__________________
|
Powered Paragliding,
Paramotoring, PPG - news
Sep 21/11 Training with Pat and Dave - September 17/11 pm.
Great evening Dave has completed 12 flight. My comments from Dave's log book: "Sep 17/11 pm - Powered training - Cima K2 size L and Miniplane 125 with XL harness 4:30 to 7:30 pm session. 12 flights all well done. Lands and takes off on his own. All flights reverse inflation."
Pat has added 5 flights to his log book. Here is what I wrote in his log book: "Sep 17/11 pm - Powered training 4:30 to 7:30 5 flights 3 with Fides 2 XS - too much swinging in flight and 2 with Fides 26 - that work very well. Flight 5 - did not apply tension on steering toggles after inflation. Had prop/line strike and damaged 4 canopy lines
Sep 19/11 Impromptu fly in Stoney Creek - September 17/11 am. My self and Mark went to Ontario fly in organized by Paul B at the Stoney Creek airport. What a great set up. We flew - it was bit windy though - and then had a great breakfast made by Dan who is great pilot (you should see him turning around the Sting Powerplay glider - sort of got me scared) and amazing field kitchen chef - bacon, sausage, waffles with fresh blueberries and strawberries... I love Dan guy - too bad he is so quiet and introverted ;-). Mark said he will write up about this so once he email it to me I will post it. Sep 19/11 Training with Paul and Ian on Sep 16/11 pm. Paul has started his course back on July 9. He is a helicopter pilot with private license therefore he does not have to work on his ultralight pilot license as his private helicopter license is above that. So when he flies, he gets in the air and stays there. This definitely was the case on Friday. Paul took off and spent close to 1 hour cruising around, enjoying the crisp and smooth air. It was bit on chilli side - he was pretty cold but very happy when he finally landed.
Ian had 7 more flights to go so the plan was to finish his course tonight. All was going well and Ian was banging flight after flight, trying " Big Ears" manoeuvre, and some touch and goes. After 2 successful touch and go he asked me if I would film it on video. I said " I will do but do not make fool of you self!" and of course he did. After touch down he did not place him self in "torpedo position" to feel the glider and just as he started to add power the right side of the canopy collapsed and he stumbled and fell. Prop got nicked beyond repair so Ian now has a PPG souvenir. BTW you are not a real PPG pilot until you have one - so welcome Ian to the club of real PPG pilots. We mounted new prop and after that he did complete couple more touch and go's as to get back on the horse. He flew 8 times total and now he has 31 flight in log book - he is done. Congrats Ian on finishing your course! Next step: Write the ULTRA exam. Sep 16/11 GO Pro cameras available at great prices. This is to all sporty people: I am in process of becoming dealer for "Go Pro Be a HERO cameras". I have to make large initial large order but I do not want to have too much money tied up in inventory so I need to sell few fast. If you are interested in one or any accessories let me know and I can give you very good price. More info here: http://gopro.com/
Sep 14/11 Trike training with Pat - Sep 14, 2011 morning Met Pat at 5 pm. Very cold 20 km/h gusty wind at the field. Pat ground handled for while. By 6 pm it looked like it was flyable. I tool of to test air. Too gusty and too turbulent. We chat and wait. I take off again, much better but still too turbulent for student to fly. Took another 10 min. Tried again. It is OK. Pat managed 2 more flights as we did not have a lot of time. Good work. Pat has 5 flights in log book after about 16 hrs of training spread over 3 days.
Sep 14/11 Trike training with Brian - Sep 14, 2011 morning Met Brian at 7 am. Layer of fog. Grass soaked. Used my truck to pull the trike with Brian sitting in it but it was not working very well with glider being completely saturated with water. Took off for quick flight to dry off glider then proceeded to hand towing. With some wind we started to have, this was working bit better. Finally we got nice breeze and Brian was able to inflate and kite the glider while I was pulling him forward with my handy rope. Wow, tiring but good session.
Sep 12/11 What a busy weekend... Sunday Sep 11, 2011 Sunday - PM Mat Patrick at the field at 4:30 pm. We had a thunderstorm in vicinity so we did bit of ground handling. Then Karan came and that is when we started to hear thunder right next to us. We packed and took one car to Chippawa house - great little pub - and had some snacks, ice tea, coffee and watched Risk and Reward DVD by Jeff Goin. At 6:45 it looked like air cleared so we paid and headed to the field. I took quick flight to make sure that they storm did not stir the air too much. Bit bumpy but acceptable. Karan took off first and had a long 1 hour flight. Pat needed several tries but the he also took off - much better this time then the first time when he tried to sit down too early. After 20 min Pat called in asked if there is enough time for landing and another flight to which I responded yes. Pat landed, good landing BTW, we got ready, set up and off he went again. The sun was already down so after about 10 min or so I asked both Karan and Pat to come in and land which they both did very well. Then the mosquitoes attacked so we quickly packed and drove off. Great evening. Sep 12/11 What a busy weekend... Sunday Sep 11, 2011 Sunday - AM I was back at the field at 6:30 in the morning. Ouch I was tired but the amazing sunrise made up for that!
I hade trike flight planned with Lupo's (student in training) girlfriend. Grass was absolutely soaked with dew, light layer of fog and only 11 degrees Celsius. Now very inviting conditions. Lupo and Marnee showed up at 7 am and it was time to go. Sun started to poke out behind few early morning clouds and I hate getting bumped by thermals near the end of the flight having passenger aboard. I hade to try to take of couple of times as like a said there was no wind, glider got soaked with weather as soon as I laid it out and the humidity was 100 %. Once we did take off though the air was very smooth but quite cold. Did some low passes by Lupo who was taking video then headed for nice circle around the area. As soon as we climbed passed 400 ft the air got much warmer I would say at least by 6 or 7 degrees Celsius - nice surprise! We have then followed the Niagara Parkway peeking in the backyards of the amazing homes down below. Came near mighty Niagara Falls and Marineland - saw the poor Beluga whales in the little pool - quite sad. We then proceeded to some low flying in less populated west side area. The sun was out for half of our flight and then it went behind some clouds which made our flight quite smooth all the way to the end. Here is video from take off and landing at
the field:
After landing Dave and Lupo were planning to do few foot launched solo flights. Sun was still behind clouds so nothing was holding us back. Lupo quickly added 3 more flight to his log book. He is now finding that it is much easier to get into the seat as he was having trouble with that on previous flights. Nice job Lupo.
Dave also did very well. He added 6 more flight to his log book for total of 11 - all his and Lupo's light have been done extremely well. Good work guys.
He flies Miniplane 125 with Sky Paraglider Cima K2 large. Sep 12/11 What a busy weekend... Saturday Sep 10, 2011 Saturday - AM Started ground school with Pat and Brian and successfully finished at 2 pm
Saturday - PM After lunch Brian was not feeling well so he decided to skip the afternoon. He is planning to trike and it would have been too windy for him that afternoon anyway. He is local guy and retired so we can train any time conditions are good. So I went to the training field with Patrick knowing that Dave who started hic course lest week is planning to come. Conditions at the field were perfect so Patrick started his kiting lesson. After several partial inflations, Pat brought the wing all the way up and kited it! Wow, do we have a natural talent here? Hmmm, maybe it was just accident. No, it was not. Second inflation, same thing! Pat basically started where most guys take 4 hrs to get to.
Meanwhile Dave showed up. Today was his third training day. He would have flown on day two but it was morning session and at the end of it when he was ready conditions were too gusty. He started to handle showing great skill and confidence. After couple of hours wind started to mellow out so I decided to demonstrate take off, flight and landing. Just before I started to strap in Jamie, who I was emailing with showed up to take a look at what we do as he is interested in the sport.
Since Pat was kiting really well there was real possibility that he may fly first solo flight tonight. It is very important that students "feel" the thrust of engine and learn how to work with it before glider is attached. This includes some running with it and me occasional yelling "abort, abort" with the expectation that student will quickly shout of the engine. Quite important to do so if control of canopy is lost and it about to fall on spinning propeller. By 6 pm Dave started to fly solo and within 1.5 hour completed 5 solo flights. Great take offs and great landings. I could not have done it any better....well I could but not by much. Here is short video of Dave taking off that
Jamie too with his phone:
At 7 pm Pats was kiting on his own with great amount of confidence and skill so I gave him the small Miniplane o see if he could inflate and control with the load on his back. He tried and no problem. Well there is nothing else to do but try first solo flight. 5 min later Pat is in the air loving the calm conditions. What an accomplishment - first solo flight after 10 hours of training out of which, 6 hrs was class room - ground school stuff. I let Pat to fly for good half an hour and then he made pretty good landing. Very soft but did not stay on his feet, sort of ended up on one hand and one knee. very common with first time landings.
Final debrief:
____________________________________________________________________________ Older news 94 93 92 91 90 89 88 87 86 85 84 83 82 81 80 79 78 77 76 75 74 73 72 71 70 69 68 67 66 65 64 63 62 61 60 59 58 57 56 55 54 53 52 51 50 49 48 47 46 45 44 43 42 41 40 39 38 37 36 35 34 33 32 31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 |
Happy first time flyers. Pat, Dave and Jamie.