On Jan 12, 4:56*pm, mattm wrote:
Essentially this is a refinement of the beginner approach to glide
slopes: take the published value and divide by 2 as a safety factor.
I divide by something closer to 1.1 and usually make it home just fine.

2 is a bit harsh!!

I use 32.8:1 plus circuit height no matter what I'm in :-)

It's about right for a PW5 (or K6), about your factor of 1.1 for a
Libelle or Grob Twin, and maybe 25%-30% pessimistic for a Janus or
DG1000.

Those are also in order (and I think reasonable proportion to) the
cost and embarrassment and inconvenience of breaking each of those
gliders!

It also happens to be 100 ft per km, which doesn't require a computer
to calculate.