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Old Folks Poll



 
 
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  #31  
Old November 4th 20, 03:57 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
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On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 4:41:15 AM UTC-8, Roy B. wrote:
I thought it might be fun (and healthy) to start a poll or discussion for the guys and gals who have been in the sport for + 25 years or more. So, my question for those people is : "What is the biggest change you have seen in the sport over the years you have participated?"

For me, the biggest change was the widespread adoption of GPS - which changed everything about flight recording, contests, contest tasking and badge flying. Second place goes to the newer trailers which are so much better than what we struggled with in the old days. Third place might be OLC . . .
What do you think?

ROY

Like Les Arnold was in Fremont, the 2-33 was the trainer of choice, complete beginners soloed in 12 flights, Diamonds were rare, fiberglass was only for floating on the water and carbon fiber was not invented.

Bruce Patton 96S
Still flying the HP-18, RV-10 and got a coffee cup from the SSA for 50 years membership

  #32  
Old November 4th 20, 03:57 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
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Decline of commercial operations. Clubs are the only way to go in many parts.

You could flip the question, what hasn't changed?

Doug
W24
  #33  
Old November 4th 20, 04:22 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Dan Marotta
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On 11/3/20 6:36 PM, Jonathan St. Cloud wrote:
I have a prayer wheel in my cocpit. Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 11:32:30 AM UTC-8, Roy B. wrote:
Anybody remember what a "prayer wheel" was?
When did you last see one?
ROY


I last used a prayer wheel around 30 years ago in my ASW-19b...

--
Dan
5J


  #34  
Old November 4th 20, 04:30 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Tango Eight
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On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 7:41:15 AM UTC-5, Roy B. wrote:
"What is the biggest change you have seen in the sport over the years you have participated?"


OLC. Despite many flaws, nothing else even comes close.

Tangentially (it's not about the sport per se), the improvement in visibility in the NE USA in last 30 years has made soaring a lot more enjoyable and XC navigation by eyeball much easier. These days, we complain (but not too hard :-)) about haze when the vis is nearly 50 miles. Time was we did a lot of flying when it was barely 3 miles on the ground... and more like 1 mile at altitude.

T8
  #35  
Old November 4th 20, 06:49 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Chip Bearden[_2_]
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Not the most significant, and they apply mostly to competition, but:

1. Turnpoint verification: I caught the tail end of "fly to the TP and draw a picture of the white panels set up on the ground by TP team". We took to Instamatic cameras OK around 1970 but the transition to 35 mm was rocky as the first mandate was for clock cameras, the clock feature of which was hardly ever used. Then GPS.

2. Tasking: I also caught the tail end of open-ended distance tasks. I never flew free distance but I did have several "fixed course back to the start and then distance on a leg extending through a point" tasks. Then cat's cradle and variations thereof. Somewhere in there was a brief fling with out-and-return-with-multiple-turnpoint-options, an attempt to prevent losing a day when the only T-storm in the sky parked right over the only TP on the task. That opened the door to POST. Then GPS brought us into the current era of AST, AAT, and MAT tasks. Whenever there's clamoring to go 100% AST, I think back to days when, if only we had picked that TP 10 miles away instead of this TP, we wouldn't have lost the day entirely.

3. Number of classes: The introduction of a Standard Class Nationals was revolutionary compared with run-what-ya-brung "Open Class" where a nationals could have long-wing fiberglass ships flying with everything down to and including the occasional 1-26. 15 Meter followed in 1976 and started to splinter the contest group. Now, I can't keep track of how many classes we have but rest assured that if you don't mind flying a "nationals" with 8 or 9 other pilots, there's a class that's perfect for you.

4. Launch times: I flew a bunch of contests with pilot-selected takeoff. Pilots chose their takeoff times each morning based on our assessment of the weather at approx. 10 AM. When your launch time came, you launched or dropped back to an open slot or the end, regardless of the wx. Yes, I've seen an entire field launched into an overcast sky just because it was time, and no one wanted to take a chance on missing something. Designated launch (a rotating launch order triggered by report from a sniffer) didn't come around until, IIRC, the late 1970s.

5. Start gates: I actually liked the conventional start gate with a high-speed plunge across the 3,300' line but it's definitely less stressful with a higher start cylinder.

6. Finishing: I also like finish lines and low passes but cylinders with floors are a bit less stressful. And less demanding: gone are the days when I spent an hour on the practice day plotting landable fields in the last few miles from every direction in case of a low final glide.

7. Weather forecasts: yeah, forecasters got it right some of the time back then and today's experts sometimes miss, but there's no comparison. QV, P3, FS, and others have a lot more and better data to work with and know how to use it.

8. And, yes, I miss not knowing how you're doing each day until the computer cranks out the actual mileages and speeds. In the old days of ASTs, cameras, and start/finish lines, when you encountered a competitor on course, you usually knew when they started and, hence, whether you had been caught (gloom) or had overtaken him/her (yes!). And I occasionally had the thrill of being greeted by my wife--who, like every good crew, kept a log of all gate times--when I opened the canopy with "and here's a kiss for the winner". Crews often knew before their pilots landed who had fastest time (equivalent to fastest speed back then because we all flew the same course distance).

9. U.S. Team selection: In the past, the Category One pilots ranked each other via a mailed-in ballot to determine the Team. There were consistent rumors of block voting, reciprocity agreements, etc., so everyone seemed happy to move to a strictly numerical-grading selection. Recently that's been tweaked to allow for some subjectivity. Check back in 5-10 years for the latest.

10. I'll get some pushback on this last one but it's my impression that we're less eager/willing to send pilots out on a task with a high probability of landouts. I don't disagree with that, for reasons ranging from lack of crew to the risks to more expensive gliders. But with the exception of days that turn sour part way around the course, I just feel like we spend less time flying in marginal XC conditions, which doubtless has some impact on our team when they arrive at the WGC and are expected to fly unless it's raining heavily.

I also recall the first televised U.S. presidential debate and the days when we all voted on the same day. But despite what 2G says elsewhere, those aren't relevant to soaring.

(yawn)
Chip Bearden
JB
  #36  
Old November 4th 20, 07:42 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Nigel Pocock[_2_]
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electronics.
My first glider didnt have a battery. No radio, electric vario etc. not
needed. (1978 Olympia 2b)

Camaraderie.
As gliders have got easier to rig, had motors, require less maintenance,
you do not get groups of people gathering to help each other the way
we used. Ahh the joys of a retrieve in a muddy field at 1am


  #37  
Old November 4th 20, 09:45 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
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On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 12:11:20 PM UTC-8, Thomas Dixon wrote:
On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 12:40:12 PM UTC-7, Papa3 wrote:
On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 11:47:45 AM UTC-5, Chip Bearden wrote:
You didn't think my response would be a one-liner, did you?

Everything already cited:
* better trailers (which, with the fiberglass revolution starting in the mid 1960s, made possible near-universal rig-to-fly style vs. hangars, the norm when I was coming up)
* GPS (more flexible tasking but goodbye navigation skills as a way to enhance contest points)
* availability--at a cost--of competitive sailplanes to the average pilot. Less than a dozen top-ranked, well-heeled, lucky guys got one of Len Neimi's Sisus back in the '60s.
* universal availability of really good instrumentation (I used to spend a lot of time tuning my varios/TE with gust filters, restrictors, add/subtracting tubing lengths, capillaries, copper scrubbers in capacity bottles, etc. Now you just plug it all together and configure the software)
* greater consistency of manufacture for new gliders (no more hoping you got a good one from the factory)
* crewless contests (I recall when Erik Mozer showed up crewless for a Nationals around 1992, IIRC; I was truly shocked! Now I've only had a crew a couple of times since 2006. Hahaha).

But the two biggies for me a

1. Leveling of competitive skills that started with the Byars & Holbrook seminars and continued through Reichmann's book and other publications and programs. The top handful of pilots used to be far better than the rest of the pack. Now they're usually more tightly packed, although leeching (another trend that got much worse) and having comparable sailplanes have contributed to this.

2. Demands on time. There's just so much other stuff going on in our lives that conflicts with soaring: other activities, family, job, etc. Those were always there but when I was a 9-to-5 guy, it was easy to free up the time and I think the same was true for my father. Now many of us are pulled in so many directions.

I don't know whether cost, per se, should be on the list. Prices seem astronomical now compared with the old days but compared to income, I don't know. George Moffat used to say, IIRC, that his limit was 1.5x annual salary.

One thing I might add but I'm not sure it's universally true is that good sailplanes seems to remain competitive for much longer; i.e., the evolution of "high performance" is much slower. The gliders I think of as enduring in the old days--Standard Austria, Ka-6, Sisu--were only at the top for a few years. Today, the ASW 20 (ca 1976) is still out there, though Sports and Club Class have made that possible in recent years. And many others with long histories: e.g., Discus 2, LS8, ASW 27. But I'm still competing in my ASW 24, designed in ~1986 and purchased in 1992. We always kept gliders a little longer than most anyway but we felt the competition pass us by while doing it. Now it doesn't happen as fast or to the same extent, which is a good thing, IMO.

And, finally, a much different set of requirements to manage the technology. In the old days, it helped if you knew how to sand and fill metal wings to keep the gliders competitive. Now it helps to be tech savvy with interfaces, communications protocols, file formats, multiple tech platforms and OSs, etc. Then, as now, you can pay someone to do this and/or lean on your friends. But while the sailplanes themselves are evolving more slowly, keeping up with the technology from an IT perspective is more difficult.

Just my brief thoughts. Hahahs. You asked, Roy.

Chip Bearden
JB

What Chip said (though I'm MUCH younger than he is :-) )

I think that GPS/recording had so many first order and second order impacts that it overwhelms the other. Whether it is competition tasking or "OLC Flying", the types of flights and ability to really benchmark oneself against others is a huge change. When I first started, I marveled at the descriptions by Striedieck, Seymour, Kai Gertsen about how they went here or dug out there or followed some "convergence" somewhere. Now, you can study every flight (if you're so inclined) and look at exactly what the big boys/girls did. To me that means current generation pilots can become reasonably competitive so much faster if they have the drive rather than having to sort of "learn by making every mistake in the book".

At the end of the day, it's still about pilot decisions more than equipment, so being able to grow the personal knowledge base more quickly seems to me to be a huge positive.

On the downside as Chip and Hank mentioned, it sorta feels like we're at the tail end of an era (probably already past it). I remember the first years I started competing (late 1980s) you needed a high ranking to be able to get into a contest. Today, if you can fog a mirror, we need you.

Same with airports. NJ had 5 active operations when I started (South Jersey, Colt's Neck, Somerset, Blairstown, Forrestal). Today only Blairstown remains.

Now, you kids get off my lawn and let me take my nap...

All of the above comments. Boy do I miss smoking & fixing the barograph. Hoping the cameras workd and the turnpoint photos were good. Opening charts in the cockpit to navigate, following a compass course, Looking at turnpoint task photos to make sure I was at the correct one for a task photo. Can I really trus my "prayer wheel" for the final glide. Yes, Roy B I still have one and it is in my ship to confirm what my CN says. Now it's, will my batteries last, who is my go to IT guy when files crash or instruments need updates. Is that other guy just looking in his cockpit to see all his screens or is he looking out at the other gliders?
Boise, ID

Only 45+ years.....

The revolution in cockpit electronics (flight & navigation computers, FDRs); much of what else has changed since is a direct fallout (my first glider(s) needed a battery only to run the radio).

The advent of accurate internet weather forecasting has changed the social aspect. We used to head to the gliderport every Saturday no matter what and either fly or hangar fly. Now everyone checks weather and if it looks unsoarable, no one shows up.
  #38  
Old November 4th 20, 10:57 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Chip Bearden[_2_]
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7. Weather forecasts: yeah, forecasters got it right some of the time back then and today's experts sometimes miss, but there's no comparison. QV, P3, FS, and others have a lot more and better data to work with and know how to use it.

Didn't mean to slight any of the other excellent weather experts who support our contests. Another one who comes to mind is WX who, like the rest of these bozos, cranks out good forecasts and then flies the tasks at a high rate of speed and makes me look bad.

In the old days, the weatherman made an appearance in the morning and then--as it became evident that the actual conditions most closely resembled the forecast only in the day, date, and time of sunset--disappeared to craft his excuses until reappearing the following morning.

Chip Bearden
JB
  #39  
Old November 5th 20, 04:09 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
2G
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On Tuesday, November 3, 2020 at 4:41:15 AM UTC-8, Roy B. wrote:
I thought it might be fun (and healthy) to start a poll or discussion for the guys and gals who have been in the sport for + 25 years or more. So, my question for those people is : "What is the biggest change you have seen in the sport over the years you have participated?"

For me, the biggest change was the widespread adoption of GPS - which changed everything about flight recording, contests, contest tasking and badge flying. Second place goes to the newer trailers which are so much better than what we struggled with in the old days. Third place might be OLC . . .
What do you think?

ROY


OLC wouldn't have been possible without:
1. The Internet and
2. GPS
The most life-altering tech advancement in my life has been the Internet, hands down. The other most glider-specific advancement has been modern motorgliders.

Tom
  #40  
Old November 5th 20, 04:35 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
andy l
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On Wednesday, 4 November 2020 at 21:57:24 UTC, Chip Bearden wrote:
In the old days, the weatherman made an appearance in the morning and then--as it became evident that the actual conditions most closely resembled the forecast only in the day, date, and time of sunset--disappeared to craft his excuses until reappearing the following morning.

Chip Bearden
JB


That didn't happen in any of our competitions, or in internationals I've been to.

The briefings at one club are held in what we call a blister hangar, a temporary then permanent construction clad with sheets of curved corrugated steel.

One day years ago the met man was telling us about showers, with occasional very heavy ...

The rest of the sentence was drowned out by the sound of hailstones hitting the roof exactly on cue.

 




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