Topic: Cotswold Slopers!

You could always tile print them, thats what I did with the 48" version, but never got round to building it, too many projects I guess

Steve

OK, for what it's worth, here my thoughts.
Forum name: I use this particular section because most of the people I know belong to the SCSA. I also add my comments to the South Wales Slopers and the South West Slopers because I hope to fly their sites, though I have no intent on joining any others clubs.
I am a member of the SCSA and also West Mendip (because I fly at Crooks Peak sometimes). This means I am contributing to a clubs existence and also as a way of getting insurance.
I don’t really care what the forum section is called. South Cotswold seems OK to me because that’s where the majority of action takes place. This doesn't mean to say that I won’t venture future afield.
As for the Compass Rose; if you put too much info on there, it becomes unreadable. This was tried by various Paragliding clubs with no success. If you want info on a variety of site, you could consider something like this or Slope Hunter's site which is getting better all the time.

You could always tile print them, thats what I did with the 48" version, but never got round to building it, too many projects I guess

Steve

Again, being dumb, is it easy to print in tile format from PDF's? If it is, it would be an easy solution and would save a couple of £££!!
 

I have the option in my settings when i hit print, this may depend on your printer of course

Steve

I'd be more than willing to get copies for anyone that wants them and would only ask you only cover the cost of your own print (again, i've no idea how much it would cost?
 

When I've had copies of A0 plans done, they cost me £2.75 for a black and white copy. 

Where was that TT, last copies I had were £40 for 3 A0 sheets

Steve

When I've had copies of A0 plans done, they cost me £2.75 for a black and white copy. 

I've heard that white can be quite expensive.
 

A big "D'oh!" on my part I reckon!

I'm really keen to get one of these things flying now. Would be great if Paul has a source for some Depron. Think I'll try Giant cod rx, servos and batterys forn the build in the hope that i'll be able to build the thing for less than a round of drinks! Would be great to see four or five of them flying at the same slope at the same time. I reckon they'll be great fun.
 

Do you have a link for the 60" I only have the 48"

Steve

I have ruined Paul's compass by trying to colour it in with red and green crayons
The idea is to have the sweet spot and on the slope dark green, OK, light green and marginal amber. I have removed the S & A from the logo.
Ihad put a lot of effort into measuring the angles for each slope. Does anyone want to argue over directions?
The Avon site has CLD stopping at North, but the slope is OK for NNE
I like the Pac Men on the map, simple and effective
If we agree on directions and style we could do a better job on the colours
I don't know Lecky very well, but is great for NE.

Rodborough was light today 5MPH, with some light snow
Phil



 

Nice one Phil!

Steve, I couldn't find the plan myself but i've PM'd Hexo (Gary) and Pasty (Steve) to bestow their wisdom, advice (and hopefully a 60"plan) on this thread. Hope thats alright with ya'll?
 

Steve, I couldn't find the plan myself but i've PM'd Hexo (Gary) and Pasty (Steve) to bestow their wisdom, advice (and hopefully a 60"plan) on this thread. Hope thats alright with ya'll?
 

Sounds good to me 

Steve

I have ruined Paul's compass by trying to colour it in with red and green crayons

 

Looks good to me guys, adds greater depth to the slope, especially if you don't visit a slope much

Steve

I'm sure Pasty won't mind me sharing this PM with you re the Swingers . . .

"I'd go for the 46" every time, I'm not a huge fan of the 60. The 46" is tougher, more fun and flies in the same air.

The key with Swingers is dont over engineer then, build as they're meant to be built.

Get a 46 under 400g's is the aim."

Thats from THE MAN HIMSELF (well one of the two). Based on this advice, i'm up for a 46" (Oooohhhh errrrr misses)!
 

WHAT THE HELL!! I CANT BELIEVE YOU JUST POSTED THAT!! IT WAS FOR YOUR EYES ONLY!! 

Word up party people

Yeah, Swingers... luv em. As said above I'd go for the 46" and keep the weight below 400g's. Dont over engineer is very important, so many people have tried to build a Swinger and slung loads of reinforcement on it, all sorts of covering etc and ended up with a dog because it too heavy.

One area I would strengthen a bit next time is where the spar passes through the fuz as thats the area where mine has slop now, this would consist of some light ply on the inner fuz sides for with the spar passing through it.

Heres a thread that covers a lot if not all the Swinger detail you'll need.

New fish on the block.... - RC Groups

My build is on there too and when I do one again (which I need to as my current one is a bit beat up) I'll be doing the same build as I love the way mine flies.

The ethos behind the Swinger is cheap fun, you dont need fancy materials or expensive radio gear. Mine has Hextronic 9 grams servos (couple of quid each) on the elevator and rudder with a single standard size servo running the rons, a crappy GWS pico rx, with a 2000mah AA rx pack up front I needed no extra weight to balance and she came out at 370g's.

My wing spar is made from 4mm pine stock from B&Q which I doubled up side by side, I put a bit of very light ply running down the centre fuz former from the middle of the wing to the tail which stiffened the tail up a lot but added very little weight. All push rods are 2mm carbon and horns are what I had kicking around.

Whats important is getting the wing section as smooth as you can without it creasing as it goes over the spar, Cliffhanger (on rcmf and rcg) has been using formers to give the wing a proper consistent section stopping the dreaded spar crease. It might be worth chatting to him about his builds as hes been quite innovative with his design solutions.

If you cant find the white depron easily you can get green stuff from B&Q which is used as under floor foam or something, its green but I dont know its trade name. Again Cliffhanger might be able to point you to the right stuff (i've only ever used the white).

That should give you enough food for thought for now, read the thread above, if you've still got questions just shout... I dont monitor this thread and my post alert thing is screwed so if I dont reply just gimme a nudge via pm.

Have fun

Steve

Aha, so the thread has been renamed. Good idea. No need to have connected it to the SCSA at all.

I'm sure we at SCSA would have been non-plussed by the thought of swingers.....

Steveo, thanks for all your help re the Swinger. Will defo start to have a look at getting all the relevant kit over the next few days.
 

Where was that TT, last copies I had were £40 for 3 A0 sheets

Steve

I use a place called "Service Point". The one I use is on Whiteladies Road in Bristol, but it's a chain so they are all over the place.

I have ruined Paul's compass by trying to colour it in with red and green crayons

The stark design I did was because I was matching the existing compass - I much prefer it with the colours and would be quite happy to add Phil's version to the original. Also to change/remove the centre text is no problem at all.

As for the Swinger, the 46" sounds like a good choice following Pasty's comments. I haven't got any brilliant ideas for suppliers - the couple of flooring/tiles places I've tried haven't had it. After that it's either the B&Q Green stuff or online/EBay suppliers, for instance here.

Regarding the airfoil shape - the wings I saw on the build thread had balsa formers, is there any reason not to use more of the 6mm depron?

And finally, is it worth starting a 'Cotswold Swingers!' thread to avoid swamping all the what/where/when talk on this thread once we start building?

£2.50 per sheet for Depron isn't too bad but it's defo worth a look at the B&Q stuff Pasty mentioned.
 

I like the idea about a seperate thread for the builds. Perhaps once we've got all the materials sorted and we know who is going to build one for definate, we could start it.
 

On another note, some miserable git has nicked that beautiful NNW from Sundays forecast. It's now showing WSW and sub 10mph.
    

I may be wrong but i think the B&Q stuff is 6mm, you'll need some 3mm for the wings... having said that, someone may well have tried the 6mm on the wings with good results... Cliffhanger would be the man to ask as I think hes been using the B&Q stuff.

I have started a map, I can make it interactive so we get a popup on mouse over and  new page on click with all the slope info and a map of the slope
Phil

On another note, some miserable git has nicked that beautiful NNW from Sundays forecast. It's now showing WSW and sub 10mph.
    

Andy, the bowl at Selsley works even in gentle winds from the WSW so don't loose hope yet! It will probably be forecast E by tomorrow!

Guy

The stark design I did was because I was matching the existing compass - I much prefer it with the colours and would be quite happy to add Phil's version to the original. Also to change/remove the centre text is no problem at all.

The colours add more information to the compass and I hope the colours make sense.
We need a place to put our maps and information, I could register cotswold_slopers.co.uk as a domain name, but we need some web space that we could access, with its own pass word
Most of us could write simple HTML or use a simple editor, some sites have on line editors like the forum

Andy, I flew Selsley west in 2MPH last week, there was plenty of lift, but maybe not enough for a brick!
Phil

Phil / Guy, thanks for the info re Selsley. I'm not jump of a tall building just yet!
 
As for the compass and the photos etc, would it not be a good idea to link it in with the descriptions Hexo is looking for regarding Sloping in the British Isles?
 
Also, I am able to edit the opeining post of this (long running) thread. I believe it would make sense to put the compass there for ease of reference once we're all agreed on it.
 

The Hexo package is excellent.

He already includes details of most of our sites (Says Selsley is a NW slope though) and a link to the SCSA but it would be good to get the 'correct' compass to him.

Also, I am able to edit the opeining post of this (long running) thread. I believe it would make sense to put the compass there for ease of reference once we're all agreed on it.
 

Me too, might be a good place once it's agreed on

Steve

The Hexo package is excellent.

He already includes details of most of our sites (Says Selsley is a NW slope though) and a link to the SCSA but it would be good to get the 'correct' compass to him.

Andy, do you have a link to hexo site?

I have made one part of the map with the Pacmen on work, only the CLD, the bottom one works so far.

http://www.glos-mfc.co.uk/cs/cs.htm
Click on the map to open a page with the larger map on it, then click CLD above dursley

We can put our info and photos on this page, I will style it later

Phil the map and the link from it work really well. Nice work!

The link to the Hexo thread is here . . . UK Slope Soaring Database[/color][/b]

It's a link the thread that's running on the main glider section board. In it you'll find all manner of links and info about what he's trying to achieve, including a link to a trial database.
 

Right, all you potential swingers!

I'm looking at placing an order for significant quantities of Depron from DepronFoam.com, if there's enough interest.

I'm going to buy 20 sheets of 3mm thick white, 1000x700mm - and the same of 6mm. It works out at £2.40 a sheet for either thickness (including a share of the p+p).

I want 4 sheets of each and so does Glenn, so the others are up for grabs. I haven't ordered it yet, so if there is a huge demand I can always add some on. There is also UHU POR glue, the ideal thing to use with it, at £2.50 for a tube. ( I used it to glue the two halves of my first electric EPP wing (no spars, tape etc, just edge jointed POR) and when I stuffed it at full throttle the wings ripped off *but* the POR joint was still solid.)

I'm passing this on at cost, buying it all at once gets the price down from £2.50 a sheet plus p+p.

Let me know what you're after - either on here, by PM, or on gliding@bitrot.co.uk. I'm hoping to order it later tonight.

Matey. that's very good of you. Can I mathc the quatities both Glen and yourself are ordering? Can I also get a tube of that glue (no point messing around trying to find an alternative). If you're out this weekend i'll give the required cash.

Thanks so much matey.
 

I'll have the same (not wanting to be left out) as Andy ie 4x sheets and a tube of glue.
At some point, would somebody tell me why I'm buying this stuff and what I'm meant to do with it. 

I'll have the same (not wanting to be left out) as Andy ie 4x sheets and a tube of glue.
At some point, would somebody tell me why I'm buying this stuff and what I'm meant to do with it. 

That's 4x3mm and 4x6mm, same as the rest of us lemmings?

In your case, I think the best thing to do with it is to spread it out across the slope to reduce the landing impact(s). Happy to help! 

Alternatively there are rumours that you can make a glider (or two) out of it. I haven't actually measured it out to see how much you need per 'Swinger 46', but I'm assuming four sheets of each is more than plenty.

I'd get some foam safe CA and kicker too, POR's great but sometimes you need the instant tack of kicked CA. Its better for putting in carbon strip reinforcement into the stab as theres no movement, good for the fin to fuz wood too.

Selsley was rubbish today, very little lift

I have done a page about Cam Long Down at


http://www.glos-mfc.co.uk/cs/cld.htm

please have a look, I will edit it again when we get a better discription of the site

Phil

I'd get some foam safe CA and kicker too, POR's great but sometimes you need the instant tack of kicked CA. Its better for putting in carbon strip reinforcement into the stab as theres no movement, good for the fin to fuz wood too.

I don't know about everybody else, but I've got CA and kicker already, and odd bits of carbon and wood. Also a hot glue gun - can Depron take the heat (for tacking bits together)?

I have no idea whether a hot glue gun would work, it doesnt take much to melt depron tho... try a bit and let us know

Your CA's foam safe right? normal CA eats depron for fun.

I have no idea whether a hot glue gun would work, it doesnt take much to melt depron tho... try a bit and let us know

Your CA's foam safe right? normal CA eats depron for fun.

Yeah, I paid a load for it then found I didn't need it for EPP... doh!

I'm thinking of using a carbon main spar (because I've got a 1m long 5mm spar handy) and cutting airfoil formers from 6mm Depron.. seems like there's no point having a bouncy wing then putting balsa in it. With my 5 months experience, that is

The spar tapers from root to tip and you're already starting to over engineer

this is a sub 400g plane, you dont need a super duper spar.

The spar tapers from root to tip and you're already starting to over engineer

this is a sub 400g plane, you dont need a super duper spar.

I know I don't *need* it, but I've got it.. isn't that a guiding principle for this thing? I can always put a tapered pine one in if needed, but that's more work not less.

And I wanted to put in a slightly better (Wasabi?) airfoil because we don't have nice high cliffs with vertical lift round here, so a bit more will probably be useful...

I might be completely wrong though, in which case feel free to point and laugh.

I have added a few more sites to the map I am making, only the page for Cam Long Down is finished

http://www.glos-mfc.co.uk/cs/map.htm

Phil