Where is the best consistent ride soaring site in the USA. Recently got my PPL, and I'd love to experience ridge soaring. I've Only flown in the flat lands.

On Wednesday, November 15, 2017 at 10:13:12 AM UTC-7, wrote:
> Where is the best consistent ride soaring site in the USA. Recently got my PPL, and I'd love to experience ridge soaring. I've Only flown in the flat lands.

http://higlideracademy.com/

On Wednesday, November 15, 2017 at 10:13:12 AM UTC-7, wrote:
> Where is the best consistent ride soaring site in the USA. Recently got my PPL, and I'd love to experience ridge soaring. I've Only flown in the flat lands.

East: Ridge Soaring in Pa or Jersey Ridge Soaring (Blairstown).
Central: Talihina, OK Oklahoma Soaring Association
West: Logan, UT; Utah Soaring Association
Hawaii: Dillingham Airfield

For east, don't forget Mifflin in PA or New Castle in VA.

Dillingham Airfield on Oahu is the absolute best ridge soaring site. The trade winds are very consistent. The view is impossible to top. A 500 foot tow and you are off. Leave the ridge and fly out over the ocean to look down at the coral reefs.

I have done it five times. The winds failed to blow on only two days. Within two days things were good again.

On Thursday, November 16, 2017 at 7:05:37 AM UTC+3, wrote:
> Dillingham Airfield on Oahu is the absolute best ridge soaring site. The trade winds are very consistent. The view is impossible to top. A 500 foot tow and you are off. Leave the ridge and fly out over the ocean to look down at the coral reefs.
>
> I have done it five times. The winds failed to blow on only two days. Within two days things were good again.

I don't think you've really experienced ridge soaring until you've done a 50 km or 100 km or longer run at high speed without turning.

Doesn't look possible there.

Along the chain on the east coast of the island, maybe, but that's a totally different wind direction than would make Dillingham local ridge work.

On Wed, 15 Nov 2017 23:51:07 -0800, Bruce Hoult wrote:

> On Thursday, November 16, 2017 at 7:05:37 AM UTC+3,
> wrote:
>> Dillingham Airfield on Oahu is the absolute best ridge soaring site.
>> The trade winds are very consistent. The view is impossible to top. A
>> 500 foot tow and you are off. Leave the ridge and fly out over the
>> ocean to look down at the coral reefs.
>>
>> I have done it five times. The winds failed to blow on only two days.
>> Within two days things were good again.
>
> I don't think you've really experienced ridge soaring until you've done
> a 50 km or 100 km or longer run at high speed without turning.
>
> Doesn't look possible there.
>
> Along the chain on the east coast of the island, maybe, but that's a
> totally different wind direction than would make Dillingham local ridge
> work.

The Dillingham ridge looks as if 7-8km should be easily usable. But, the
section of the Pennines centered on Cross Fell and easily accessable from
a winch launch at Eden Soaring is 12km. This section works in wind from
SSW through NW and in good conditions 60km will work. In addition, a
decent easterly sets up wave directly above the airfield and westerlies
can give wave off the Lake District on the other side of Eden Valley.

As Bruce says, you could get 40km on the east-facing ridge past Kailua,
but how often do you get an easterly there and does it wave?




--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

What about the continental US?

On Thursday, November 16, 2017 at 10:58:04 AM UTC-5, wrote:
> What about the continental US?

It depends on where the wind is blowing the right way today.
I'd add Benton TN to the list. Good site and terrain, and excellent teaching staff.
UH

At 15:58 16 November 2017, wrote:
>What about the continental US?
>
It all depends on what you want to do. There are a number of
sites in the CONUS that offer very nice shorter length ridges. If you
want to try to make long distance ridge flights, then the Appalachian
mountain system in the eastern CONUS is where you want to go.
There are a number of good sites along that mountain chain, some
of which are better located on some of the main ridges for long
flights. That ridge system can be accessed from numerous places
from New York, all the way south to Alabama. It pretty much all
started back in the late 1960's with Karl Striedieck flying from his
private field on Bald Eagle Ridge just west of State College, PA.
Ridge Soaring is a commercial operation that is in the valley just
below Karl's private field in Julian, PA. Ridge Soaring is geared
towards accommodating pilots like you who are new to ridge
soaring, and are able to provide very good support for newbies and
record flyers alike. You will want a commercial operation that is
there 7 days a week if you are going to be visiting. You don't want
a club which only operates on weekends. History shows that a large
amount of national and world records have been set with a launch
point of either Eagle Field (Karl's place) or Ridge Soaring. I don't
think you will find another CONUS location that can rival these
accomplishments using pretty much "ridge only" flights. If I were
you, I'd get in contact with Tom Knauf at Ridge Soaring and see
what he has to offer. I don't think you will be sorry.

Good Luck......

RO

I'll just echo what both Mike and Hank pointed out. Your first focus should be to find a site that has both ridge and ridge instruction. In addition to the ones already mentioned, don't rule out Wurtsboro NY. While the ridge is quite short, it's perfectly adequate for basic ridge training on techniques. Concepts including things like climbing off the ridge, how well is the ridge working, getting around offsets and small gaps, etc. are foundational skills that are required before tackling the big missions.

Also, consider joining the Appalachian Mountains Soaring group on Google Groups. I'm the admin for that, and I'm sure some threads from a newbie would be good.

Erik Mann (P3)


On Thursday, November 16, 2017 at 11:45:07 AM UTC-5, Michael Opitz wrote:
> At 15:58 16 November 2017, wrote:
> >What about the continental US?
> >
> It all depends on what you want to do. There are a number of
> sites in the CONUS that offer very nice shorter length ridges. If you
> want to try to make long distance ridge flights, then the Appalachian
> mountain system in the eastern CONUS is where you want to go.
> There are a number of good sites along that mountain chain, some
> of which are better located on some of the main ridges for long
> flights. That ridge system can be accessed from numerous places
> from New York, all the way south to Alabama. It pretty much all
> started back in the late 1960's with Karl Striedieck flying from his
> private field on Bald Eagle Ridge just west of State College, PA.
> Ridge Soaring is a commercial operation that is in the valley just
> below Karl's private field in Julian, PA. Ridge Soaring is geared
> towards accommodating pilots like you who are new to ridge
> soaring, and are able to provide very good support for newbies and
> record flyers alike. You will want a commercial operation that is
> there 7 days a week if you are going to be visiting. You don't want
> a club which only operates on weekends. History shows that a large
> amount of national and world records have been set with a launch
> point of either Eagle Field (Karl's place) or Ridge Soaring. I don't
> think you will find another CONUS location that can rival these
> accomplishments using pretty much "ridge only" flights. If I were
> you, I'd get in contact with Tom Knauf at Ridge Soaring and see
> what he has to offer. I don't think you will be sorry.
>
> Good Luck......
>
> RO

Consistent is the key word here. When its good, the Pennsylvania (and north and south) ridges are great. But you can go for weeks without a good ridge day. Just look at the flights for this year on OLC. I'm told by those have been doing this much longer than me that ridge days were much more common in the good old days. I'll second the suggestion to call Tom Knauff. If its predicted to be a good day you could almost certainly get a ride with Tom or one of his instructors. Be careful, though. When the soaring bug bites you you'll wonder why you spent all that time and money getting a power rating. ;>)

Mike

Not to get too persnickety on this subject, but I don't think it's true that there were more ridge days in the past. There are a lot more ridge-soarable days than folks realize in the appalachians, including backside (SE) days. But, a lot of folks don't come out for the marginal ones or the ones where the day is going to die early, which are often good training days. In fact, it's probably ridgeable right now, should be tomorrow morning, backside on Saturday, then NW again on Sunday. If you are "on the property", you might be able to get several days in, even if they aren't the sort of days you'd drive 4 hours for.

I have to look, but I think we had at least a dozen backside days this year and a similar number NW (which is a bit low), though we couldn't fly at Blairstown on several good NW days due to tow operations or other issues.

P3

On Thursday, November 16, 2017 at 1:41:30 PM UTC-5, wrote:
> Consistent is the key word here. When its good, the Pennsylvania (and north and south) ridges are great. But you can go for weeks without a good ridge day. Just look at the flights for this year on OLC. I'm told by those have been doing this much longer than me that ridge days were much more common in the good old days. I'll second the suggestion to call Tom Knauff. If its predicted to be a good day you could almost certainly get a ride with Tom or one of his instructors. Be careful, though. When the soaring bug bites you you'll wonder why you spent all that time and money getting a power rating. ;>)
>
> Mike

On Wednesday, November 15, 2017 at 12:13:12 PM UTC-5, wrote:
> Where is the best consistent ride soaring site in the USA. Recently got my PPL, and I'd love to experience ridge soaring. I've Only flown in the flat lands.

If by consistent you mean always being able to count on staying up as long as you want on nearly every day of the year then Dillingham is pretty hard to beat. I did over 100 days of flying there over a three year period and only had 1 flight where I had to land before I was ready to call it a day, and that one was my fault for flying into sink while I was low.

You get *maybe* 3 to 5 days per year that are not good for soaring, so you can plan on flying any day and there is no worry about the weather being bad...

Once you tow to 1000ft, you can stay up as long as you want on the ridge, it's actually hardly any challenge to just fly around at 3000-4000ft all day going back and forth between Kaena point and Mt Kaala. So basically between 10am and 6pm there is always constant ridge lift. And by midday, there is usually a good thermal over the far end of the runway as well, although you have to be careful of the skydivers who are just to the east of there.

There is also wave lift at times, one day while I was there Elmer (the owner of soar Hawaii) took the Grob 103 to 23,000 and would have gone higher if they had been dressed warmer.

On the Waimanalo side of the island, the ridge is actually longer but not many people fly on that side. Some guy did a 36 hour duration flight there in a 1-26 years ago.

I've wondered if there was an actual data to back up the recollections and have never taken the time to look into it. And you're right about marginal/short days. In the case of Ridge Soaring, its remote enough for most pilots that conditions have to be pretty good to justify the trip. Those days have been pretty scarce, at least in my opinion. I'm pretty sure there are many more days that are suitable intro/training flights.

Half the population of the USA is within a 500 mile circle around Ridge Soaring Gliderport. It is about a 4 hour drive or less from western Ohio, northern NY, southern Virginia.

The spring and fall "ridge seasons" are easily predictable, and if the ridge winds are not blowing, the thermals are augmented by the undulating earth /mountains. Thermals can reach 18,000 feet, and we have flown over 39,000 feet in wave lift.

Bottom line - watch the weather. it is worth the drive.

Finally, don't put it off. Doris and I are ready to retire, and we are not sure there is enough interest in the gliding community to preserve the Gliderport.

Great ridge day today, (Friday, Nov 17) and probably tomorrow.

Tom Knauff

On Friday, November 17, 2017 at 5:43:50 PM UTC+3, wrote:
> Half the population of the USA is within a 500 mile circle around Ridge Soaring Gliderport.

That's an astounding statistic, especially considering how much of that circle lies in the Atlantic Ocean. Chicago is an easy walk outside that circle, and Nashville and Atlanta maybe 50 miles.

It might well be that near half the population of Canada is in that circle too! Quebec is 25 miles outside it, but Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton are well inside.

Don't get me wrong, Ridge Soaring is an awesome place and definitely worth the drive. As a matter of fact, half the experience is staying in the bunkhouse and having a beverage with some of the best/most interesting pilots and people you'll ever meet. I feel a little bad for the people who choose to stay in hotels. If work didn't prevent it, I'd be making the five hour drive right now.

P.S. - Get on their e-mail/newletter list. Tom normally sends something out if it looks like good flying is in store.