Weight shift and thermal technique

[Simon]

I am mostly writing this to solidify my own understanding of paragliding, and for others to criticize as they please. So to start, here's a sketch did in Illustrator.

From what I have deduced, added weight to one side of the wing alters the profile of that half of the wing. This creates more drag for that side of the wing, without changing the angle of attack, while the other wing counter-actively becomes more aerodynamic and accelerates faster than the loaded wing. The sketch is an exaggeration of a wing profile and a loaded wing profile.

Now here is my thermal technique

This is exaggerated as well and will always change with the weather. It's an illustration of me entering a thermal, finding the high pressure system at the edge of the thermal, doing two 180 degree turns in the core, then dragging out my upwind leg as much as possible. On the upwind leg I increase brake pressure to a little less than minimum sink and gently shift my body side to side. I have always been told to use linked 360's, but haven't been one to abide by that.

See you all at the League meet on Sunday.

[Leeside]

So how was your flight?

[Simon]

Fair question to ask. Here it is,

Took a flight this weekend in Ojai and it was great. This was my second Ojai flight, and I was joined by Mark P (Nitrous), Mark M (Treeman), and Fast Eddie (thank you for being there to retrieve and for the flying tips). Wind was blowing East at 6 gusting to 10, so we launched at Nordhoff Peak. I was the first to launch even though I failed my first attempt. Worked my way out to Front Point, but wasn't taking Eddie's advice and was flying too low and too far from the ridge. (Personally I don't mind using ridge lift and scratching the hell out of Oat Mt because I've watched Nitrous do it multiple times, but i hesitate to do it anywhere else, especially on an East wind day.) I ended up flying out to Bruces, and in the process climbing to 5685'. I stayed there as long as I could waiting for my Sensei, Nitrous, to come out and join Treeman and myself. Unfortunately he did not launch, so Mark and I soared for as long as we could. We stayed above and around Front Point for a while and had our sites set on Nordhoff High School as our LZ, but lacked the altitude and were facing a headwind. We landed on the southside base of some small hills south of the base of Pyramid.

flight time: 0:53:48, max alt: 5685', ascent: 920 ft/min, descent: 950 ft/min

[Ben H]

I have always been told to use linked 360's, but haven't been one to abide by that.

Hey Simon, I think you will soon figure out the continuous 360 method as you start to fly other places with less wind.

I hope we get some action this weekend.

See Ya Dude,
Ben

[trifco]

....
From what I have deduced, added weight to one side of the wing alters the profile of that half of the wing. This creates more drag for that side of the wing, without changing the angle of attack, while the other wing counter-actively becomes more aerodynamic and accelerates faster than the loaded wing. The sketch is an exaggeration of a wing profile and a loaded wing profile....

Simon, I believe that your conclusion is inaccurate . The weight shifting does not "alter the profile" (airfoil cross section geometry), but the overall airfoil symmetry. Weight shift actually does two things at the same time - it shifts the center of gravity and creates "imbalance" in resulting lift vector of an airfoil (parallelogram anyone?). I think you can conclude in which way my illustration will start to turn .

Sincerely,
Trifco

[Simon]

I can go along with that, thank you trifco.

Here's another thermalling illustration

It's a variation of the last drawing. Thermalling like this gained me about 1000' when i was only a couple 100' over Bruces Point. I may have completed three 360 degree turns, dragging out the upwind legs.