My thinking is that for a wind blowing towards the east, the top of the
rotor is also blowing east and the bottom of the rotor is blowing west,
so the lift side of the rotor is to the west of the sink side. This is
idealized because if the feature causing the wave is convoluted and
irregular, all sorts of chaotic interactions can result in unpredictable
patterns.
That's right, and I don't think it can be predicted, hence my original
position that I would not penetrate upwind looking for the up side of
the rotor unless I had plenty of altitude AGL and a place to bail out
(figuratively). I have personally worked rotor up into wave an several
occasions, but I've always had at least 5K' AGL when I did it. This is
the nature of western flying.
--
Dan, 5J