Click on invitation to enlarge!

Well gentle pilots, I can tell you that it hasn't stopped raining in Auckland since dawn or earlier, and Waikato is no different, hence the cancelled sign went out for today. so idle fingers need work. No late editions this week!

The mole has already leaked committee activity from Wednesday 18th, he (she?) has no respect for his lowly peers, struggling to find something to write about. However I have gazzumped him and taken to publishing this edition of Winglets to a broader audience, here on the website.

To business............

Winter did get its way ruling out flying on Wednesday again as well, but Saturday was a day; oh yes.

Hiding behind cloud base of about 2500 -300 feet was a huge wave band that seemed to stretch from Thames to Taupo (OK - Te Aroha to Te Poi), and once it began to show itself, a number of eager beavers turned up.

PK was rigged and readied and Peter & Dom flew some circuits. Then the Duo Trio turned up (Steve, Bob and Dave) with YL and after a circuit for Bob and Steve, Dave climbed in and disappeared with Bob, East bound for the wave.

Will Kamp took his DP's compulsory flight with Dom in PK and followed YL into the unknown, and an eery quiet came over the field. Not for long however, as Roger had GJ rigged in a flash and was soon heading for mecca.

David Muckle arrived shortly after, wheeling out WW to take up the attack. Iggy and his mate Chris decided that my suggestion of getting NI out warranted support, so all at once the hangar was empty! Being last man away at 16:07 I was keen to get high and get down asap, happy and content. Little did I know that I was about to take a romp around the sky looking like a drunken hawk - oh yes I found it (wild rotor) and was a little stupified by the experience, but happy that I found my way home OK after flying nearly to the swamp to find a hole in the cloud and barely losing a foot in altitude!

David reckoned I was working some secret leavers to make the wings flap when he went past, but didn't look too hard because his little stubs were trying to emulate NI's apparently. I am now initiated and, wiser as to what I should have done - as Roger commented "we've all been there", so I guess I am part of that club now too! 

What I didn't do was ask Alan Belworthy, our wave guru, why he wasn't flying - did he know what I found out? In fairness he was working hard tidying up loose ends on his ASK 13 (GS) readying it for use. Evey was busy sewing covers as well, so the B team was having a full on day. 

Visitors included Rainer and Anna and Wills friend Kim, who managed to fill in a few times on the laptop for me, and make some suggestions for improvements - thanks Kim. 

In all 9 flights taken in 5 gliders for a total of 6hrs and 11mins flying by 9 pilots, which, given the general look of the day, was a great turnout for winter. Moral: There can be great flying in weather that looks like rubbish. 

Look out for the Awards Dinner invite later this week and meantime check you have got the date of 18 August reserved for this function.

Finally, please pay your subs asap. The Awards Dinner is for club members and the rsvp date for the dinner is Monday 13 August. If you haven't paid your subs by then you won't be able to attend the dinner!

PC

Happy New Year everyone. It looks like summer has only just caught up with us, I think everyone has been a little miserable for the past month. Except those trying to grow grass.

PW5 Upgrade

We now have a new glider! GWW has joined the fleet, and GSN has been sold. The new PW5 has a covered trailer, and is in great condition with an excellent new paint finish. It's over at Raglan at the moment, and is ready to fly.

Keith is excited about GWW

Trip to Raglan

We've been over in Raglan for a couple of weeks. It was an interesting trip over. Will, one of our new students went for a ride in the twin and we ended up looking straight down the Hamilton main runway. We are there until this weekend, and looks like the weather has finally turned into summer.

So this is what the big boys see

Drury Competition

I've been flying in the Drury competition which was slightly rained out compared to last year. We had 4 competition days in total, in some very interesting weather. Each day involed a number of landouts, and landbacks. I ended up with 4 outlandings: Te Poi (near the pub conveniently), Matamata, Twin Silos, and finally at Mercer airstrip. There was a number of showers and rain bands to avoid on some days, and that's what put us on the ground at the airstrips.

We ended up second place, not too bad for landing out every day :)

Results are at soaring spot http://www.soaringspot.com/drurycomps2012/results/mixed/total/day4.html

Another day, another paddock

There is now a new gliding operation at Mercer, with Mark Ford's winch in action. It's primarily used for training with Pukatek gliders and others. They even have a hangar, bar, accomdation and the skydiving will be starting up again soon too.

The JS1 has landed

Brett Hunter's new toy has arrived, and been taken for a couple of test flights around the Waikato. As Brett is the New Zealand agent for the JS1, he'll be happy to sell it to you if you are feeling the need for that new resin smell. It looks pretty slick, congratulations Brett, we look forward to seeing it in the air.

Smile Brett

It even came with a trailer

Very similar to our new PW5 really ;)

Upcoming National competition

The nationals are in 2 weeks starting on Sat 28th, and runs for one and a half weeks. I've been selected to represent New Zealand (don't get to say that very often) in the Tasman Trophy. Bryan Hayhow is the Australian pilot coming over to fly. If anyone is interested in helping crew, even just for a day or so, let me know.

Finally

The Walsh Flying School is on in Matamata at the moment, until the 24th Jan. We get back from Raglan this coming weekend, so there may be a day or so of flying while the Walsh is on. Be aware all operations are under Airways control while the tower is there. That means even driving gliders down the runway requires permission. Permission from the tower is needed for takeoffs and landings.

Happy Flying,
Tim

Merry Christmas everybody!

A few notes on what's happening at Piako Gliding Club over Christmas and new year.

• Sat 24th Dec - Flying Christmas eve.
• No flying Christmas Day. Eat lots instead!
• Boxing day 26th Dec - Should be flying, no tow pilot yet, check the website to confirm.
• Tuesday 27th - Sun 1st Jan - Christmas camp, Full on flying at Matamata!
• Mon 2nd Jan - Fri 6th - One glider at Raglan, One glider at Matamata
• Sat 7th Jan - Sun 22nd - All club to Raglan

The next month or two are often the best flying conditions of the year, so come out and make the most of it! We have even upgraded one of the club gliders, which we'll send out details about soon.

The roster for Raglan is online, please check days you're rostered on:
http://glidingmatamata.co.nz/members/roster/

Have a great holiday everyone, see you out at the field soon, and don't forget the sunscreen!

A christmas glider (Sugar glider)

The Regionals are well underway with 3 interesting flying days so far. The first day was forecast to be blue, but with good thermals. It turned out to be rather awful, blue but 2200' was as high as we could go. That meant we could sneeze and suddenly be in 'survivial mode'.

The second day we had a turn point up towards the firth of Thames. Even with a 10km circle around it, it was completely in the sea breeze, and all but Steve landed out or back. Steve got around but because no one else did, it was a zero points day, bad luck for Steve.

Yesterday turned out to be also challenging, but very interesting at the same time. A couple landed out early near the first southern turnpoint, as cloudbase was only 3000' so it was easy to make one mistake and be at 1000', looking for landing spots. As we went north things improved, and there were big convergences we could use to travel up/down the valley.

The top turnpoint for the fast classes was Maramarua which had light thermals and cloudbases of 2000' which made things interesting. There was also some sea breeze, a strong convergence over the swamp, and easterly pouring in. 2 of us in the standard class managed to get around.

A big thanks to David Hurst for his excellent weather forecasts, so far they have been pretty accurate.

Full task details and results are available on Soaring Spot:
http://soaringspot.com/nznr2011/

We'll also try to put short daily news updates on that competition page.

The 2011 Cross Country Course is underway today, with what looks like some days of ridge soaring.

For club members there will be towing all week (but no instructors available), and on Wednesday there is normal club flying with one twin and instructor available.

Yesterday saw the arrival of many of the gliders, pilots and tow planes, and they were greated with a rather impressive wave system. Thanks Bill for organising that one for us all.

Alan and Pat jumped back into the wave and reached 18,000 and 20,000 feet. Pat then flew back to Drury, arriving at 10,000 feet. The primary worked well to about 12,000 ft and then they had to shift back into what became the main secondary wave which worked well about 5 km out to sea from Matakana island.

The whole wave, thanks Adrian from Zing Photography

Thanks Jamie for this one

Webcam pic at 4pm

Piako Gliding Club Inc. 

Attention All Glider Pilots

A further notice to make sure you come along to the:

 2011 PRESEASON BRIEFING

This is compulsory for all glider pilots

Tow pilots and associates are also most welcome 

The new weather pattern is looking great for an awesome soaring season!  So get ready.

10.00am Saturday 24 September 2011, 

Gliding Clubhouse, Matamata Airfield 

with a repeat of briefing at 11.00 Wednesday 28 September 2010 
(boring shortened version only) 

You’ll receive your logbook endorsement sticker showing that you’re ready for this season’s flying.

To be followed by Jan’s free lunch at 12.00 (Saturday only, no free lunch on Wednesday) and club flying in the afternoon.

(Instructors meeting to be held after lunch 12.30pm to 1.00pm)

Let the westerlies blow!

Bob Gray

CFI

Michael Kirchhain’s first gliding experience, 7th November 2010, Matamata gliding club. Thanks Tony for the story.

I had met club member Tony Davies on the Warbirds over Wanaka airshow club trip to Queenstown in April this year. Tony has not only got a PPL (A) but also a B-Cat Instructor rating for gliders and is instructing at Matamata. In my training at the aero club, I had often heard of gliding stories, especially from the aero clubs senior IFR instructor and life-long gliding enthusiast John Shuttleworth.

I remember from back home in Germany that there was a gliding club not far and I often watched gliders being towed, in flight or during landing and was very keen on experiencing this different way of flying.

My wife gave me an awesome present for my birthday a few month ago, a voucher for a trial flight in a glider!

I had waited for better weather and since summer is finally upon us, the big day was arranged with Tony. We arrived at Matamata airfield early afternoon on a beautiful sunny and hot Sunday afternoon. There was hardly a cloud in the sky and it made me wonder if this are actually good conditions for gliding or not...

Tony was already waiting with the 2-seater training glider P(apa) C(harlie) prepared for me on the beginning of runway 28. We were the first glider to go up on the day and others were waiting to see how we got on and if there is enough thermal activity to sustain a longer gliding flight.

Waikato Aero club President Richard Small was the eager pilot of the glider towing aircraft and by that time probably didn't know what a busy day it was going to be.

I can only share this and other stories with you because my wonderful wife not only supports me in my passion for flying and makes me presents like this but also takes mostly the great photos to share with all of you readers. I got her to have a sit in the glider first so that she got an idea of what was awaiting me.

Gliders of course need to be very streamlined and therefore there is not a lot of room in these aircraft. It is usually a reclining position and takes some getting used to in comparison to powered aircraft. Luckily, the rudder pedals can be adjusted to fit even taller people in a glider and eventually I found a comfortable position. I brought my headset but because gliders are obviously much quieter than powered aircraft, this was not needed and instead a built in microphone is used to communicate with each other, other aircraft and the ground. Soon I was strapped in and we were ready for take-off. The take-off roll was different seeing it from such a low angle and after only a very short roll, we were airborne. The tow was one of the best parts of the flight but is also the hardest part for the pilot. It is not easy to follow the aircraft without getting behind in following its turns. It felt new and almost a bit scary seeing an aircraft so close in front of us. Usually any other time when an aircraft comes so close (except during formation flying...), you would get a big fright.

Tony decided to have us towed to 2500ft and luckily we experienced a few bumps here and there which are signs of some thermal activity. The towing wire was disconnected, the towing aircraft disappeared quickly and suddenly there was silence… An engineless machine which is suspended only by the air around it and completely dependent on the prevailing conditions and the skills of the pilot.

We flew towards some tiny whisky cloud formations and slowly experienced some slight updraft. There is an instrument called a Variometer in a glider which indicates the gliders rate of climb in near real time. It does this like any other gauge but also by audible signals. These signals vary in pitch and the higher and faster the sound, the higher the rate of climb. We stayed in this updraft doing circling climbing turns and eventually reached an altitude of just over 4500ft which was very impressive for the conditions of the day. It is really amazing to see and feel this heavier-than-air object rising only by the forces of the air.

Once we gained enough altitude, Tony even showed me a loop in the glider which was a fabulous experience. We flew towards another tiny cloud formation and were hoping for some rising air but it wasn't much. This is was gliding is about, reading the sky and winds and finding strong enough updrafts to maintain or regain altitude to continue gliding. After I told John Shuttleworth about my experience the next day, he put it in great words "...it's like chess in the sky."

We continued gliding for almost 55min and at the end had to point the nose down and force a descent as Tony thought that the glider was booked for the next flight. The landing was very smooth and the landing roll much shorter than I had expected.

A fantastic experience came to its end and it was very clear that I have enjoyed this birthday present to the fullest.

The Matamata Piako gliding club is a great way to experience the magic of gliding and the club offers training for starters and experienced glider pilots. It is possible to get a QGP (Qualified Glider Pilot) license there and many of the aeroplane PPL exams can be cross credited.

I can only recommend a gliding experience to any Aviation Enthusiast and it will definitely help your F.L.W.O.P. training. :-)

For anyone who is keen, we could also make it a cheap club trip to fly over with some aircraft and connect it with a trial flight in a glider.

For more information, visit the gliding clubs website: http://www.glidingmatamata.co.nz

Cheers and thanks for reading,

Michael