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88 CHAPTER 8. SPECIAL SITUATIONS IN X-PLANE
button will load another aircraft (by default, the Stinson L-5) to which your glider will be attached.
This aircraft will pull yours along behind it, and you will be able to release the line connecting you
to the towplane at your desired altitude. On the other hand, the Glider Winch button will set up
a stationary winch on the ground which will quickly pull in a wire attached to your glider, which
you will release once you are 1500 feet or so above the ground. In either case, you can release the
tow line by pressing the space bar.
When using the towplane, you will start behind the plane with its engine running and ready to
go. Releasing the glider’s brakes (using the ‘b’ key by default) commands the towplane to take off,
dragging your glider with it.
The towplane, once in flight, will take the glider as high as you likes. While being carried up to
altitude, though, you must keep your glider in formation behind the towplane. Pressing the space
bar will release the line between the aircraft, allowing you to soar freely.
Notice, of course, that until you have unhooked yourself, the tow rope connecting your glider
to the towplane is attached to your nose and the towplane’s tail. X-Plane models the real physics
of this situation, so if your glider pulls left, right, up, or down, it will drag the towplane’s tail in
that direction. This could result in simply pulling the plane off course, or ultimately in dragging
the plane into a stall or spin. If that happens, things will get very complicated very quickly—the
towplane (which will likely be crashing) will be dragging the glider with it! The dynamics of the
resulting crash are interesting if nothing else.
According to the FAA Glider Handbook, a glider pilot should keep the glider in one of two
positions when being towed to altitude. It should either be in a “low tow” position, wherein the
glider is just below the wake from the towplane, or it should be in a “high tow” position, just
above the wake from the towplane. Hold this position carefully to keep from dragging the towplane
around!
A glider pilot must watch the wind and the slope of the terrain carefully to hold inside the
upward-moving currents of air, using the lift of the air flowing up the mountain slope to hold the
craft aloft. With a good 25-knot wind set in the simulator, you can get a nice, free elevator ride to
10,000 feet when flying along the windward side of a nice, steep mountain. This is called ridge lift.
X-Plane will also model the columns of rising hot air, called thermals, that are useful for prolonging
a glider flight. To turn on the thermals, open the Weather dialog box from the Environment
menu. Select the set weather uniformly for the whole world radio button, then drag the thermal
coverage slider up—15% coverage or more makes for a nice flight. A 500 ft/min thermal
climb rate is fine, but you can raise that value, too, if you like. Additionally, as you’re starting out
in gliders, you may want to keep the various wind speed, shear speed, and turbulence sliders
set to minimum.
Now, to take full advantage of both ridge lift and thermals, gliders have a unique instrument
known as the total energy variometer. This indicates your glider’s rate of climb or descent. You can
see the visual representation of this instrument in the panel (it is labeled “Total Energy”); if the
needle is above the center of the dial, you are climbing (perhaps due to ridge lift or a thermal), and
if it is below the center, you are falling. Even better, you can flip on the switch labeled “Audio”
in the instrument panel to get auditory feedback from the variometer. If it is beeping, then the
aircraft is in a nice updraft from the air following the terrain. Circling in that area will let the
glider ride the climbing air to altitude. When the variometer is emitting a steady tone, the craft is
in descending air—the glider has been blown to the wrong side of the mountain, and a crash will
follow soon if you do not find a way out of that area!
To land the glider, simply circle down to runway level. The trick is to approach the runway
with just enough speed to set the craft down safely. Remember, pulling the speedbrakes in can help
slow the craft down, but if it doesn’t have enough speed to reach the landing strip, the glider has