Soaring Club of Tasmania
There is Gliding
and Soaring
in
Tasmania
Woodbury, (near Tunbridge)
Tasmania (Where's that??)
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Soaring Club of Tasmania |
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There is Gliding and Soaring in Tasmania |
Woodbury, (near Tunbridge)Tasmania (Where's that??) |
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You are Visitor Number :
Please visit out Photo
Library
How do you get there?
Coming from Hobart (going North)
Take the Midlands Highway (highway 1), go through Pontville, Bagdad, past Oatlands, and across St Peters Pass. As you come out of St Peters Pass, you will come onto the Northern Midlands plains, a large flat bottomed valley between ranges of hills. A couple of kilometres on, you will see the roadsign directing you to the right for the gliding club. Turn off to the right.
Coming from Launceston (going South)
Take the Midlands Highway (highway 1), go through Perth, Campbelltown, past Ross, and past Tunbridge. A couple of kilometres past Tunbridge, you will see the roadsign directing you to the left for the gliding club. Turn off to the left.
Once off the main road
Turn off the main highway, cross the railway line. LOOK OUT FOR TRAINS.
They are fairly infrequent, but the line is active.
After crossing the railway line, follow the signs. You turn right after crossing the railway line, then left a short distance on near a recently renovated weatherboard house. Proceed along this road (bitumen). The road changes to gravel, then about a kilometre or so on at the property "Ratharney", you will see the sign on a gate on the left hand side directing you to the airfield.
Follow the track. It's pretty rough. Take particular care if it has been wet as the track can be extremely slippery. There are two more gates to go through before you come to the airfield. If gates are already open, you can leave them open. If you have to open a gate to go through, you MUST shut it. If the farmers sheep get into the wrong paddocks we'll be extremely unpopular.
By Air, the coordinates are: 42° 11' S 147° 28' E
We have 10 instructors, comprising one level 3, 6 level 2's, and 3 level 1's.
| President
Southern Contact |
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| Vice President |
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| Secretary |
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| Treasurer |
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03 62 388 607 |
| C.F.I.
Northern contact |
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| Airworthiness Officer
North West Contact |
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| Publicity/WWW
Southern Contact |
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If you wish to come along and be certain that someone is going to be there, please contact one of the people listed in the contact details to ensure that someone will be there.
Members usually arrive about 9.00 to 10.00 am on a flying day, and flying
will usually go on till about a half hour before last light. If you are
visiting from interstate and on a tight schedule, please let us know when
you might be coming so that we can do our best to ensure that you get a
flight.
(see "Contact Details" below)
The winch is mounted on the back of an old truck, has two drums and has more than adequate power for our operations. In a moderate breeze, launches would usually be to a height of about 1500 feet and sometimes higher. Due to restrictions of length, winch operations are only possible on the North strip and the South West strip.
Aero tow (when available) is with a 235 hp Maule M5.
Gliders| QTY. | GLIDER TYPE | SEATS | REGISTRATION | MANUFACTURER |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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BLANIK L13 |
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GUT | LET (Czechoslovakia) |
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IS28 |
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IIA | Brasov (Rumania) |
In addition, there are several privately owned gliders - Ka6, Pik20B, Club Libelle, Astir CS. However, these are not available for general club use.
Unfortunately due to the irrigation requirements of the land owner, we lost the long North/South and South West/North East strips in 1999. Since then, we have created a new winch launching strip which runs North West/South East.
PLEASE NOTE: The main North West/South East strip has a removable fence and a gully across the middle of it. THIS STRIP IS NOT CONSIDERED SUITABLE OVER ITS FULL LENGTH FOR POWER AIRCRAFT EVEN IF THE FENCE IS NOT UP. Visiting power aircraft may use either end of it on each side of the gully provided that the shorter lengths are within the peroformance requirements of their aircraft.
There is a hangar in which six or seven gliders and a towplane can be
stacked (carefully)!
Attached to the hangar is a club house which has a toilet, kitchen area with sink and gas stove, and a wood heater. Water supply is limited (tanks only). There is some lighting (battery powered), but no maind electricity supply.
Rudimentary accommodation is usually available in shearers quarters on the property (except when being used by shearers).
| Member (adult) | $120 + GFA Membership ($147) |
| Member (Family, Student, Junior) | $60 + GFA Membership ($90) |
| Associate Member (Non-Flying) | $15 |
| Joining Fee | $50 (includes log books, training manuals |
| Winch Launch | $12 |
| Aero tow Launch | $20 to 1000 ft, plus $1 per 100 ft thereafter.
(includes club charge of $2) |
| Private Glider Facilities Fee/Launch | $5 |
| Glider, Dual seat,
with or without Instruction |
60 cents per minute minimum charge 10 minutes |
| Trial Instruction Flight,
Winch Launch |
$35
includes $5 GFA Introductory Membership |
| Trial Instruction Flight,
Aero Tow |
$60
includes $5 GFA Introductory Membership |
| Club House /Hangar (Weekends only) | +61 (0)3 6255 2191 |
| Phone (Graeme Martin) | +61 (0)3 6223 7615 |
| Phone (Richard Doyle) | +61 (0)3 6225 2561 |
Graeme Martin : [email protected]
We welcome new members. If you would like to join,
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to Top of PageDespite the reputation that we have for "bad weather", we have surprisingly good conditions throughout much of the year, particularly for local flying or short cross countries. Although the west coast of Tasmania is very wet, the east coast and some parts of the midlands are quite dry, including the area around the gliding field at Woodbury.
Even though local flying conditions may be quite good, long cross countries are very difficult to achieve due to the variability of terrain and weather (even on good days). The longest cross country that I know of that has been done in Tasmania is about 240K by John Welch (now of Beverly S.C, WA) from Woodbury to Oatlands, Avoca and return to Woodbury. Due to the strong possibility of running into varying weather conditions and the often almost unlandable terrain, a cross country pilot in Tasmania needs to be substantially more skilled than what is normally required in the "flatlands" on the larger island to our north!
The current gliding site at Woodbury is situated close to a ridge which works well in northerly wind conditions, and has frequent wave conditions in North and South Westerlys (the predominant winds, especially in the winter). Unfortunately the wave can seldom be reached from a winch launch, so not many wave flights have been made in recent years (since regular aero tow has not been available).
Other sites where gliding has been conducted in recent times are at
Bothwell (at the southern edge of the Central Highlands) and Sandfly (in
the lee of Mount Wellington, near Hobart), and camps at Caveside (near
Mole Creek in Northern Tas).
Gliding facilities are still present at Bothwell, (a winch, a Blanik and a hangar). Although the club is in abeyance at the moment, there are plans to initiate some gliding activity there again from time to time using the glider that is still there, and perhaps others if anybody wants to bring them. Bothwell is an excellent wave site, particularly through latter part of the winter. I have actually winched into wave at Bothwell (although this is very unusual). Many good wave flights have been done from there, with a few flights to over 20,000 feet west of the Derwent Valley, easily accessible from Bothwell. In a westerly, the tertiary wave from the mountains on the west of the Derwent Valley is just a few miles west of Bothwell, usually requiring a tow to about 4000-5000 feet. From you there can hop from wave to wave until you pick up the primary over the Derwent Valley. Wave action between 4000 ft and about 12000 feet is reasonably common, and higher amplitude waves occur from time to time.
The Bothwell area has a control area lower limit of 6500 feet, but this changes to fully uncontrolled airspace west of the Derwent Valley which is only about 25K away. It is indeed fortunate that this coincides with some of the best wave flying areas in the state.
The strip is 650M (very short for glider operations) and can only be used with a powerful tug. It is in terrible country for outlanding with very few large paddocks (shall we say none! - only small ones), and lots of bush, trees and hills, and EXTREMELY rough conditions when the wind is blowing strongly from certain directions. Only highly skilled glider pilots should attempt to fly gliders from there. That being said, it is in a magnificent area for wave and scenery!
Sandfly has an advantage in being in uncontrolled airspace, so
high altitude flights (up to 20,000) can be done without any approvals
required from air traffic control authorities.
Controlled airspace extends upwards from 6500 feet, but this is not
often a problem. To the west and east the limit is higher and these areas
can be reached if conditions are good.
When good thermal conditions occur, there will usually be a sea breeze
by mid to late afternoon. However, this does not always spell the end of
soaring for the day. The Woodbury gliding site is not too far from the
centre of where sea breezes from north/west and south/east meet up which
leads to a powerful and often long lasting "sea breeze front". This can
extend in a line for over 50 Kms on some occasions and last for two or
three hours providing a reliable and constant source of lift at around
400 to 600 feet per minute. It's great fun to soar this. On a couple of
occasions I have (in a Blanik) gone 30 or 40 Kms out and then back at a
speed from 70 to 90 knots without circling. A higher performance machine
could get along at top speed. These conditions would occur a quite few
times a year during summer, (but not always on weekend gliding days).
This is not often the "big wave" with an amplitude of many thousands of feet, but even in marginal wave conditions will usually be sufficient to allow you to work it in a height band of around 4000 to over 6000 feet. Depending on the wind direction that is causing the wave and the associated cloud, it is sometimes possible to fly right along the tiers up to Millers Bluff.
Secondary and tertiary waves also occur, sometimes almost right over the field. In a North Westerly, there is often a "bounce" generated by the small hill just to the North West of Tunbridge
There is also often strong wave over the central highlands plateau in North Westerly and South Westerly conditions, but this has seldom if ever been worked by gliders from Woodbury as far as I know. When flying from Bothwell, we have on occasions used this wave and I have encountered it a number of times whilst flying through the area in a powered aircraft. One of the problems from Woodbury is that it is difficult to get high enough to get into wave over the plateau without first breaching the 6500 ft control area limit, bearing in mind that for several Kms you have a ground height of 3500 to 4000 ft AMSL in totally unlandable places leaving only 2500 to 3000 above the ground in order to remain clear of controlled airspace. This is not usually sufficient to be able to safely jump to the adjacent wave. Once over the plateau proper, the lower control area level is 12500 which leaves more than adequate clearance above the ground for you to fly to within range of Bothwell or other landable areas. There are a few crop duster strips on the plateau, but they can't be relied upon as they are not maintained well, and may have stock and who knows what else on them. (One of the paddocks near to one of these strips has a sign tacked to a tree. It says, and I quote: "A good man can cross this paddock in 30 seconds. Our bull can do it in 10". Watchout mate!).
Unfortunately, the Soaring Club lost its tug 3 years ago and decided to switch to winching so that opportunities for wave flying there are now fairly limited.
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Tassie has some kind of wave activity going on somewhere more often than not. I live at Mount Nelson near Hobart and often walk just up the road to the signal station where there is a good view of Hobart, Mt Wellington and surrounding hills. Except when it is calm or nearly calm, there nearly always appears to be some kind of wave action visible in one direction or another. Sometimes this can be quite spectacular with the classic large lenticular clouds indicating wave to 25000 feet plus. These can be observed in the North East, South East and sometimes the South West depending on the wind direction. However much of the time, the wave is not of the highly spectacular variety, but shows lines of clouds which look more like cloud streets which are lying across the wind. These are sometimes as low as about 4000 feet, though often higher maybe around 5000 to 7000 (judging from the height of Mt Wellington). Associated roll clouds are often visible underneath at levels well below the height of the mountain.
The lee of Mt Wellington is pretty deadly in a strong wind, attested to by many power pilots who have ventured into the area in windy conditions, and the associated wave can be very strong indeed. I have been in this area in my Maule M5 going up at 1500 feet a minute with the engine at idle.
Other areas can show similar very strong wave action. Many years ago, I had a half share in a Cessna 180. On one day when wave was apparent, my partner in the 180 and I took off from Bothwell and climbed out to the wave which was over the Derwent Valley. We established ourselves in the wave at about 7000 feet and were climbing so well that we decided to switch the engine off and see how it went. This we did (it took quite a bit of doing to get the prop stopped, but we managed it by flying right on the stall in a nose high attitude for about a minute until the prop finally came to rest). We proceeded to fly up and down the wave at about 50 knots with one notch of flap set, just a few knots above stall. On the straight we slowly climbed, averaging around 100 ft per minute. On the turns to come back we would lose a bit and then start climbing slowly again as we moved along the wave front. We did this for an hour and 17 minutes (we timed it) and gained about 1300 feet before the lift weakened to where we could only maintain height. We could have gone on longer but decided to call it a day. Now a C180 with 2 up and about 2/3 fuel weighs over 2000 lbs and has a lot less wing area and one helluva lot more drag than say a Blanik. That gives you an idea of how strong the wave can be! As a matter of interest, we decide to do an air start of the engine. It took over 3000 feet of height and quite a high speed to get the prop turning again (don't worry, we had our landing position all picked out, and a finger hovering over the starter button).
There are many other stories that have been told. When I first came to Tassie, one of the old timer pilots told me a story of someone in a Chipmunk going up to 24000 feet in the lee of Ben Lomond. He switched the engine off and still couldn't get down for quite some time. Associated with these strong updraughts are often very strong downdraughts. A friend of mine has a small Grumman and tells the tale of being caught in a down draught in the Coal River valley and dropping from 3000 feet or so to within 200 feet or so above the ground within a time frame of what seemed to be only a few seconds. The aircraft suffered some structural damage and the incident frightened the living daylights out of him. What goes up must come down!
Most of these tales are from power pilots. Why? Very few glider pilots have put the time and resources into trying to explore these wave systems. It takes time, good equipment, quite a few dollars and a bit of nerve to have a go. For myself, I think I would prefer a motor glider before I go charging out too far from civilisation under strenuous conditions and over some of the most inhospitable and unlandable terrain in Australia. Mac Forster (mentioned above, Sandfly ) was one who explored the wave in the Southern Tasmania region and had many long and interesting flights in his Pik20B. He basically devoted several years of his life to this and had quite a few tales of his own to tell. Another time!
One day I'll get that motor glider and go exploring. Well, it's a dream, or maybe a goal!
Australian Soaring Page.
A privately maintained page with a great deal of useful information, including
up to date Australian competition results.
Links to general aviation sites.
Tourism Tasmania Much information on holiday activities in Tasmania.
This page is hosted by www.fortunecity.com
where youcan get up to 20Mb of free space for your pages
Comments on, suggestions for, and criticism of this
page should be addressed to the author Graeme
Martin by email.
Assistance with the original arrangement of
this web page by John Giddy (Mangalore
G.C) from whom I copied the original html file is gratefully acknowledged.
