Snow goes, Wilga wisits!
Saturday was a typical spring day, a bit chilly with a front passing on the other side of the mountains. The last bit of snow is melting on top of Sneeukop and now the red Namakwaland daisies came up en masse on the airfield while the yellow madeliefjes are less visible than previous weeks. The whole week was marred by the passing of fronts. Not severe ones with rain on the field but certainly low temperatures and lots of wind.
Many vested member came to spring-clean their hangar, trailer, and plane or inspect the facilities etc. We saw Rudi (as usual) doing the odd repair and further Bill, Reinhold, Rob K and Rob T, Peter W, Hubert, Gerhard, Kevin, Trevor and John, all busy with their equipment.
For the first time the Apis could be seen flying here. First Martin had a check ride and thereafter Friedrich took it twice to the sky. May he have lots of enjoyment. Bill’s hangar is sold to Friedrich and the plane will be hangared there. This Apis is the only one in the country and is made in the same factory as the DG500. A semblance to the DG sailplanes can be clearly seen.
It is getting busier; we had 21 flights. Of these 4 were paxes and 10 self launchers/motor gliders. Friedrich did some training flights in the Rudi’s Astir while Gerhard used it later in the day. Rico stayed up longest with more than two hours trying the wave at Waaihoek, no luck there and finally coming to the thermals at Vic Peak..
Andre Leeb du Toit and Boet Coetzee in GUF along with Alison and Johnny in VAE flew to Tanqua for brunch and joined a few of the WFC guys there including Paul Troskie who had left late on Friday afternoon in the Rotax Falke.
On Sunday another front came closer in, a tablecloth on Slanghoek / du Toit Berge and we saw a windy cold day. Prior to the wind picking up, the Hepburns were seen doing Touch and Go’s in their Lambada.
Martin Y with great enthusiasm was the first to start at just after eleven. When coming all the way from Knysna one has to extract as much as possible from this flying opportunity even though he was on duty. He tried the wave on the west side of Vic Peak for more than two hours. Although the wave was there no great heights were reached. Peter F was there too Jesse Roos turned up to fly but the wind became way too strong.. Mark took a pax for a ride. He arrived with this pax in a Wilga, an ugly looking utility plane based in FASL. It has a bit of a cross between a mechanized locust and wildebeest. They are well known tugplanes in Europe but with their heavy engine are very expensive to run. They regularly tug 3 gliders together.
This model had an effective dashpot fitted on the exhaust undoubtly to do with the noise requirements at FASL. East European engines are normally very noisy.
RK
Many vested member came to spring-clean their hangar, trailer, and plane or inspect the facilities etc. We saw Rudi (as usual) doing the odd repair and further Bill, Reinhold, Rob K and Rob T, Peter W, Hubert, Gerhard, Kevin, Trevor and John, all busy with their equipment.
For the first time the Apis could be seen flying here. First Martin had a check ride and thereafter Friedrich took it twice to the sky. May he have lots of enjoyment. Bill’s hangar is sold to Friedrich and the plane will be hangared there. This Apis is the only one in the country and is made in the same factory as the DG500. A semblance to the DG sailplanes can be clearly seen.
It is getting busier; we had 21 flights. Of these 4 were paxes and 10 self launchers/motor gliders. Friedrich did some training flights in the Rudi’s Astir while Gerhard used it later in the day. Rico stayed up longest with more than two hours trying the wave at Waaihoek, no luck there and finally coming to the thermals at Vic Peak..
Andre Leeb du Toit and Boet Coetzee in GUF along with Alison and Johnny in VAE flew to Tanqua for brunch and joined a few of the WFC guys there including Paul Troskie who had left late on Friday afternoon in the Rotax Falke.
On Sunday another front came closer in, a tablecloth on Slanghoek / du Toit Berge and we saw a windy cold day. Prior to the wind picking up, the Hepburns were seen doing Touch and Go’s in their Lambada.
Martin Y with great enthusiasm was the first to start at just after eleven. When coming all the way from Knysna one has to extract as much as possible from this flying opportunity even though he was on duty. He tried the wave on the west side of Vic Peak for more than two hours. Although the wave was there no great heights were reached. Peter F was there too Jesse Roos turned up to fly but the wind became way too strong.. Mark took a pax for a ride. He arrived with this pax in a Wilga, an ugly looking utility plane based in FASL. It has a bit of a cross between a mechanized locust and wildebeest. They are well known tugplanes in Europe but with their heavy engine are very expensive to run. They regularly tug 3 gliders together.
This model had an effective dashpot fitted on the exhaust undoubtly to do with the noise requirements at FASL. East European engines are normally very noisy.
RK
posted by CGC Reporter at 10.9.07
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