About A470 Soaring


This is the blog for a few guys who spend their time flying radio controlled gliders, or slope soarer's, from the many and varied slopes around SE Wales.

This usually begins at the northern end of Cardiff, driving north up the A470 up to the Heads of the Valley's and the southern fringe of the Brecon Beacons. But the A470 road continues its windy way all the way to N Wales.

There are many slopes available for most wind directions, the most famous being the area between Nant-y-Moel and Treorchi known as The Bwlch, which has some of the best slopes and flying in Europe with many F3F competitions being held there each year and visited by many fliers from Europe and around the world. At 1500 feet (450m) above sea level, there is usually more wind than not, and certainly more than at sea level.

If you require any further information, are new to slope soaring or are visiting the area, please contact Steve at steve.houghton59@gmail.com . I look forward to hearing from you.

Take a look at Page 2 (look below and to the left here) for Google maps of our most popular Flying Sites.


Sunday 19 October 2014

Cornwall visit - Day 3

Today the wind was south westerly at an estimated 25 mph. I was standing on a shear, vertical cliff on Rame Head with the sea and white foam crashing onto the cliff below. 

Tentatively I launched the M60. I've discovered that when the wind is blowing well, the M60 has to be launched with a good amount of up elevator held on with the stick, otherwise it plunges nose first into the ground. This is what it did today and the plane almost came a cropper and was about 2 feet away from dropping over the cliff. 

Second try and away she went and rose a good 100' before I sent her running parallel with the cliff. 

Picking up speed I was amazed at the energy retention of this model and it reminded me of Marks old Ballistik as it would climb vertically before stall turning it into another dive and with each pass of the cliff face, it got faster and climbed higher. 

Eventually I had to land her and I brought her around. As she came into the wind I should have put the nose down and landed her further back from the slope edge because I hadn't realised there was some rotor going on and she was tossed onto the ground with a thump. 

You can't float this plane down for a landing, it has to be done with some speed to stop her from tip stalling. 

All in all, it was a great weekend where I did manage to get in a little flying and I shall be back next spring for more. 

Oh, and my new car transportation method worked a treat. The models didn't budge and I still had full view through the rear window. 


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1 comment:

  1. Phil19 October 2014 at 20:18

    Glad you had a good time.
    The Meio was awesome today with the heavy foamies loving the big wind :-)

    I like the way you carry the foamies.

    ReplyDelete

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