Greg Justus - Boat Driver Walter Neser - Acro Instructor Bradley Mundell - Winch Operator Dirk Coetzee - SIV Instructor

Great first day at the SIV/Acro Course at Koppies Dam in the Free State with Walter Neser, Bradley Mundell, Dirk Coetzee and Greg Justus.
Dirk looked after the SIV pilots and on this course we had Herman 'Halvies' Havenga (Aerodyne Jumbe), Kobus Jacobs (Independence), Tinus Deetlefs(Swing), Darnie Zeeman (Skywalk Chili ), Rudi van der Walt (Aerodyne Shaolin) and Andre Steenberg (Gin Gangster).
Walter took care of the wannabe ACRO pilots which meant Ioel (Ozone Addict), Ian (Swing Astral 5)and sort-of me (Aerodyne Shaolin).

Andre Steenberg Darnie Zeeman Herman HALVIES Havenga

Kobus Jacobs Rudi Van Der Walt Tinus Deetlefs

Take-off is from the shallow banks of Koppies Dam at about 1300 ASL.  We had tows of 600m on the morning of the first day, to 800m -1100m in the afternoon and for the remainder of the course; releasing at approximately 2300m ASL.

Ian is flying his new Swing Astral 5 and Ioel is on his Ozone Addict and both are here for the Acro.

Flygirl is here to get comfortable with her Shaolin and remove the last vestiges of uncertainty as to how The Shaolin will react under pressure doing the SIV manoeuvres and to try a little bit of Acro on the last day depending on how that went.

We looked at the Acro manual and expressed some interest in the Dynamic Full Stall.  Walter thought it was a good idea.  In fact he suggested this as therapy especially for Ioel who has some fears of Dynamic manoeuvres going wrong into weightlessness and subsequent over excitement. He then gave us a briefing on the manoeuvre.  Then Ian and Ioel went for a 'boskak'.  I felt the need to re-iterate that I was here for the SIV and was not with them.

Walter said the Acro team was going first followed by the SIV's and who ever was first to get ready.  I repeated again I was with the SIV boys (therefore definitely not going first) where upon there followed quite a dispute between Ian and Ioel as to who was going first, as each thought the other was a better candidate.
'Ioel you should go first because you have done 5 SIV's already.'
'No Ian, you have got much more experience and are definitely a better candidate.'
Of course being outnumbered 8-1 it was ladies first in the end.

You can read separately about Flygirls manoeuvres on Day 1 http://flygirl.co.za/content/view/216/117/

Ian's First Flight: Boring Full Stall and a few other warm up manoeuvres.

Ioel ShemTov

Ian de Vries

Ian's Second Flight

Result: Big (dynamic remember) dive, much pulling of brakes again, massive cravat, into a cravatted SAT, insane G-Forces, break pressure insane (Ian used this word a lot), could not pull outside brake into very necessary Full Stall as Walter was suggesting would be a very good idea at this point.  Ian contemplated throwing reserve, saw he still had plenty of height, decided to leave the useless inside break and use both hands to pull the outside brake which was experiencing very high pressure from the wing loading.  He had success and managed to Full Stall the rampant glider.

Again came out too soon and this time immediately twisted up and was truly f....ed.  Brakes locked with glider now racing into a hectic sequence of Stall, dive, glider inversion (Ian says the top skin of his glider whipped up and passed his nose).  To me it looked like he was everywhere in relation to his glider all at once. Quite horrifying to watch and worse than doing any of our own manoeuvres ourselves. Eventually it untwisted with a little luck and determination from Ian and sorted itself out upon which time Walter asked Ian to please fly back to shore.

The Towing
The tows are incredibly smooth with no hic-cups or line breaks.  Greg and Bradley have a very professional paraglider pilot friendly set up.  The drum feeder allows them to tow pilots at right angles to the boat right around the dam if necessary.  Almost everything is automated with only a press of the switch required to release or rewind the line.

The line has a kite that inflates after the pilot releases and so the line stays dry all the way to the boat.  The motor winder has its own water cooling shower system which is engaged each time the rewind switch is pressed and this keeps the motor from getting too hot.  The quick line recovery means quick turn arounds to shore for the next tow. Even before the pilot in the air has finished his manoeuvres the next pilot is hooked up and ready to launch.

After our first tows to about 600m, Greg the boat driver and Bradley the winch operator improved our second and subsequent tows to 800m -1000m+ AGL ,occassionally running short of line. They have 1400m on the drum.  We were well satisfied.

For more info on the Quantum Pay-out Winches built here is South Africa, go to http://www.quantumwinches.com/

And no, Koppies Dam does not look so small you are gonna miss it if you throw reserve, but the tows are high and that gave me the confidence to try what I did, the distance to the water/ground being so great, I felt I had the time to recover from most mishaps.  The launch and landings are on the banks of the dam which are a flat as a pancake and the weather is super stable.  The Koppies Crew have run 5 SIV's to date and only lost half a day to bad weather overall.

More on Walter and Dirk later.