I wasn't aiming at the hawk it just came out of the blue - or should I say that I came out of the blue and nearly flew into its path. Luckily the hawk missed me, or I missed him/her. I did hear a loud complaint from the hawk, as in "What the F#*k are you doing? I was thermally here!".

So far I have 4 screen captures which I'll give some information about below each image (if they need some explanation). Click on them to see the full images!

Upper and lower launch at Mt Washington

There's the red tail between my risers and right down tube.

Now just between right down tube and right side flying wire. It's "yelling" at me here!

This picture shows the top LZ, the launch areas and the valley LZ all in one shot.

In the last picture you can see the valley LZ in the middle far right and the launch area just above my right side wire about 2/3 rds of the way out. The top LZ is just below my wind speed indicator. I'm about 600 ft over launch in this picture.