Oct - Rcsoaring.com

out light and stiff and looked up tohandling full speed dives.We built the wings just before my fiancéeand I moved back to Australia, sounfortunately my mentor was unable tosee it fly.Here where we have based ourselves inNorth East Victoria, slopes big enoughand with a nice LZ to land a slipperyplane are few and far between. Thenthe winds have to come from the rightdirection, and unfortunately they are alsorare, so it was some time before I waslucky enough to get some wind that wasgood enough for a maiden.The slope I maidened it for the secondtime is a superb one, a huge meteorcrater many kilometers across and 200mor so of steep slope.I had already flown my heavy Destiny, sofelt confident enough to launch the Orca.A few dry run launches to check thedirection of the throws and get my armmoving again and she was away.Although the lift wasn’t big, there wasenough to get some height for somegentle speed passes and carving turns.Since it had been some time since theoriginal had flown, it was so nice to seeit in the air again and hear the turbinewhistle as she flew past. The lift wasgood despite the low wind-speed, so thenoise was very clear and very differentfrom any other plane I’ve heard.The lighter wingloading was apparent— down to a little over 18oz/sq foot —though I was unable to get more thanabout 75m above the slope. A successfulif bumpy landing meant that I wasecstatic. I was taking her home in onepiece again.I then rebuilt the heavy tail and managedto shave another few ounces off thewingloading (down to just over 16oz/sq foot) so the second time I flew it indecent lift, I was able to really wring itout.Fast passes were addictive, half pipeswere endless, and the energy retentionwas excellent, with endless Cuban 8’sOctober 2008 47