Super fast assembly and launch...

They looked switched on enough to have rehearsed this a few times and taken
the safety aspects into consideration.

Given most of the previous comments in the thread I'm not surprised that
soaring is turning into an old farts hobby.

Live a little before you die.

On Nov 14, 3:45*pm, Z Goudie wrote:
They looked switched on enough to have rehearsed this a few times and taken
the safety aspects into consideration.

Given most of the previous comments in the thread I'm not surprised that
soaring is turning into an old farts hobby.

Live a little before you die.

eh? speak up sunny........I caint hear ya?

Brad

PS..............totally agree with you!

It's obvious that they rehearsed this many times to get all the bugs
out of their act. It wasn't a one-time thing. The only way to do it
this fast is to do it exactly right. The winch launch was to prove
they had indeed done it right. I'm applauding their show.

I'd be less concerned about a botched assembly than a smashed
finger. In fact, the assembly errors I've seen come from a too-slow,
interrupted assembly than from an intensely focused fast one.

Some of the oldtimers may recall that contest re-lights used to be
allowed after a nearby off-field landing and a lightning fast
retrieve. Crews actually practiced this sort of thing so they could
get their pilot re-launched before the start gate closed.

I did one while crewing for Bill Ivans and his Sisu 1A at the 1964
Nationals at McCook, Nebraska. It went like this:

Launch Bill at 12:00
Bill lands 5 miles out at 12:30 with Don Wimple and I on hand.
We de-rig the Sisu and hit the road at 12:40
Sisu re-rigged at McCook by 12:55
Launch Bill again at 13:00

Bill D


On Nov 14, 12:17*pm, jcarlyle wrote:
I don't think they did a positive control check. Not too smart...but
oh, well, it was a record attempt, don't you know?

-John

On Nov 14, 12:49 pm, KevinFinke wrote:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Huk_WOxk1oc

After seeing this video, I think I'm going to try and recruit 5 people
to help me assemble my ship instead of just one....

At the Marfa World Soaring Contest in 1970, four of us pulled a
Libelle out of the factory trailer, rigged it and it was rolling on
tow in 4 minutes 5 seconds. That included a positive control check.
The pilot, from New Zealand, had waited longer than he should and was
trapped by overdelopment in the local area. He took 12 or 13 tows that
day - landing off base at the Marfa Muni airport at least 6 times. By
the time we did the fast rig we had already practiced it about half a
dozen times. Needless to say, he was flying dry. Rigging a Libelle was
pretty easy!

Albert Thomas

"4"

On Fri, 14 Nov 2008 15:59:04 -0800 (PST), bildan
wrote:
[snip]

Some of the oldtimers may recall that contest re-lights used to be
allowed after a nearby off-field landing and a lightning fast
retrieve. Crews actually practiced this sort of thing so they could
get their pilot re-launched before the start gate closed.

I did one while crewing for Bill Ivans and his Sisu 1A at the 1964
Nationals at McCook, Nebraska. It went like this:

I saw one done with somewhat different motivation, when a pilot not to
be named (though now deceased) flew an Astir under the Rio Grande
Gorge Bridge at Taos. His family was waiting on the plateau with the
trailer ready, and they were out of there in fifteen minutes.

The sheriff's office is twenty minutes away...

rj

On Fri, 14 Nov 2008 09:49:45 -0800 (PST), KevinFinke
wrote:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Huk_WOxk1oc

After seeing this video, I think I'm going to try and recruit 5 people
to help me assemble my ship instead of just one....

In my experience, if two people can rig a ship in fifteen minutes,
five can do it in an afternoon.

rj

snip
four of us pulled a Libelle out of the factory trailer, rigged it and
it was rolling on
tow in 4 minutes 5 seconds.
/snip

Two questions:
(1) what do you mean by "out of the factory trailer"? (I hope it's not
the first thing that comes to mind
(2) Who thought to have a stop watch running on the first go?!

snip
He took 12 or 13 tows that day
/snip

Oh my. That's got to be the record by a long shot. Anyone else come
close?

When I was a student (solo) pilot I tried to kill a December Saturday
by just taking pattern tows all day. I was just warming up when the
instructor asked me how many flights I'd had. A dozen, I replied. He
said "That's more than enough. Call it a day."

I didn't argue but I was a little miffed driving home!

~ted/2NO

Ralph, that is too funny! I'm going to have to add a third
corollary ...

And if it's a dozen club members out to assemble the club two seater,
it'll take the whole day,

Maybe it's not such a good idea to add more help to put my ship
together.

Kevin

Many years ago, the fast assembly was sometimes done during off days at
the 1-26 Championships. Note that this is a glider with no automatic
hookups, and you were only allowed to use two guys to do the assembly. I
don't know what the record was, but it was a couple of minutes or so.
And the assembly ended when the guys stood back and said, "It's ready to
fly." Then somebody else did a complete pre-flight and PCC to confirm
that it was indeed flyable.

The fact that this crew omitted the control check is really kind of dumb.
If something had gone wrong, it would have spoiled their whole day.

Jim Beckman

It's a Discus with self connecting controls, so fairly hard to get wrong.
The most important things are remembering to fix the tailplane and put the
main pin in.

Some years ago a pilot at our club forget to do the latter. The glider
amazingly survived a launch, a short flight and a circuit, with the wings
being held on only by friction, but they fell off shortly after touchdown.
The pilot wasn't hurt, but quite a lot of damage was caused to the glider.


Del Copeland


At 12:30 15 November 2008, Jim Beckman wrote:


The fact that this crew omitted the control check is really kind of dumb.

If something had gone wrong, it would have spoiled their whole day.

Jim Beckman