For those who don't live and slope in the Oregon/Washington area, Peterson Butte is in the mid Willamette Valley of Oregon. The butte is open for hang gliding, parasailing and slope soaring from Nov 1 to May 31 every winter and spring. Closed during the summer because of fire danger and the wind comes from the north during dry season which is the wrong direction for the slope.

Today being Nov 1, I wanted to be up there on the first day if weather permitted... and it did. I had talked to a couple other friends about going and one of them made it. Yeah, he only worked a half day and beat me there!
I brought three planes: The trusty XR wing (about to be retired), the Super Talon (maiden) and a scratch built 2 mtr (maiden). Frank my buddy brought his discus launch Spinner and his 130" Stork. Frank had so much fun flying the spinner he never pulled the Stork out.
The lift was medium light, 7 - 10 knots and gusted up to mabey 15 for a little while, long enough for Duane to get his hang glider up over the top of the Butte.
Frank was flying when I arrived at 3:30 pm and Duane had just taken off. I took the XR up to get the jitters out, haden't flown since Sept. and didn't want to dumb thumb on any of the maidens. My XR is balasted to 25 oz and is so easy to fly it only took 15 min to know I was steady of hand to maided the new planes. The next plane to fly was the Super Talon. It flew great right out of my hand, clicked in a few notches of down trim but other then that it flew very well. What a great plane! The lift was tender at that time yet it climbed easy and kept up with Franks Spinner. Then when the lift began to drop even more I sent the 2 mtr up. It's a cross between a Wanderer and Windfree. What a floater, tho the Spinner was still up too. Duane landed his hang glider but Frank and I flew until it was almost too dark to see. It was a very nice 2 hrs of flying even tho the lift was on the light side and a great way to start the first day of the season at Peterson's.

John

More pics.

And we gotta have pics of Duane's hang glider.

Gentlemen, exactly how far from Portland is Peterson Butte? I moved up from Denver last summer and have only found a couple of sloping spots within decent distance from Portland. Is the landing zone decent? I'm looking for a friendly spot to maiden my first molded sloper soon. Thanks!
Chris Swan

It's about an 1:15 to 1:30 hr. to get there from anywhere in the Portland Metro area. It is south of Albany, Oregon and due W of Lebanon.

The LZ is Sweet!
Todd

Concrats to all of you early birds out there; way to celebrate opening day! Looks like Duane has a new glider with a small empennage...for pitch assist maybe?
Big wind is forecast for Thursday, accompanied by rain, unfortunately.
Chris, the LZ is a grassy saddle. Only dangers are hidden rocks near where the cars park and getting blown back into trees in high wind. The Portland club (PASS) has scheduled an event for Saturday, and it is a good club to become a member of.
We share Peterson Butte with hang- and paragliders, and we have an excellent relationship with these groups. We ask every visitor to respect and help maintain that.
Please be aware that Peterson Butte is private property, and that we must have AMA insurance to fly there.

Dieter Mahlein, ShredAir

Dieter,
Thanks for the chiming in with the particulars of Peterson.
Hope to see you up there soon. I usually fly after work during the week, occasionally I go up on the weekend.

Yes, this is private property and the owners are very generous to let us use the site. Respect is a must.

John

hey war bird, where did you get that avatar? is there a large version around?

It was nice meeting up with you at the Butte this afternoon War Bird. The Whisper likes CROW landing in that big ole open spot! Enjoyed watching your 60" blue bird flying...the perfect plane for those lighter winds.

May the rain go away,

SC

SC I got to ask how your Whisper is doing. Have you had any problems with the elevator hinges? Also have you done dive tests? Does the Whisper pull up? and where is your CG. I just got done pulling the radio gear out of my destroyed whisper as well as the wing spars and ballast tubes. The tail is the only thing that survived.

David:

So far so good. I have done some dives and it just slightly balloons up out of the dive so I'm thinking maybe the CG needs to go back just a hair from the manufacturers listed...or I need to pull a little of that big ole chunk of lead I put in the nose! You know, I can't figure out why the people making these planes go so far to err on the tail heavy side. I know it would be a pain to have to put weight in the back, but so far all the planes I've had (and wrecked) have to have a chunk of weight in the front.

Anyhoo, I've really enjoyed flying the Whisper so far. This Sunday at the Cape was really the first time I flew it "hard" and it seemed to do really well. Today at Petterson's the wind was really light, about 5-8 maybe and it just took off Northward! I know I'll be able to thermal the thing with a couple clicks of elevator down and once I move the tow hook back aways as you suggested on the other thread.

The crow settings that came with the manual seem to be right on the money, because like I told Birdworks Steve, it seems like seriously cheating now bringing it in and just slamming those on and having it drift gently in...nothing like trying to land a Destiny at Mach 5!

I met up with War Bird up there and he had a nice balsa 1.5 meter that just goes to show you that you have to have that light air bird too. He was having a blast flying it around after the wind really died off.

Well, darn sorry to hear about your Whisper. "GLOVER" told me there is one for sale in Salem for $275 or something around there that's been hanging in a hobby store there for a while. I was thinking about getting a "spare" but I think if I don't want to become a "spare" husband I better cut it out!

Take care David,

Mark

PS: And I changed my Avatar to the Whisper too.

MtnGoat,
The avatar is reduced and cropt from a WWII poster. Can't remember where I found it but I'll do a search and see what I come up with.

ScaredyCat,
Great flying with you to day. Love your Whisper!
The "light lift" was almost too much for the little Zephyr at times but the Super Talon loved it!
You and Bruce will have to come up to Sweet Home in the summer and fly off my private slope. Then you guys can show me the site above Marcola.

John

I think with the 7037 airfoil some of the pitch up with speed is something you will have to live with. Minimizing it with CG will help. I agree everyone needs a light air ship. My whisper ballanced at 88mm and did pitch up considerably. I did not get a chance to check the CG or the tail to determine if the elevators were trim. I have a 3M Esprit F3B with a 7037 and have the CG set back to where the ship does not pull up in a dive but it is not as stable at high speed, however a 3M TD ship is not designed to be a speedster. Last week with light wind on Sunday I was able to hand catch the Esprit several times. I could float the ship up above me and it looked like I was flying a kite.

Pics of the planes I was flying to day.