Opening weekend for the Cherokee

I've been slow to get airborne this year. I moved to Wichita in Feb. and
the glider came down at the end of March. I managed to break the canopy
while doing the annual so first thing was to put new polycarbonate (Lexan)
on the frame. That turned out well, then I decided it was time for a new
instrument panel. That took longer than I planned, like everything else.
My trailer got damaged during some major wind storm action we had a few
weeks ago (but the glider was OK whew) so it is demanding my attention. I
decided to prioritize and get the Cherokee ready to fly for Memorial Day
weekend. I slapped together the instrument panel well enough for flying
and installed it, then pulled the glider the 4 miles to the gliderport and
assembled it and put it in the hangar.

Saturday was a late launch, got up about 3:15 PM but the lift was great.
5 knot lift was pretty typical and stronger was seen. Cloudbase at 8,300
MSL. Not too shabby from tow release at 3500! This was my first flight
of the year so I took advantage to get re-aquainted with the glider. I
missed it. Incredibly, I haven't flown it since last October when I
tested for the glide polar. I made several climbs to cloudbase with
varying bank angles. Also took the chance to do some stalls and some
practice with coordination (dutch roll). Of course, I forgot to install a
new yaw string. Flight time was 2 hrs.

Sunday Dr. Jack was forecasting lift again, although not as good. I had
some other power flying scheduled for the morning and got out to the
gliderport just after 1. The 2-33 had already launched. I blasted off
behind the Cessna 185. Literally, it felt like I had a JATO pack. I
worked around down around 4000 for a while but finally had a good climb to
cloudbase at 6000. Did several more climbs and then the day started to
cycle. Had a save at 1500 AGL in a thermal that I cored right over the
gliderport, but that only got me back up to 4500 feet. everything kept
dying and I was forced to land. Another 2 hr performance. The 2-33 had
landed after an hour and a half. The Ka6 launched while I was up and ran
out to Sunflower and back, staying where the weather was good. He must
have had about a 3 hr flight.

Great weekend to fly in the middle of the country! Now I have to get
electrons flowing in my cockpit to power the new Microair 760, Soaring
Aids vario w/audio (does anyone know anything about these?), and Garmin
transponder. Hope everyone else had some good flights this weekend too.
Welcome to Summer!


-Tony Condon
Cherokee II N373Y