I didn't expect to write today's blog. Scratch and I were due to continue our Flight Instructor training at Upavon on a Royal Navy Gliding and Soaring Association Gliding development week. Alas, a very poor forecast caused the organiser to cancel the week. A disappointing development considering we had lost 50% of the time to weather, helicopter operations and defects during our training at RNAS Culdrose over the summer.
So would it be Wavers or Waders this Wednesday? I didn't need Andy's forecast to work it out. Skysight's windgram said it all.
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| A picture is worth a thousand words |
And so it turned out to be. The windgram was prescient and the cloud base rarely exceeded the airfield height all day. Mike Bennett cancelled our visitors. Richard was the Duty Basic Instructor, but his largess didn't run to bacon butties even though he was unemployed today.
The lure of bacon was probably what brought Neal to the club today as he got stuck into membership packs and changing the LED light in the parachute room. Apparently, his wife does know he is capable of hoovering after working, so there are no compromising photos included in this blog. Next time, a PIR sensor will be fitted in the parachute room and an LED strip light in the Tech Office. Then its over to others to undertake the long-awaited solar upgrade to the clubhouse.
I reviewed another iteration of the sunshade for the Flarm LED display in the front of the Puchascz. It's almost there. Apparently, the poor visibility of these new displays is a wider problem. Next time, it will be ready for a test fit and a flight test. If successful, the 3-D printing code for the glare shield mount and instrument panel mount versions will be shared with the wider gliding community via gliderpilot.net.
That thought, the need to test-fly the Puchacz, led the Wednesday Wavers to ponder why they had been so unlucky with the weather over the last three weeks. Thoughts turned to the suspicion that we had a "Jonah" amongst our ranks. An analysis of the common factors determined that the "Jonah" was Mike but not the one who had recently returned from a holiday in Portugal. It was 28 °C, sunny, with clear blue skies in case you are wondering.
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| At least one of the Wednesday Wavers has been enjoying fine weather |
Next week, things will be better as Peter Howarth is the Duty Instructor for the Waders.
Colin arrived and baulked at the rain and wind, and decided it was not a day for the annual inspection of the Astir CS77, DNE. However, John Smith and Colin managed to measure the control surface deflections, and test the ASI and altimeter whilst I prepared the associated paperwork.
The simulator got some good use by a number of us. More preparations were underway in preparation for the adoption of the new rules at the end of the month. More significantly the Basic Instructors wondered whether their updated Sailplane Pilot Licenses (SPL) would be back in time to continue to fly our lovely visitors in October.
John Allan was busy installing a fixed ground radio in the Volvo. His enthusiasm had to be dampened considerably until he understood that putting a hole in the roof for the aerial was not a good idea for a vehicle that was going to live on Dartmoor. Phil was beavering in the MT hangar, working his farmer magic on tractor hydraulics. As ever DB was busy making up strops, fitting new canopy covers to the gliders, and doing other jobs, whilst I touched up the port side of the Puchacz's rudder with some white paint.
Other jobs were going on, so much so that I couldn't catch them all. The Waders were busy today, but perhaps not busy enough to take their minds off the fact that we weren't flying. By mid-afternoon, the workers started to dissipate after their efforts. Roll on next Wednesday, which will be Jonah-free!
Gavin Short
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