On arrival the light wind was coming from a strange direction but the planes were soon assembled, first the Taser for a few stable air trimming flights. She is really flying well other than with full flap down. With full flap if you want to turn she yaws in the opposite direction quite strongly, I need to increase the differential a lot!
Under the early morning light lift conditions it was really fun to fly the Taser, she can circle so tightly and indicates the smallest bit of lift. Several 10 minute flights were flown never going higher than 100m, great practice!
Taser ready to go
Once I had a few flights on the Taser I assembled the Osprey for a bit of landing practice. I managed to dial in a bit more flap movement the day before so landing it is now easier, but it still needs more to make landings as easy as my eSupra. Task for the week ahead!
Osprey ready for action under some clear skies.
With the sun now higher the first decent thermal activity started and rather than just practice landings I had some thermal-ling fun. On quite a few flights I rode a thermal for a while before a fast decent, either while doing aerobatics or with full crow, once low down again I would look for the next thermal and repeat the cycle. Great fun!
The first flight with some thermal activity.
The graph above shows a flight with a launch to 140m followed by working a few patches of buoyant air, never climbing but just slowing down the decent. towards the end of the flight a thermal broke away but I did not follow it long as a friend arrived at the field and I wanted to chat to him.
Working some weak lift
A thermal ride followed by some aerobatic fun on the way down
The next 2 flights, shown above, produced a few more thermals, climbing out a bit was followed by some fun aerobatics on the way down. The Osprey can loop, roll and do a split S quite well. It also flies surprisingly well upside down!
4 thermals in one flight!
By now the conditions had changed, the wind direction changed by 180 degrees and it picked up a bit. The thermals were now starting to pop all over the place and you could fly as long as you wanted. On the flight depicted by the graph above I worked 4 different thermals in different places, followed by intentional descends before catching the next thermal, lots of fun!
Last flight, strong thermal followed by low level fun.
By now it was getting very hot and I decided I would fly one more flight before heading home. A 110m launch right into a thermal resulted in a climb up to just over 300m before I pulled full crow for a quick decent. At this point I decided it was getting too hot and I would land and pack up.
While setting up the landing, at about 35m high, I felt a slight bump and could not resist....
Over the next 6 minutes I worked 4 very weak low level thermals never going much higher than 50m before the lift dissipated and I had to find the next bubble. Eventually the fourth bubble broke away and I rode it up to 100m before pulling full crow for landing. What a fun flight!
Tomorrow would hopefully have similar weather, then it will be time for some serious practice, I want to work on my landings and more importantly time precision. During the last 2 contests I could have moved up a place or 2 if my timing for the landings were better.
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