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By Soarcerer
#400024
Last weekend I caught what to me was some big air - I zoomed-up over launch almost immediately after launching from our local mountain site. The problem is that the air was bumpy and it made me a bit nervous. I probably could have stayed up for an hour or longer, but after about 15 minutes I decided to land. I had a lot of trouble trying to descend, though, because thermals were popping over the landing zone. Again, the air was choppy and bumpy. I landed just fine but it felt like it took me forever.

So my question is...is turbulence and choppy air just something a new pilot gets used to the more he/she flies?
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By NMERider
#400025
Soarcerer wrote: Fri Aug 18, 2017 5:39 pm....So my question is...is turbulence and choppy air just something a new pilot gets used to the more he/she flies?
Honestly, some of us get less used to it and choose to fly later in the day after it smooths out.
This was my most recent flight (caution NSFW): https://youtu.be/YfhK9qukkTc
Please ask your instructor for personal guidance on this question. Turbulence is very subjective and what one pilots says is an 8/10 on the make-believe turbulence scale, another pilots may laugh and call it a 3/10.
Your safety depends on not crashing into the hill or the LZ and turbulence can cause either of these and more.
Our gliders and harnesses can make a huge difference in how turbulence affects each of us.
The simple answer is that you can get used to turbulence and learn to ride it our but there's more to it because turbulence can take your control of the glider away from you and you must learn how to either avoid the turbulence or how to manage your glider and your harness in order to keep your wing under control. Unless I was there in the same air as you I really can't give your a more meaningful answer. Talk to the senior pilots who fly in the same air and talk to your instructor. There are a load of variables.
Cheers, Jonathan
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By kukailimoku2
#400026
After a few thousand hours I got to the point where, when I really got slapped, my first thought was , "I'm too old for this s--t." I found I searched out smoothness more and more.

Not to say a good lumpy thermal wasn't fun but a few hours of getting thumped certainly lost its magic.
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By red
#400027
Soarcerer wrote: Fri Aug 18, 2017 5:39 pmLast weekend I caught what to me was some big air - I zoomed-up over launch almost immediately after launching from our local mountain site. The problem is that the air was bumpy and it made me a bit nervous. I probably could have stayed up for an hour or longer, but after about 15 minutes I decided to land. I had a lot of trouble trying to descend, though, because thermals were popping over the landing zone. Again, the air was choppy and bumpy. I landed just fine but it felt like it took me forever.
So my question is...is turbulence and choppy air just something a new pilot gets used to the more he/she flies?
Soarcerer,

Short answer, Yes. You will even get good at flying in bumpy air, but flying in a lot of smooth air in the future will decrease your "bump tolerance" back to earlier levels. A good "bump tolerance" is even a safety factor of sorts, because you may (wisely) decide not to trust the thermally LZ at mid-day, and just fly the bumps at altitude, until things mellow out later. Never assume that you can hit a thermal at 75' (23m) AGL without very serious physical risk.

Ideally, for now, you should wait out the roughest air of the day on launch, then take off when you are able to fly in the bumps until the air gets more mellow in the evening. Then you won't need to deal with a radical LZ when you land. That judgment takes experience at the flying site, and hopefully there will be local HG pilots who can give you the right answers from their experience. Otherwise, just approach the issue on the cautious side; it's better to miss out on the bigger thermals of the day than to land in wild-and-crazy air because of fatigue (when you are least able to cope with the combination of bad air and close to the dirt).

Unless you are flying close to terrain (in any direction) or other pilots, there is no real need to get tense and fight against every bump. Keep a decent grip, sure, but let your arms relax, and maybe the next bump will correct for the last bump. 8) Once you get bumped off course to some uncomfortable degree, then make a single big (relaxed) course correction, to correct for the last few bumps. I'd call this flying style "going with the flow," as long as you are keeping things reasonable. After some time in the bumps, you will know by the feel which bumps you can safely ignore, and which bumps will need instant corrections. When flying close to terrain or other pilots, then you should take a firm hand with the glider, and keep yourself out of trouble.
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By mtpilot
#400029
This is always an interesting subject with lots of opinions. Nobody wants to fly in conditions that can tumble a glider or
make landing risky. My own thoughts are to try and plan the flight , choose when to launch, try to get enough altitude
to make it to that bigger smoother lz. We are looking for a degree of turbulence, that is lift. I often find it's smooth and
fun once in a good consolidated thermal. I also try to avoid known dangerous areas or have enough clearance. It's
also helpful to have a radio and get information from a pilot in the air or lz. The air can just be annoying like a bumpy
road or choppy lake, vs a real rodeo. it's usually possible to find smoother air. After a while you know the site.
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By idahoDal
#400034
One of my favorite quotes ever was from Kevin Frost from way back on the Yahoo group days (apologies for mangling it but this is the gist):
"The feeling of hang gliding is totally up to the individual and the day you chose to fly. You can choose to fly at sites and in air where its like kicking back in the barcalounger watching the ball game and drinking a beer. Or, you can choose to fly at sites and in air where its like doing pushups as fast as you can with a gun pointed at your head. The beauty of it is that its your choice where to fall on this spectrum."

The advice I have here is to fly in what makes you come back out to the hill again tomorrow and fly again. Every single flight is better than the last one. Why? Because the flight I'm having right now is the best flight of my life. I want every flight to end with the feeling that I want to go do that again!
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By RobertKesselring
#400038
As stated earlier, that turbulence is the lift that turns 5-minute sled runs into multi-hour epic experiences.
There's air smooth air that's not active enough to stay up, and there's rough air that's too active to be fun. For a new pilot, there may not be any overlap at all. The more skill you develop to use weaker conditions, and the more tolerance you develop to the stronger conditions, the more overlap there will be, and the more days will be soarable for you.

The other option is to buy a Mosquito and have hour+ flights in the silky smooth air. This is the route I've gone. Everything about the Mosquito sucks on the ground. It's heavy and bulky and hard to transport. The engine has all the fussiness you expect from a suped up 2-stroke. And, it's expensive. But, everything about the Mosquito is awesome once you're in the air. You can fly for hours in silky smooth air, you can fly wherever you want to instead of always chasing lift that may or may not be there, and there's no need to fly in uncomfortable proximity to mountains, looking for ridge lift.
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By red
#400089
jearybayter wrote: Wed Aug 23, 2017 1:13 pmGet the equipment and gears to learn the miniature modelling of gliders - gliding stages =https://www.icrfq.com/part/2734191-JAN4N23.htmlgear , technical assistance way of learning to glide in real way in turbulence.
Campers,

The provided link above does not work, but I would agree, RC gliders can teach a new HG pilot a lot about the air. You can get free computer RC simulators (see my web page). After that, the best way to learn RC in real life is with a good RC pilot who has a "buddy box." Then the RC ace can assume control anytime you find yourself heading for trouble. The alternative will be splinters, which can be demoralizing. As you gain skill, the RC ace will need to take control less often, but it's nice to let the RC ace handle the launches and landings, at first. 8)
By Dave Gills
#400090
Unintentional turns of more than 90 degrees, wire snappers or too much over the falls action & I'm feeling serious cooler-suck.
Kinda like the feeling a pinball has when it hits those those things that go 'ping-ping'.
:shark:
Some say it's better to stay up in that crud rather than try to land but I've been lucky so far.
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By Vinicius
#400403
In my second soaring flight, I stayed above the ridge in popping thermals about 30 minutes then started to feel really dizzy. It was the time I decided to go for landing but lift was so widespread that I got really high above the LZ and pulled in to go down fast. The moment I landed I started to puke. The subsequent flights I started eating ginger before, unless it is a planned sled ride. It was night and day, not placebo IMO.
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By red
#400405
Vinicius wrote: Sun Sep 24, 2017 10:01 amIn my second soaring flight, I stayed above the ridge in popping thermals about 30 minutes. . . . The moment I landed I started to puke. The subsequent flights I started eating ginger before, unless it is a planned sled ride. It was night and day, not placebo IMO.
Campers,

More information, from the WIKI:

http://www.hanggliding.org/wiki/Motion_Sickness_Relief
.
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By mario
#400408
Loved it for years...until I started puking!! Read about ginger here on the org and it worked like a charm. I seem to tolerate turbulence better than many now and I only have a ginger candy if I think it will be rowdy.
Good luck!!