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.


Friday, 26 October 2018

Weekend flying forecast 27th-28th October - Brrrrrrr

Happy Friday fellow flyers, another weekend is upon us. Our weather is changing with northerly cold winds from the Arctic heading our way, but with it are wind strengths that mean is is finally worth a trip to the slopes. So let us see what we have in store.

Saturday - a dry day with some sunny periods, 7°C and the wind beginning north westerly but turning northerly by noon and 13 - 23 mph. Your slope choices would be the Ice Cream slope at the Bwlch whilst it is NW and then moving over to the VR98 when it turns northerly. Meio can also be flown on a NW but will be off slope when the wind changes to north. My recommendation however would be Hirwaun Common which has slopes facing in both directions and only about a 2 minute walk between them. This is a fab slope if you've never tried it.

Sunday - a sunnier day with temperatures of 10°C and the wind NNE or NE and 15 - 28 mph. Your slope choices will be the Wrecker at the Bwlch, Meio which also has a NNE slope or Fochriw. Fochriw is my favourite of these three as the flying is great, as is the landing zone, with the added bonus of being able to warm yourself in the car between flights.

Unusually I am including Monday here as my good friend Paul of Slope Soaring Sussex is visiting Wales and is looking to fly. So Paul this is what Monday looks like.

Another bright, sunny day with temperatures around 8°C and the wind 13 - 25 mph NE. So you have the same choices as Sunday, the Wrecker or Fochriw. You could fly Fochriw on Sunday and the Wrecker on Monday as that is closer to home for you. I hope you have some good flying.

I have a window on Saturday afternoon to fly so I think I will head up to Hirwaun Common with the L213 and the Balistik .

So whatever you're doing, have a great weekend and keeeeeeeep flying.


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