NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #23/NN_1992_23.iso/spool/rec/models/rc/4195

Text File | 1992-10-13 | 2.8 KB | 60 lines

Newsgroups: rec.models.rc
Path: sparky!uunet!panther!mothost!white!rtsg.mot.com!svoboda
From: [e-mail] (David Svoboda)
Subject: Re: Hi-Start
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail]
Nntp-Posting-Host: guppie44
Organization: Motorola Inc., Cellular Infrastructure Group
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 18:46:34 GMT
Lines: 47

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Greg Tarcza) writes:
|[e-mail] (Skip Egdorf) writes:
|>
|> After you stretch out the rubber tubing (holding onto the glider to
|> keep the Earth from flying away until you are ready,) let go of the
|> sailplane.
|>
|     Skip just hit my hot button (no offense, Skip).   NEVER, NEVER just
|let go of your plane when launching on the hi-start!  I haven't been
|flying very long (2.5 yrs), but I have seem a couple of mangled planes
|as a result of "letting go."

I agree, to a point.  If you want lousy launches, you can usually hold
the airplane completely level and let go.  The rubber pulls hard enough
to quickly give you airspeed enough to start climbing.  But keep that
nose down for a little while!  On the other hand...

|          A major cause of mishaps on a hi-start is a lack of initial
|     airspeed, usually resulting in a stall, wingover and crash. Always
|     throw your plane as you would for a hand-launch.  Keep the nose and
|     wings level and use enough muscle to give it more than enough
|     airspeed for flight.   A strong level toss will get you at least
|     part of the way up.

...my technique varies somewhat from this.  I throw the glider as if it
were a javelin, at about a 45 to 50 degree up angle.  The difference is, I
THROW it, as bloody hard as I can.  If you start with the nose level,
you are throwing away that first 15 feet of line pull, and that is enough
to lose you 40 feet of launch altitude.  The only minimum requirement is
that you throw it hard enough to immediately be well above stall speed,
but most people can do that.  Beyond that, the harder you can throw, the
higher you will launch.

Now, of course, how hard you throw your glider also depends on how fragile
it is.  You don't want to tear the wings off your Gentle Lady or anything,
but any 100 inch glider can easily take a strong launch.

(I once knew a guy named Chuck Whipple who had a Big League arm.  He used
to throw his Sailaire like a HLG (no highstart), and get two to three turns
around the field with it.  He once "Chucked" my Sagitta 900, and it
whistled so loudly with velocity (at a 45 degree up angle!) that I was
sure it was going to rip the wings off.  I got nearly highstart altitude
from that throw, caught a thermal from there and stayed up about 15 minutes.)

        Dave Svoboda, Palatine, IL