Sailplanes vs. Electric

[John Gallagher]

Things have changed a great deal at the club I belong to. In the last two years the membership has gone from almost all sailplane to a majority of electric flyers. Everyone is pretty good about staying out of each others way, but the attitude of the electric guys towards the sailplane guys is pretty obvious. Understand I do have electrics but hand launch most of the time. In the past I've let a couple of the electric guys fly my 1-26hlg and my Phrophet (100"wingspan RES plane). They went back to steering their electrics back and forth across the field.
A few weeks ago we had an unusally nice winter day. The electrics were out in full force with their zagis, parkflyers, simple 400s, etc. I was the only one at the field flying a glider (Aspen Leaf HLG). I had just specked out during a 7 minute flight. I felt pretty good about the day until the 12 year old son of an electric flyer approached me and asked what I get out of gliding. I couldn't beleive it. It was obvious that the kid was just repeating what he had heard.

I guess you either get it or you don't!

[BatteryJockey]

I know how you fell, I'm 1 of 7 that fly electric assisted gliders at the local field. The field is 98% glow fliers. We are treated as the redheaded step children. We fly off to the side where the helecopters are and get a visit from the glow boys every time we cross their patern. They have even given us grief when we fly 200 feet above their planes. Most of them are okay when you get them on a one on one situation, and we have even converted 2 of them to gliders. The rest of them just don't understand the challenge of trying to keep a plane in the are without the motor on. I think that they are just jealous that we sit in lawn chairs and fly for 20 - 30 minutes at a time.

Gilbert

[Dave Seay]

As much as I might want to get hot about such things, I also know I have to deal with reality and the means electrics (better than slimers!)

Lets face it, when starting out in electric, you get to go fast and do 'things' right away. In sailplanes we go up and come down. So, from one perspective, electrics can seem better. This is especially true with todays 'me' generation. Instant gratification is required or somethings wrong.

However, as time goes on, the things the electric guys (and the slimers) do in the air does not seem to change much. Fly here, fly there, loop, roll, etc, etc. That's why the love for going faster and faster is so prevalent. As time goes on for us, we come to realize that each flight is a challenge and totally unique. That's something they will never get and is the primary reason I fly sailplanes. How can you ever get bored of something that is different every time!

Trying to figure out where mother nature has hid here latest little bubble of energy makes it unique and I doubt I would have to remind anyone who has actually risen in a thermal just what a rush that is.

I have no idea how you make a youngster understand this. I wish I did.

One thing I have come to love is a blend of the 2. LMR ships are fantastic! No string histarts or winches and the launches are way higher than you get from either of those. I fly both (LMR and pure TD as well as DLG's) and love them all.

Good luck,
Dave

[Ollie]

I may duplicate some of my post in the Longest Flight topic but, here goes:

Power fliers will outnumber sailplaners more than 10 to one. People that fly both are an even a smaller minority. Our culture of power over nature and instant gratification reinforces these statistics.

People who want to harmonize with natural forces and use them in non-dominant ways are a small minority and likely to remain so. What you can't change is best accepted. For example: sailboaters are a small minority of all boaters. Patience is a virtue that is rapidly shrinking in our society. Fewer and fewer people are finding the time to build their own models from kits, fewer still scratch build and fewer yet design their own. In a like maner fewer are willing to take the time to learn the subtle clues that point to thermals and stalk the elusive things. There are satisfactions associated with meeting the difficult challange but, such challanges hold little appeal for those seeking instant gratification.

Most power clubs have much higher dues than sailplane clubs. It only takes five members to charter an AMA club. I have been happiest when I have associated with people of like interest. My formula for getting the most out of the hobby is to belong to a sailplane club. The overhead is a lot less. The administrative hassles are a lot less and the comraderie is a lot greater. You won't have to have regular scheduled club meetings. You can seek a flying site that is best suited to sailplanes and the site maintenance will be near zero.

Lacking a seperate club and flying site, you can fly when the power guys don't

[SoarNeck]

Unfortunately, the onus (sp?) seems to be on sailplane pilots to appeal to our electric and gas flying cousins. Our club has found that aerotowing and speed/slope flying seem to be the best way to "bridge the gap", so to speak.

At a gas fun fly last fall, we were invited to bring a winch out and show the folks what glider flying was all about. Little did I know that that entailed flying off of an adjoining field barely within view of the main field.

Sooo...after flying all on my lonesome for a little while, I launched my Hera, themalled out, and started walking back towards the gas pilots stands. Getting through the barbed wire fence was a trick, but no harm done. I duly took my spot on a station, called out my intention to land, and came screaming down from up high in full-reflex mode - remember to save this for when there are no other noisemakers up, and stay over the runway. If that didn't wake the pits up, the flaps out, walking pace hand catch afterwards sure did (half the Extra or CAP fliers end up in the weeds after rolling off the runway, I notice). From then on, the gas guys were a little more interested! You just have to learn to speak their language a little bit.

[pval3]

Ok, I fly E and e sailplanes with props, the task of finding a field big enough to lay out the high start without getting folks mad for interfereing with their runway was getting tough.

I started flying the E birds and have not gone back to noisemakers since!

I do endorse the use of an electric motor (ballast) as long as the prop does fold up and hides when I dont need it, there is nothing more frustrating than looking at that thing killing a speed run when it is not doing something for me!

Beats the heck out of spending 20 minutes of my flying day dragging out the rubber band and string as my kid calls it!

[Ex-Slimedriver]

I went pure E-boosted years ago. There is nothing I miss about using a hi-start or winch. It's the ultimate freedom! I'm always at least ten minutes into a thermal, while others are still going through the hassle of setting up there launchers.

Randy

[Dereck]

Yes, what do you lot get out of gliders?

I actually started with shooting gliders off a bungee (and crashing them shortly after) until I wised up, got a real trainer model and an instructor. For the next few years, I learned aerobatics with power, competed with hand-towed open gliders and decided that while slope soaring was kinda fun, freezing your parts off atop a windswept hill was not actually fun in total.

Eventually figured out how to make an electric act like a model aircraft and thought I'd found next door to heaven with a site for electric and glider use only in the middle of a local town - the local wet power club's patch, lost to noise and much later regained for quiet flight.

Save you muttering - my favourite electric is a 60" CAP 232 and it flies 6 mins. Every time. It catches up on straight and level in the pits mostly.

Nice deal - if you can put up with people who have no flying discipline, think that wandering around the runway is fine and dandy, and that flying from wherever on the site is acceptable. At least trees stand still - HLG pilots can't even do that.

After a couple of years, I've gone back mainstream and am staying off that site until the glider club dies out or goes away, and it gets safe to fly there again.

Neither's "right", but mostly they don't mix. When I flew gliders at a wet power site, I accepted that I'd better be able to launch and land off the runway, not leave string all over it, and when I got into their flight pattern area, play ball and not wander around in circles and in the way.

I feel happier with flying pattern rules, safety barriers and pilot stations. If a glider pilot feels happier standing in the middle of the runway - which one local explained is how it is done in comps - fine. I don't want to be around that behaviour.

Promise not to drop back through this way again - I followed the link off the zone front page. Doubt if you will appreciate an 'outsider' view (not that I discount a return to more boring models when old age catches up ;)), but this is how others might see you.

[SoarNeck]

Well, I guess it's nice to see the other side of the issue...I suppose. Like Ollie said, I think it's basically the kind of issue where you get it or you don't. It always seems to me like a question of patience - there's always a LOT more swearing at a power field than at a glider site.

For me, a lot of the appeal comes from getting back to nature a little bit. My most memorable evenings usually involve a DLG and an a quiet evening at the field with a couple of good friends. To paraphrase Dave Thornburg, "...if a fourth person shows up, and especially if they're on my frequency [and ESPECIALLY if they have one of those noisy Zagi 400X's!!], it's never a problem, because I was just leaving anyway..."

It takes a certain kind of personality to appreciate the challenges of unpowered flight, and it seems to carry over into other parts of life too. For example, I'm 22 and most of my male friends are heavily involved in their sports cars. Every week at the bar, the same discussion ALWAYS comes up: how many horsepower such and such gives you, how fast they got up to on a quiet backroad, how long they could hang the backend out in a powerslide etc etc. I can appreciate an issue of Road and Track as much as the next guy, but I bought a station wagon thanks, and the only horsepower I truely care about is in the Thoroughbred X I ride on the weekends.

Then there's the old landing issue. No offense, but the only reason you guys need a rigid pattern and active runway is because the average prop driver couldn't hit the broadside of a barn with a bazooka on landing. There can be 15 glider flyers at our club field, doing everything from hand towing to hand launching to winching, and nobody comes close to getting hit with a model. The nature of the game means that we sometimes have to put a 4 meter bird within 2" of a dot, on a time measured to the 1/10th of a second, with 5 or 6 others coming in on ajacent lines at the same time...do that with a CAP.

Sailplane pilots, due to the requirement of always having to be aware of the air around them, seem to be MUCH more aware of their surroundings. At a power field, however, I've seen people do stupid things like insisting that they be able to fly alone simply because they have some whizbang 23% Extra or F3A machine. There are WAY more close calls there, too; maybe just because powered planes are considered "lightly loaded" at 20 oz/ft2, and just generally fly faster.

In the same way that you might see thermal flying as boring, I don't see the appeal of BORING holes in the sky every flight. I rapidly lose interest at power fields. Transcipt of me watching the average flight at a local power club:

"LOOK, A SPIN. NOW HE'S SPINNING UPSIDE DOWN...NOW ON A WINGTIP...NOW UPSIDE DOWN AGAIN. NOT EXACTLY AN EFFECTIVE WAY TO USE ALTITUDE, AND YOU SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT TIPSTALL. ROLLING CICLE...NICE, BUT'S A COORDINATED TURN WOULD BE MORE EFFECIENT. WHAT, THE ENGINE JUST QUIT? STOP YELLING?...sorry, but my ears were still ringing from the racket. DEAD STICK MISSLE INCOMING!!!...I mean landing. Naw, I'm sure the weeds at the end of the runway will stop him...ooh, maybe not. You get the wheels from the end of the runway, I'll pick up the wing, and you get the fuselage from the other side of that fence over there..."

[Ex-Slimedriver]

Well said, SoarNeck!

Although I am a bit offended by your remark about the Zagi 400X. I actually thermal mine, and do outside loops..and knife edges...and point rolls and so on...and on.. and on... Ah maybe your right. They are kinda annoying. But then again, so am I(just ask my wife)

Randy

[NickW]

You know, threads like these truly disturb me. They just dont go anywhere, and they serve little purpose but to aggrevate the opposing sides. I usually stay away from these, but today I let it get to me so here goes....

The fact is this. There are disciplines of this hobby that just dont mix. Its a great hobby, and all disciplines should thrive and prosper, but they dont have to thrive at the same field! Us glider pilots do set up our fields in a unique way. But we do have some unwritten rules. We try not to fly over the winch launching area. We try to always land into the wind, so we are all approaching from the same direction. And we do try and be as safe as possible.

Power pilots have their own way of setting up a field that suits their needs as well. The fact is that both are different. And perhaps they shouldnt mix. If you find yourself flying strictly electric sport models at a sailplane feild and their layout bothers you, then simply go find another field you feel better at. You have the power to choose your flying site, so find one that makes you happy and keeps to the pattern you find safe.

We also fly electrics at our field, but the electrics tend to launch off to one side of the field away from the sailplane activity. They know that since we are a sailplane field that the sailplanes have the right of way as thats the primary use of the field. I dont pull out my hotliner style ship untill the soaring activity has died down and I know I will have the sky almost to myself. I dont have a problem with that, as I accept that the sailplanes have the right of way.

As much as it would upset me, if my glider club became an electric majority, then I think I would find another field more suited to my use. I would be saddened by it, but I wouldnt complain about it, and I would move on to search for another field or club.


Nick Wisdom
Orlando, FL

[fprintf]

I have been sailing since I was 8 (I am now 34 going on 12) and I can tell you in all that time it was only rarely that sailors and powerboaters really got along. There was too much competition for the same space, and the powerboaters never really *got* sailing either as it was too slow, boring, quiet and restrictive (6 foot draft will do that to ya). Sailors never got powerboating as it was too noisy, hurried, uncomfortable and smelly.

This is exactly the same situation, and despite my initial reaction which was much worse than SoarNeck's, I decided that the only course for such a thread was way downhill and responding wouldn't really accomplish that much. I prefer gliding for the same reasons I prefer sailing. I am sure the power guys prefer their part of the sport for similar, if opposite, reasons but this is not the place to bicker over that.

Meet me at the bar or coffee house and I'd be glad to discuss the merits of various aspects of our hobby (heck, there is even an argument to be made about sport vs. hobby!)

No flamethrowers or flame resistant suits needed on this forum, please lets keep it that way.

[SoarNeck]

Sorry Randy, I just call them as I see them :)

It isn't the aerobatic capability of the 400X that bugs me, it's the SOUND!!! Our field has recently had a rash of the things develop, with one especially noisy day hosting 6 at once. It was like soaring in a beehive! :eek:

One gent tried replacing the Gunther prop with an APC, and that quietened it some, but not to my liking. A Zagi is about 10X as noisy as my electrified MPX Lucky, at about 1/10th the power. Oh well, there's room for all sorts :rolleyes:

[Ex-Slimedriver]

SoarNeck

I have succeeded in quiting my 400X down quite a bit.

Anyway, back to the original subject. I truly enjoy all aspects of the hobby and hanging out with other aviophiles. I kid my pure sailplane buddies about not being able to find a thermal to save their lives. They in turn, rib me about conveniently finding all those "throttle thermals". I tell them that I have an instrument onboard that emits a kinda whooshy-gearey sound whenever the sailplane flies into lift.

Randy

[Dereck]

Nick
Feel free to feel anything you like - I aren't getting paid here.

Last year, I nearly lost a big brushless powered ship to a glider pilot flying across the far side of the patch - he had the wrong crystal in, which put him on my frequency, which I had the right peg to. If he'd been flying where a real site would have had him - yards from me - we'd have sorted it out and his glider wouldn't have gotten sadly bent. Good luck allowed me to get mine down, much as anything else.

The glider lobby got me later with the same model - a guy wandered out into the middle of the field while I was flying in one patch of sky. The shock of overflying someone in what was an empty patch of grass five minutes earlier - and the middle of field - was enough for me to end up with a bent model.

If that's what you glider guys think is safe, I'm staying out of it. Some things cannot be legislated against. Have fun, try and fly safe.

[Bert]

I just could not bare to have Dereck's post as the last word. I'm sure he really did find this thread by pure accident. I know he would not have deliberately clicked on the "Thermal" messages.

Bert

[R. Carver]

Do a search for his posts...the guy's a freakin' troll. If he isn't singing the praises of his girlie-man car, he's bashing sailplanes and the guys that fly them.
The way I figure, he-
A- Was hit in the head as a small child with a sailplane, thus he harbours an unconscious ill will.
B- Had a past girlfriend or lover leave him for a sailplane pilot (they can keep it up all day you know-their planes, that is :) )
C- Tried soaring but found that it was not as easy as it looks, quickly became frustrated due to lack of instant gratification, and swore off this segment of the hobby using the "boring" and "unsafe" excuse.
D- Joined a rather famous SOARING club and expected them to change the way they operate to accomodate him and his sport planes. When they continue operating as a soaring club, he gets his panties in a wad.
E- Combination of all of the above

Note that both "safety hazards" that he cited could easily have happened at a power field- Pilot retrieving stalled plane from runway, someone accidentally grabbing the wrong pin, etc...
Next time you're down this way Dereck, bring your super-whizbang brushless, swing by the field and fly it over the launch area..I'll show you how exciting 700 amps pumping through a Ford starter motor hooked up to 3 meters of fiberglass, carbon fiber and kevlar can be ;)

[Sparky Paul]

One of the main attractions of the 'net is the absolutely -free- psychoanalyses you can get.
I guess those whose lives are expressed by the cost and elegance of their possessions get irritated when a simpler method of doing what they do so noisily is presented.
Free of course is worth what you paid. :D
.
I like to twang my sailplane up and sniff around the rabbit farts and buick lifters until they go away, and then.... and then... turn the motor back on and go up and do it again without landing.
No Fords needed.

[davidleitch]

Well I'm too new at electric flying to have a fixed view of what's best.

Its just as much fun to do some touch and gos and then bring a highly loaded plane in for a hot landing as it is to seek out the subtlties of a thermal.

You can learn from a good glider pilot and from a good power pilot.

If you want to learn takeoffs you have to have power.

Where we fly there is only a few of us and a small field. Most of the people there have a glider and a power plane.

[Ollie]

These,"What I like is better than what you like!" type discussions seldom go anywhere or change anyone's approach to the hobby/sport. I say let everyone enjoy it in their own way(s). People who like what you do will congregate and people who don't will not.

[Masterpiece]

Here here ollie (is this the same Ollie from RCsoaring.com?),

I agree with ollie full heartedly.....enjoy what you like and stop comparing what is better, because all rc sports are great. We all have different tastes in what we like. For myself, I love my electric sailplanes and planes (sport and pylon), thermal sailplanes and slope rockets. BUT I don't hate IC planes, or helicopters, sailboats or cars.

In fact I love to go to other clubs to just see what people build and what the like. I make new friends and they like the fact that I've made the effort to come out to their clubs to see. I can't see myself in the near future getting into IC models but I enjoy the fact that we have a similar interest. RC flight (motor or not)

Later
G

[ramair]

i can tell you guys first hand;your topic is going nowhere,its pointless to worry about which is better,,i fly r/c gliders,gassers,electric gliders and full size gliders,hanggliders and if i was to take all the comments to heart,i would be considered a fool by all!
the only thing that seems to be consistant,is that everyone wants to have the last say!!!
ramair

[MTT]

Seems to me that Dereck is one of those guys who will only be happy if things are done exactly the way he is used to and how he wants them.

In other words- hopeless !!

As to sailplane pilots supposedly endangering him or others, thats not limited to them. I have seen plenty of dumb stunts from electric and gas power flyers, too.

Michael

[Tim Jonas]

I started in Sailplanes, went power, went electric...now I do all three. Gotta say, though, nothing prettier than an Aquila overhead.

[ramair]

i love to see mr mootsies comment about the aquila because i agree that buy flying power planes,i only love gliders more,,i guess it depends on weather im in the mood for flying or driving!
although about a week a go i managed about a twenty minute flight at 200 ft in my gentle lady,i drove home thinking about how priceless that can be,,,its always very rewarding to grab a g/l and get back to simple basic all round FUN
ramair

[John Gallagher]

I'm sorry I started this discussion. I totally agree that there's room for all types of R/C flying. If you read my original post, you can see that what I was really talking about was - Those who get soaring vs those who don't. Pleae let this discussion die.

John

[greenshirtrwg]

At the risk of beating a dead horse I'll throw in my two cents. I fly both Sail and Power (Dynaflite Bobcat and several scale warbirds) and would like to get an electric that I could fly in somewhat smaller areas. I don't get it, and what I don't get is why there is an argument. We all share a love of aviation, or so I thought, that's why we do this. Maybe I'm different than most but I prefer scale like flight, that includes glider and scale speed electric flight. In my humble opinion and I confess to being a new guy in this forum, but we have lost sight of the big picture and are only seeing our own little worlds. Not trying to offend anyone, that's just where I'm coming from.

Russ Gordon

[Whizwaz]

My .02¢
I fly a little of everything. Sport, funfly, pure thermal, electric thermal, park flyer, pylon, etc.

I believe you should fly what's fun. There are days when I want to fly a particular plane, so I just grab one and go. Great to be able to fly a variety of different planes. As the cliché goes: Jack of all trades, master of none. :D

Who really cares what you're flying, just as long as you have something in the air. (BTW: This also includes helicopters and kites. If it flies, enjoy!)

[webguyjv]

I have an idea for a working peace plan that I know both sides of this discussion would love...

Let's all meet with our planes (e-gliders AND sailplanes) at my flying site on the slope (or it could be your favorite slope -- it really doesn't matter).

When the lift is great, the e-guys will tape down their throttle sticks and we'll all launch into the wind and enjoy the awesome lift. Slope is the equalizer where both can fly and there are no differences (KEEP YOUR HAND OFF THAT THROTTLE!).

This is all in fun, but I wanted to remind you to think about how much you love flying, and how much you admire watching ANY plane fly (gas, jet, rocket, electric, sailplane, sloper, hang glider, paraglider, etc...), and consider that maybe this reminds you of when you were a kid.

There is a popular gas field near my home, and as much a Slope-purist as I am, when I drive by that field, I find it's like a magnet and I HAVE TO drive over, park, and watch those guys having fun. I usually find myself smiling :)

Happy flying ;-)

webguyjv

[Spelchkr]

I've just gotta get my 2cents in!
I started building these things when I was about 10 years old. Then I joined the Air Force and left them behind for twenty years (tried to build, but got tired of trying to find them a good home when I was reassigned - 18 times in twenty years).

Then I discovered Archery and got to be pretty good at it - even had two Archery Shops and enjoyed making a little bit of a living at it. During that time, I used a Long Bow, Recurve, and Compound, and was proficient enough with them to place in the top three, no matter what the discipline. I always felt that each type of bow had its particular niche where it excelled over the others. The same goes for R/C Planes.

Here in the windy, mesquite covered deserts of Southeastern Arizona, we can't fly small E-planes... heck, we can't fly anything quite often in the Spring! The hills and wind around here would be great for sloping if you could get to the top of one and then figure out how to launch your sloper over five - ten foot high bushes and then land it without destroying it. Some other areas are lucky enough to have "cultivated" hills (somebody drove up and down enough to cut a trail).

The field I fly from (the only one within sixty miles) is about 150 feet of asphalt with the same amount of bulldozed desert at each end. It's about 40 feet wide, and has a slightly cleared area on both sides. After that, it's the same flaming desert brush... try to recover a three-hundred foot hi-start from that!

So we compromise.

Several of us have Kadet Sr's. and one of them sports a .91 4-stroke; it's the neatest tow plane you ever saw! I think almost everyone of us has a sailplane, with a couple of us being a little more infatuated with them than the others and therefore have more. When we want to fly them, the power jocks either sit and watch or fly in a different area and everybody has a great time.

That's the name of the game, isn't it? In fact a couple of us are working on E-Planes for those days when the wind stays away!. Spelchkr

[webguyjv]

Your "2 cents" are worth 2 dollars in my book...

That's what it's all about -- forget the shades of difference between the genres, focus on your love of flying, and have fun together :)

As a matter of fact, you probably didn't mention the cool barbecues and sunset socials you and your buddies probably have. One afternoon I was at one of our favorite slope sites, and I learned that one of the veterans at that site is a plumber, and he's really good at building things with pipe. He made a cute little one-burner grille, just big enough for one hamburger pattie. He was grilling burgers for anyone who came by. Now that's flying ;-)

Happy Flying :)

webguyjv

[rocketman47]

GEEZ! They sell burgers at you slope?! All I get at mine, are ticks and skeeter bites......

Randy

[Ollie]

What with rockey mountain spotted fever and lyme desease, getting ticked off at the slope seems appropriate. ;)