North UK2

[OXO]

One of the classic ways to get into wave is a thermal climb into cloud, ...

Under VFR conditions..?
How did you get your GPL..?

Cloud flying is permitted in the UK, and there is no Glider Pilots License. The land of the free !

[k6chris]

Thanks Andy, Milfield's looking good!

[Andy1248]

Thanks Chris. Nice screenshot. Your graphic display looks better than mine. I will have do a close look at my settings.
I have Nvidea GTX 1070 so should be good, maybe not set right.

[k6chris]

Hi Andy, here are my graphics settings - you should win this one!!



Thanks again for all your hared work.

Chris

[Bre901]

Congratulations Andy !

I tested some airfields in the Lake District :

Lattrig :
QFU 23 : underground towplane

Diana or Antares (no ballast) : nasty takeoff but doable
DuoDiscus (2ppl) + Dynamic : nasty takeoff but doable (had to extend airbrakes not to overtake towplane)
DuoDiscus (2ppl+ballast) + Wilga : nasty takeoff but doable (same)
DuoDiscus (2ppl+ballast) + Winch : OK (but where did they put the winch ?)
QFU 05 : towplane rolls above the runway

Diana : bumpy glider roll.
DuoDiscus (2ppl+ballast) + Dynamic : had to roll the glider downhill to take off
DuoDiscus (2ppl+ballast) + Robin : doable

Not what I call an easy field (crashed a few times)

Cockermouth :
QFU09 :
Diana (full balast) + Dynamic : towplane takes off just before the road but OK
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Piper : nasty (but flyable)
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Robin/Wilga/Zlin towplane takes off very close to the road but glider already flying
QFU27 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Piper/Dynamic: towplane rolls/flys through the hill at the end of the runway, glider can fly above
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Robin/Wilga/Zlin : towplane misses the hill. OK
Diana (full balast) + Dynamic/Piper : towplane misses the hill. The bumpiness of the runway makes lateral control tricky during roll

Bleese Hall
QFU 23 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Dynamic : towplane rolls/flys through the hill at the end of the runway, glider can fly above
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Robin/Wilga : towplane flys through hilltop, glider can fly above
QFU 05 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Dynamic : towplane rolls/flys through the hill at the end of the runway, slightly touches next hill, glider can fly above
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Robin : towplane rolls/flys through the hill at the end of the runway, misses next hill, glider can fly above

Skelling Farm Ed
QFU 32 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Dynamic : OK
QFU 14 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Piper : towplane crosses the road on ground but OK

Glassonby :
QFU 36 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Dynamic/Wilga : OK
QFU 18 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Zlin/Piper : OK

Walney Lakes GC :
QFU 23 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Dynamic : OK
QFU 05 :
DuoDiscus (2ppl+max ballast) + Piper : OK

That said, the part of the scenery I saw is quite nice ('ope no one minds ze F- reg number )


And, yes, there is wave in North UK I left 2-3 m/s (4-6kts) @ 4000m (13 kft) (and that was the _first_ flight I ever flew in N-UK)

[davesalmon]

Yes, found wave in a westerly after hill soaring The Cheviot from the College Valley,, but it just seems to be a continuation of the hill lift. There were no more waves downwind towards the coast. Wave seems to need some more work to become realistic.
To comment on an earlier post, glider pilots are quite legally continuously moving between VMC and IMC and back, as they climb within 1000ft of cloud base etc, and glide down again. EASA was intent on it requiring something like an instrument rating, but the BGA negotiator, Andy Miller, persuaded them that a glider was an aircraft and not an aeroplane, and so they are exempt. The EASA mind is a weird and wonderful thing.
There is no compulsory licence yet, many in the UK continue to fly under the BGA scheme, but in 2 years time, it seems that you will have to have a licence to fly EASA gliders, BREXIT notwithstanding.

[Bre901]

There were no more waves downwind towards the coast. Wave seems to need some more work to become realistic.

In complex mountain ranges like BigPyrenees2, there are clearly more than one wave crest downhill of (a) ridge(s).
It looks like more isolated summits don't generate that kind of waves.

I guess the best way to check that is to increase the airmass saturation in order to create more lenticular clouds.

[Andy1248]

Thanks all for the feedback. I included Lattrig as it is a quick way into the lakes. In real life (someone will no doubt confirm,jy?), that a reverse pulley or reverse Bungy was used for launch at this site. I believe it is mainly a paragliding site. To include it as it on top of a hill, has very minimal flattening, hence the odd tow plane. Aero tow not recommended.

[jy1]

Hi Andy - Just back off holiday so not tested Lattrig yet. In real life we lost access to Lattrig due to DEFRA rules but due to the hard work of one of the team we have operated off the smaller hill, just a bit closer to Skidaw and just as easy to get amongst the other hills and lakes.
We had used winch, Auto Bungee, Static Bungee and were very tempted to try shoulder launches from Lattrig.
The Auto Reverse Pully launching was tested in another expidition site at the end of Bassenthwaite Lake a couple of years ago.
Another regular way into the lakes is launching from Skelling, across the Eaden valley onto the ridge at Pooly Bridge and along Ullswater then its up to you - just watch out for landable fields.
JY

[Andy1248]

I have removed the beta version of North-UK from my Google Drive as the Version 1 has been uploaded to Condor Club.

Anyone wanting to try this scenery should be able to in the near future from CC.

Happy Soaring.

[KipperUK]

I've spent all week tearing my hair out trying to get a North UK heightmap into Condor 2, your timely upload may have saved me throwing my PC, and then myself, out of the window

The scenery looks good - at least from height - well done and thanks for that.... but would it be possible to create a non-photoreal version that has roads/rivers/water/fields/forests using Condor objects and lighting? Perhaps even a thermal map?

I do my real flying from Sutton Bank and found soaring the ridge there with photoreal scenery looks flat and weird given the altitude, when in real life the trees and cliffs really focus the mind! I managed to add a few trees in the terrain editor and it makes ALL the difference (although some are slightly in the wrong place). I have added all of the local turning points and it means replicating real life tasks is now possible.

I'd be happy to help populate a 'clean' version of the terrain with a few objects including the distinctive YGC Clubhouse and some of the other local landmarks.

[Andy1248]

Yes it would be possible to make a scenery without photo textures. This is the method shown in Jbr's Condor 2 scenery guide. The method used for Slovenia scenery. I have not persued this method as I prefer photo sceneries. Therefore if anyone wants to make a synthetic UK scenery then go ahead. My sceneries are a bit rough and ready and do not have a authentic thermal map, I am perhaps a touch lazy in that respect.

Great that you have modded your scenery and enhanced it. Any enhancements like this, including 3d objects can be part of OXO's airfield project. The aim is to make authentic detailed airfields which scenery designers can implement into their sceneries.

Sceneries can always be modded with a patch.

[KipperUK]

What I can't figure out from your scenery is where to put trees, and also doing that for the whole of the area covered would take the rest of my life.

The scenery editor instructions talk about being able to download road/farmland/forest locations straight onto the map using QGIS but I think there might be a source file that you may have, and I don't?

Either that or know what the lat/long bounds are at the corners might help?

[Andy1248]

Using the Condor landscape editor the main image shows what bmp texture tiles have loaded. In my case it is a photo texture image. In synthetic tiles it would a tile created as per Jbr guide. All this data is in a scenery working folder which is removed by the designer before upload as the working folder is very large and not practical or required to run the scenery. Without this tile map, placing objects is near impossible.

The only work round I can think of is to use my scenery, open it in landscape editor and create synthetic tiles just for the area you want. The created objects could then be placed into the original North UK scenery.

In the case of South UK I placed the Lasham photo tiles on my drive to help Paul UK to enhance the site. I could do this for Sutton Bank but not until 2 weeks time.

There may be other options that I do not know about.

[EDB]

You can convert the dds textures to bmp textures and place them in a working\textures folder...