Airplane Porn (and the occasional helicopter)

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[wayno]

Lake Chelan WA Butte launch.

[wayno]

Frostbite Festival landing zone Saturday Night bonfire.

 

[wayno]

Here is my friend Larry launching his new Tecma Ixbo carbon fiber frame ridged wing(first flight) at Fort Funston CA(San Francisco area).

 

 

 

 

 

This is the wave cloud we ended up flying in that day, a once in a life time flight of flying that site, I was 5 miles out over the ocean when I took this photo.

Edited March 1, 2020 by wayno

[wayno]

Some people would let me get close and others would not, if I have posted these photos already sorry.

Larry 

 

His wife Tina

 

[wayno]

Here are photos of the women's worlds competition(I forget what year) at Lake Chelan WA.

 

Start of the day

 

Ready to go

 

General photos of the women waiting.

 

 

 

 

 

A shady spot to make plans/a strategy.

 

 

The Japanese team

 

Sara Chadwick

 

Waiting on between the rocks launch.

 

These women did a task harder than any task ever called in the Men's Worlds ever and 33% made goal, it was a perfect call, the assistant launch director told the launch director he was crazy for calling that task and walked away, 11 women did a 100 mile out and return(50 miles out and 50 miles back), it was an awesome meet, women from all over the world came to fly Lake Chelan, the site that opened up the flat lands of the US to cross country flying as no one even knew that we could fly over flat land in foot launch-able hanggliders and stay up all day, all the greats started at Chelan.

Edited March 2, 2020 by wayno

[angliagt]

13 hours ago, wayno said:

Frostbite Festival landing zone Saturday Night bonfire.

 

 

                                Frostbite Falls,Minn.?

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[MikeRL411]

1 hour ago, VFR800 said:

 

Hien, Kawasaki Tony with [presumed original] Japanese version of the Mercedes engine, not the radial later conversion.

[wayno]

12 hours ago, angliagt said:

 

                                Frostbite Falls,Minn.?

 

No, it was at what we call Dog Mtn, which is at the end of a reservoir near Morton WA, it's a hanggliding site that has been around since the early days of hanggliding when Standards were the only hanggliders, the photos of the bonfire were at the frostbite Festival, that is a hanggliding event to pay for cost of the site as we were cutting their trees down to keep the launch safe, we were buying trees and cutting them down.

 

This is a Standard Hangglider, a lot of them were made from plans on peoples garages, they were kinda dangerous to fly, back when these were all there was around 60 people were dying every year, in 1981 or 1982 only 3 people died hanggliding.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The hanggliders made since the 80s are way safer as they have built in dive recovery and are tested on trucks made to do such testing, the new stuff is amazing I am sure because it was amazing when I quit flying in 2003, factories didn't like me because I was always changing my gliders to make them better, I modified my Tecma Ixbo to the point where only I could fly it as I was afraid someone would kill themselves trying to fly and land it, it had a velocity not to exceed of 46mph, during a race someone at one of the speed gates suggested I was likely doing about a 100mph 6 feet off the ground thru that gate, this is a photo of that glider the day I took possession of it in Fort Funston CA.

 

 

That glider was a great glider to fly once I figured everything out, it could stay with/keep up with the next generation of gliders, I still have that glider to this day.

 

This is another one of my gliders, the factory was not happy as it had 7071 battens that I ordered it with but they said them battens flunked the tests so they sent it to me with 6061 battens, but the dealer/Rep made a set up and gave them to me because that is what I paid for.

 

 

Edited March 3, 2020 by wayno

[VFR800]

[wayno]

This was a friend that worked where I worked, I talked him into taking a hanggliding ride with an instructor Dave Chadwick(floating head), Dave was a little concerned at first when I made this fly-by.

 

 

 

Here Dave knew we were good and he stuck out his tongue.

 

Dave brought a lot new pilots into hanggliding, he would set up hanggliders in a mall and talk folks into coming out to Dog Mtn for a lesson.

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[wayno]

I knew there was a photo of me going thru that lower gate.

I had to let up as I was heading at the ground, my wing had a 40' wing span so there wasn't a lot of room between the poles at the gate.

 

You can see the far pole is bent over, but there was not really any wind, looking at the photo the guy may have been making room for me to get thru, all I know is they told me my body had to be below the tops of them poles when I went thru.

You can see the top of Chelan butte in the back ground, there was an upper gate just below the top of that peak, then between that gate and this gate I had to do one 360 turn, but I was going so fast it was more of a wing over loop than a turn as I came out going at the ground, I came within 10/20 feet of impacting the ground, it was a very big surprise to me and this is why.

Just before coming to the Chelan beach-in I made a major modification to my glider, it had these pockets that the spoilers slid into, when trying to fly fast these pockets would try lifting because of the lift being created going them kind of speeds, the glider was made to fly at lower speeds, the VNE(velocity not to exceed) was 46mph, when I moved to the right in the control bar, the right spoiler would lift and the glider would turn, but at speed they both lifted creating a huge amount of bar pressure, this was dive recovery built into the glider, so what I did was cut the pocket off except for 2 inches and I had Velcro sewn into it, I then put Velcro on the spoiler also(way more involved but this is the short story), so now instead of the spoiler being slid into the pocket it was held on with Velcro, they did not even try to lift anymore at any speed, before that modification I had adjusted outer 3 ribs to have less bar pressure, so I get there, set up my glider, hook in, and then do a race to the beach for my test flight(kinda stupid, but I was indestructible back then.

I launched between the rocks, I did such an aggressive launch I was able to cut the corner and go between the rock and the hill while everyone else had to go around the rock, I pulled in just after the rock and felt something I had never felt before in this or any other hangglider, the glider accelerated forward at a high rate of speed, I realized I was going to have to let off as I would be too low to make the upper gate, that is when I had my first clue to throttle it back, I made the gate and pulled in, like I said I had a warning already to throttle back, that glider accelerated like the devil was on its tail, I had to pull the control bar back,  the glider was divergent(it wanted to fly into the ground and crash), I played the game and kept going as fast as I could without loosing control, I did my 360 degree turn I mentioned above, I went thru the lower gate at a very high rate of speed, and then I landed at the finish line.

I broke the glider down and went back up the hill to make one more run, up there at launch I re-adjusted the ribs half way back to the stock position and made one more race to the beach, I do not know which time they said I went thru the lower gate at 100mph, but the adjusted glider flew great, it was almost neutral bar pressure, it didn't want to dive into the ground anymore, it is adjusted the same way to this day.

Just so everyone don't think I am entirely crazy, a couple weeks later I had flown 30 miles out and was on my way back to the Butte when I chased down a dust devil trying to find some lift(dust devils are thermals) and I went over the falls at around 2000 feet above the ground, I was going straight down and I decided to let the glider do it's thing, I didn't put any control input into the glider and it came out of the dive on its own, after that time I would always bring it out of the dive sooner, but I wanted to see what would happen, this is why I never changed the glider again, it flew great as far as I was concerned, but I also realized that all these modifications were done in steps, no one could just go from their glider to this one, it was too large of a change and I was afraid someone would get hurt or worse yet kill themselves trying to fly it, so I have never sold any of my modified gliders to this day.

 

This is me with a cloud covered Mt Rainier in the background in that hangglider before the modification to the spoilers, you can see how they are both lifted a little on this photo, the guy in the ultralight that towed me up swung around chased me down to take a photo of me before heading back to tow someone else up.

 

That is one of a hand full of photos of me in that glider, I was the one that took photos, most were kept too busy flying to bother taking a camera up with them, it was like a hornets nest above that hill where I took most my photos, but I had been flying with that camera so much I didn't even think about it anymore, the saddest part is that I would take 3 rolls of film up with me and take 96 photos, I was lucky to get 2 or 3 worth keeping as the camera would focus on the background rather than the subject like this photo below, I have thousands of these photos.

 

 

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Edited March 5, 2020 by VFR800

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