First Flight

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Yesterday I was able to fly in Hungary and make the maiden voyage for my new JS1.  The airfield is huge.  Gary and I towed the glider out to the launch area and I got ready to fly.  Everything was in order and the plane felt just like the serial number 2 JS1 I had been flying.  All set, a wag of the rudders to signal to the tow plane and off we go. 

The grass runway was recently cut so there was a dust storm of straw thrown up and then bump, bump, bump down the rough runway.  Quickly apply flaps to get me in the air quickly.  The tow was uneventful, the controls are even lighter than the number 2 ship.  Off tow at 600 meters and right into a nice thermal.  Ah, music to my ears as the variometer sings out the indication of lift over the speaker.  Wow!  This ship is much more responsive than old number 2 and extremely light on the controls.  Up I go taking in the Hungarian landscape and Szeged skyline. 

I give 8H a call on the radio.  He is a few miles away so I head for him.  "Al, how about we head of to the North East first?" 

The terrain is flat farmland.  Mostly hay fields and some corn.  The hay is being cut now and all the hay should be up by the time the contest starts next week.  There are small towns but the area is mostly the same in every direction.  There a two rivers in the area, the Danube to the west and another to the east.  The river valleys (maybe 50 lower than the surrounding areas) appear to be quite wet. 

As 8H and I head northeast, we cross the eastern river area we we move from good lift to a much softer area of lift.  Once across the "valley" the lift is strong again.

I am extremely pleased with the new glider.  I can't believe it but it handles so much better than the numbe 2 ship that I have been flying ... and, I thought that ship handled beautifully.  The controls are light and the roll rate is quick.  She tracks very nicely while circling and climbs like a home sick angel.  Also, the cockpit is amazingly quiet -- absolutely the quietest I have every heard.  I wonder if that is the new air extractor.

There is new trim system that seems to work very well too.  I am able to trim to 50 knots for thermalling and without much of a change move the flaps forward and accelerate to 80-90 knots for cruise.

All the instruments are working well.  The panel layout turned out nice and functionally better than I had before.  (I'll provided pictures tomorrow.)

It's breakfast time.  So, that is enough for today.  I fly again today.

Bill Elliott