"it’s very important to be patient." I was a tow pilot in the Rockies for a ski season and got a whopping 3.5 hours of glider time. The spinning in circles to gain altitude was enough for me to stick with powered flight (patience indeed!) This is an amazing accomplishment, way to go!
A few years ago I met a guy at the Smith Creek hot springs out in the middle of the Nevada desert towing a glider. He told me about glider flights from Truckee CA or Minden, NV to Utah and I was amazed then.
Another impressive journey was Truckee CA to Nephi, UT and then back again against the prevailing winds.
Wow they were flying at 27,000 feet for a lot of that. I was wondering how they'd get over the Rockies but had no idea they'd go all the way up there. Obviously they need oxygen and the plane has to be designed to fly in that thin of air, but just how hard is that?
I'm curious why he chose Minden as a starting point. I'm assuming it's because it's at the foot of the Sierras and as a result there's a lot of updrafts?
Minden is a very popular place for gliders; with the right conditions the Sierras trigger serious mountain wave that you can ride for a long, long way.
I met a guy in a gas station parking lot in southern New Hampshire who was towing a long trailer with a beat up Subaru Forester. A question of "what the heck is in the trailer?" led to him telling me about his glider and thermals and various techniques for gaining speed / altitude and turning it into distance.
Easily one of the best conversations I've ever had. There was nothing about his set-up that screamed what I imagine would be considered "well-off" in this crowd.
That's all to say, that I doubt money is as big of an obstacle to getting started in this as you imagine if you prioritized it.
> That's all to say, that I doubt money is as big of an obstacle to getting started in this as you imagine if you prioritized it.
Very much the case! (Well, idk quite what gp imagined, but it's not as expensive as many things.)
When I was learning, around 2020, I budgeted ~$300 / month for glider flying, + ~$600 (I think: they've gone up!) for annual club dues. These days the monthly would be a bit higher, and the dues more like $700-800, I think. Flying as a club member is a lot cheaper than rides; you pay for the tow and for time on the aircraft, but aircraft time is way, way cheaper than power (no fuel to burn, no engine to maintain) and the instructors are volunteers.
NB this is in a club environment. The upside is that it's cheap and the club environment is a really good place to learn by osmosis / watching everybody else / listening to stories / seeing all kinds of different situations. The downside is that it's a huge time commitment. You'll drive 1.5 hrs and hang around all day to get twoish flights, sometimes < 10 min. each. And you have to be willing to commit all of every Saturday (or Sunday) for a year plus: you need to be flying just about every week, and given that some weekends'll be weathered out you have to be ready to take advantage of every flyable weekend. Folks that aren't committed just don't make progress: hang around, season after season, still flying with instructors, until they finally give up or just occasionally grind it out.
(I did the bulk of my training in 2020 and spring/early summer 2021. This was perfect: I was single and newish to the area I was living in, and thanks to Covid I had nothing else going on in my life. Even as things started to reopen in 2021 it was easy to maintain that "saturday? of course I'm at the field" habit.)
This is all harder to do as a Real Adult with responsibilities. Some folks manage to do it, but it's harder. Commercial operations, where you go and get a whole bunch of flying in relatively quickly, are also an option---but I hear there's a wide range of quality, and even the best won't get you the seasoning / airmanship you get from hanging around at the field every weekend for a year, flying in all sorts of conditions and taking advantage of the unofficial ground school from all the other instructor/student pairs there at the same time.
The economics change first once you've got your rating, when you're no longer doing short training flights and the bulk of your flying is (one hopes!) longer soaring flights; and then again when (if) you buy your own glider---but it's still that few thousand bucks / year order of magnitude. Expensive, but doable, especially compared to power.
Gliders themselves range from "surprisingly inexpensive" to "less expensive than a new powered aircraft", more or less. I'd expect to hear something like $5,000 for a Schweizer 1-26 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schweizer_SGS_1-26: classic glider, still widely flown by a devoted community, but appreciably lower performance than gliders built after the massive jump that came with the switch to fiberglass); I have a part-share in a Jantar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SZD-41_Jantar_Standard, early fiberglass) that totals $25,000 or a little less, with reasonably nice avionics.
So, all told, yes, flying gliders costs a meaningful amount of money, but isn't terribly terribly expensive. The question to ask yourself is really not whether you've got the money, but whether you've got the time.
Thanks for sharing this detail. I've been interested in taking some form of flight training for a long time and finally have the financial means to do it, but I haven't decided whether to go with glider or powered flight. Your comments makes me realize that the time commitment might be larger than I can manage at this stage (two kids 1 and 5) and so may need to wait until a little later in life.
I want so badly to try and talk you into flying gliders, because it's amazing: way, way more fun (IMO) than the overwhelming majority of the power flying you can do as a civilian. And there are people who make it work! But ... probably this is wise, and better to make thoughtful decision.
It seems like this gets easier as the kids get older; I've seen parents of teenagers make it work. For some folks it's a family affair---several kids & one or both parents learning to fly. These families have been uniformly super fun to have at the field! For others I think it's a matter of the kids being old enough to have some independence, + I'm sure a very supportive partner.
So don't give up on gliders forever! I'm expecting times in my life when I can't get out to the field enough to stay proficient & safe, and I'll have to quit flying for a little---but a dearly hope not forever. It's just that, likewise, now's maybe not the right time for you.
Is there some kinda "here's what gliding is all about" article I can read to so I can understand this website / this accomplishment?
"it’s very important to be patient." I was a tow pilot in the Rockies for a ski season and got a whopping 3.5 hours of glider time. The spinning in circles to gain altitude was enough for me to stick with powered flight (patience indeed!) This is an amazing accomplishment, way to go!
A few years ago I met a guy at the Smith Creek hot springs out in the middle of the Nevada desert towing a glider. He told me about glider flights from Truckee CA or Minden, NV to Utah and I was amazed then.
Another impressive journey was Truckee CA to Nephi, UT and then back again against the prevailing winds.
https://youtu.be/4xb-CKa-FPI
https://www.weglide.org/flight/407896
Wow they were flying at 27,000 feet for a lot of that. I was wondering how they'd get over the Rockies but had no idea they'd go all the way up there. Obviously they need oxygen and the plane has to be designed to fly in that thin of air, but just how hard is that?
Atmospheric waves are quite fascinating. Crazy to see a glider utilize this over such a distance:
https://www.weather.gov/source/zhu/ZHU_Training_Page/Miscell...
Almost 1200nm!! Damn! What a flight! That’s got to be a new record.
I'm curious why he chose Minden as a starting point. I'm assuming it's because it's at the foot of the Sierras and as a result there's a lot of updrafts?
Minden is a very popular place for gliders; with the right conditions the Sierras trigger serious mountain wave that you can ride for a long, long way.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_wave
I love seeing highly niche little social networks like this one.
Thanks, took us some years to build. Respectful and friendly community all around.
Super cool. Hope to be well enough off one day to do stuff like this.
I met a guy in a gas station parking lot in southern New Hampshire who was towing a long trailer with a beat up Subaru Forester. A question of "what the heck is in the trailer?" led to him telling me about his glider and thermals and various techniques for gaining speed / altitude and turning it into distance.
Easily one of the best conversations I've ever had. There was nothing about his set-up that screamed what I imagine would be considered "well-off" in this crowd.
That's all to say, that I doubt money is as big of an obstacle to getting started in this as you imagine if you prioritized it.
I found the website to their glider club: http://www.franconiasoaring.org/glider-rides.php
A ride costs less than a full day lift ticket at most American ski resorts.
> That's all to say, that I doubt money is as big of an obstacle to getting started in this as you imagine if you prioritized it.
Very much the case! (Well, idk quite what gp imagined, but it's not as expensive as many things.)
When I was learning, around 2020, I budgeted ~$300 / month for glider flying, + ~$600 (I think: they've gone up!) for annual club dues. These days the monthly would be a bit higher, and the dues more like $700-800, I think. Flying as a club member is a lot cheaper than rides; you pay for the tow and for time on the aircraft, but aircraft time is way, way cheaper than power (no fuel to burn, no engine to maintain) and the instructors are volunteers.
NB this is in a club environment. The upside is that it's cheap and the club environment is a really good place to learn by osmosis / watching everybody else / listening to stories / seeing all kinds of different situations. The downside is that it's a huge time commitment. You'll drive 1.5 hrs and hang around all day to get twoish flights, sometimes < 10 min. each. And you have to be willing to commit all of every Saturday (or Sunday) for a year plus: you need to be flying just about every week, and given that some weekends'll be weathered out you have to be ready to take advantage of every flyable weekend. Folks that aren't committed just don't make progress: hang around, season after season, still flying with instructors, until they finally give up or just occasionally grind it out.
(I did the bulk of my training in 2020 and spring/early summer 2021. This was perfect: I was single and newish to the area I was living in, and thanks to Covid I had nothing else going on in my life. Even as things started to reopen in 2021 it was easy to maintain that "saturday? of course I'm at the field" habit.)
This is all harder to do as a Real Adult with responsibilities. Some folks manage to do it, but it's harder. Commercial operations, where you go and get a whole bunch of flying in relatively quickly, are also an option---but I hear there's a wide range of quality, and even the best won't get you the seasoning / airmanship you get from hanging around at the field every weekend for a year, flying in all sorts of conditions and taking advantage of the unofficial ground school from all the other instructor/student pairs there at the same time.
The economics change first once you've got your rating, when you're no longer doing short training flights and the bulk of your flying is (one hopes!) longer soaring flights; and then again when (if) you buy your own glider---but it's still that few thousand bucks / year order of magnitude. Expensive, but doable, especially compared to power.
Gliders themselves range from "surprisingly inexpensive" to "less expensive than a new powered aircraft", more or less. I'd expect to hear something like $5,000 for a Schweizer 1-26 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schweizer_SGS_1-26: classic glider, still widely flown by a devoted community, but appreciably lower performance than gliders built after the massive jump that came with the switch to fiberglass); I have a part-share in a Jantar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SZD-41_Jantar_Standard, early fiberglass) that totals $25,000 or a little less, with reasonably nice avionics.
So, all told, yes, flying gliders costs a meaningful amount of money, but isn't terribly terribly expensive. The question to ask yourself is really not whether you've got the money, but whether you've got the time.
Thanks for sharing this detail. I've been interested in taking some form of flight training for a long time and finally have the financial means to do it, but I haven't decided whether to go with glider or powered flight. Your comments makes me realize that the time commitment might be larger than I can manage at this stage (two kids 1 and 5) and so may need to wait until a little later in life.
I want so badly to try and talk you into flying gliders, because it's amazing: way, way more fun (IMO) than the overwhelming majority of the power flying you can do as a civilian. And there are people who make it work! But ... probably this is wise, and better to make thoughtful decision.
It seems like this gets easier as the kids get older; I've seen parents of teenagers make it work. For some folks it's a family affair---several kids & one or both parents learning to fly. These families have been uniformly super fun to have at the field! For others I think it's a matter of the kids being old enough to have some independence, + I'm sure a very supportive partner.
So don't give up on gliders forever! I'm expecting times in my life when I can't get out to the field enough to stay proficient & safe, and I'll have to quit flying for a little---but a dearly hope not forever. It's just that, likewise, now's maybe not the right time for you.
A video with Gordon Boettger about it...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8p95a4JRcw