Technical Inspection

Today I will try to put the glider through the technical inspection process.  Our Canadian compatriot, Art Grant, from Winnipeg is on the inspection team.  The inspection is used to confirm that the glider conforms to the Class specification, so wing span will be measured and all-up weight with full water ballast and pilot will be measured.  The glider will also be inspected for instrumentation to verify no cloud flying instruments. 

They will also measure a tow-out weight with the glider full of water, with tail dolly and wing dolly in place and the tow bar attached to the car. This is done so that each day every glider can be quickly weighed enroute to the grid.  The car drives over (straddles) the scale and places the glider main wheel on the scale and the tow-out weight is checked to ensure it does not exceed the weight measured in this configuration during the technical inspection.  Using this system allows each glider to be weighed in about 20 seconds.

The weather looks OK for the next few days, so I should also be able to get in some practise flights.

 

Dave

The Team is now fully assembled

We connected with Willem Langelaan and his crew Diane and Pim today.

Jerzy and Maria arrived later in the evening.

Tomorrow, at the 10 am briefing, the Canadian Team will be present in full strength for the first time. We still need to place Jerzy's and Willem's gliders in their assigned positions. The parking positions are sorted alphabetically, which puts us between our colleagues from the Americas, Brasil and Chile.

Getting ready

Dave preparing his glider for the competition.
Part of our preparation is also to load airspace files and turnpoints into the on-board computers. A concern is the very complex airspace north of Szeged around Budapest. Fortunately, Serbia and Romania have opened part of their airspace for the Worlds, so meaningful tasks can be set to the SW and SE

Glider Preparations

After our arrival in Szeged today, I spent the afternoon working on the glider.  It now has the PDA mount installed and wired, an altimeter in feet (can't fly in meters - its just wierd) and Canadian Flags stuck on the tail.  Next on the list of things to do are:

setup the LX7000 preferences to my liking
upload the airspace, turnpoint and airport databases
setup the cockpit seating,
prepare maps
prepare a chart for flap speed changes, and
GO FLYING.

 

Dave

Arrived in Szeged

After 800km on the Autobahn from Germany, across Austria with an overnight stop there and deep into Hungary, we arrived in Szeged today at 1:30p. The VW Van Dave rented through a Schleicher connection performed flawlessly, burning an average of 7.8 liters diesel per 100 km.
Our first stop was the airport where we got a warm reception and met members of the US and South African teams. We dropped the glider off and had lunch before proceeding to Hotel Bella in town.

It is hot here, so it comes as a welcome relief that the a/c in the hotel is working.