Oz Report

Tin Cup, should readers financially support the Oz Report?

How do we support our community? (LA, CA, USA)

Tell us what you think.  Is the Oz Report in its twelfth year an important part of the international hang gilding community?  Does it deserve support?  Are we doing the right things to make it worthy of support?

You can send $20 or more for a yearly subscription/donation.  To pay for your subscription with your credit card or PayPal account:

If you’d rather just send a check for $20 (US Dollars, only please) or more, please feel free to do so.  The mail gets forwarded to me wherever I’m at.

Payable to:

Davis Straub (Not to the Oz Report)
PMB 1889 PO Box 2430
Pensacola, FL 32513

These are our supporters (if you are not on the list and have donated to the Oz Report, email me and I'll make sure that you are recognized): http://ozreport.com/supporters.php.  Some of you who I've missed in the past did write to me and made sure I knew just how important the Oz Report was to them.  If I've missed you, please do tell me.

Discuss Tin Cup at the Oz Report forum   link»

Oz Report automatic recurring monthly/yearly subscription/donation

A reader wanted to pay $6.30 a month automatically

Michael Bradford wrote to us and said that he wanted to automatically contribute $6.30 a month to the Oz Report, taking a little bit out of his PayPal account each month, sort of bite size morsels.  That would be a contribution of $75.60 a year to the Oz Report.

We worked with Michael and he helped us create the first iteration of an automatically recurring monthly subscription/donation button that would allow us to easily take subscriptions/donations from Oz Report readers who wanted to donate a small amount automatically on a monthly basis.  Scare then updated our "Support Us" web page to allow for much more flexibility than that offered by the buttons that the PayPal site produces.

Looking into this issue of recurring monthly or yearly automatic subscriptions/donations, I realized I needed a way for regular Oz Report subscribers to easily cancel their recurring automatic subscriptions (you can always just do it by logging into your PayPal account) with one button and Scare created an Unsubscribe button (which just allows you to cancel any of your recurring subscriptions).

So come over to the Oz Report support web page and sign up to support us: http://ozreport.com/support.php.  Or click here:

Discuss Monthly/yearly at the Oz Report forum   link»

Dalby Aerotowing Club

So what other club has an aerotow operation? (Dalby Airport, QLD, Australia)

http://www.hgfa.asn.au/~dhgc/

The Dalby Hang Gliding Club is an aerotow based hang gliding club.  It is the only "real" aerotow club that I know one of.  The club has a hangar at the Dalby Aerodrome.  It was given the use of the hangar free for a few years but now pays a nominal fee.  This was provided by the local council in order to encourage use of the air strip.

The members expanded the hangar and enclosed the rest of it to double their space.  There are two Moyes-Bailey Dragonflies in the hangar as well as a motorized Swift, and hang gliders.

One of the Dragonflies belong to the club.  The club is dependant on the fact that Blaino, Bruce and Smokey like to tow up hang glider pilots.  I guess that they could all get Mosquitoes if they needed to (but then there would be no need to go out to the airport).

Most of the pilots live a couple or three hours away on the Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast or in Brisbane (where there is good mountain flying not too far away at Canungra and Beechmont).  But the weather is better on the western side of the Great Dividing Range.

Other aerotow "clubs" like say the Draachen Fliegen Soaring Club, Inc.  (http://members.aol.com/dfscinc/index.htm) are really the invention of the owners of the flight parks (http://members.aol.com/cloud9sa/).  Clubs like the Draagenfliegers are created as a way to stay within FAA rules, but aren't clubs in the sense that the Dalby Hang Gliding Club is a self governing vehicle and the members really do have the final say in all matters.

I would imagine that it would be tough to have a club that actually owned the Dragonflies and it is amazing that the Dalby Hang Gliding Club owns one.  This is what Jason Reid <jasonr>, the current president, had to say about the history of the club:

Obviously the sailplane guys were out there on the Darling Downs for many years before hang gliders ever flew in the area.  I started flying sailplanes 25 years ago.  Some Canungra and Sunshine Coast pilots started car towing hang gliders out in the Dalby area 20 years ago, then Phil Pritchard and others with the help of Moyes help a couple of comps in the 90’s at Dalby airport.

About the same time I started heading out to the Darling Downs Gliding Club where Smokey and Shane McCaffrey (the gliding club airfield is called “McCaffrey’s field.  Shane did fly on the Oz team, a very handy pilot) would tow me up and laugh like hell about the poor performance I had in the old XT.  Anyway, after many years of taking mates out to car tow Smokey, Tex and I sat down over a beer and planned the formation of an aero tow club.

We started looking for a cheap trike and during the search we were told of this guy named Flocky who was a commercial pilot and that he had a Dragonfly without a home (he had just moved up from Sydney).  His partner in the Dragonfly was Kieran Brown at the time and they both jumped at the chance to hangar their tug in Dalby.

Smokey and I lobbied the local aerodrome board and were successful in securing the hangar.  We now occupy free of rent for the first five years providing we enclosed it ourselves.  We begged, borrowed, and scraped the materials together and by the time we were ready to do the work we had 10-12 very handy members willing to pitch in and help.  It was a tight crew with Flocky (very handy man in all respects), Rowdy (Paul Allen, roofer by trade), Boof (Daron Hodder, very generous with money) and a bunch of very motivated pilots.  We managed to enclose the hangar, doors and all, in only two weekends,  the Dragonfly was home!

Flocky and Kiero were not keen on having anyone else use their aircraft initially, so they split the towing between them, later on they worked out a deal to allow Smokey to start towing and then sold the tug to the club (high price, but generous offer to be paid off over three years).

Unfortunately (so often happens in clubs), personality clashes and factions happened, but those that have remained have had the last laugh with superb flying and great friendships.

Bruce and Annie joined us a couple of years ago and decided to back up the club’s tug with one of their own, they introduced Blaino who is now the reason the green tug is going so well,  so that’s it really, seven or eight years of history.

Like I said, difficult for a club to do this.

Discuss Dalby at the Oz Report forum   link»

Moyes in Germany and Austria

Skyline is the Moyes hang glider representative in Germany and Austria (Skyline, Germany)

http://www.skyline-flightgear.com/

No price list.

Discuss Moyes at the Oz Report forum   link»

Gliders in France

Xavier Vergès (La Terrasse, France)

http://www.ulteam-vol-libre.com/ulteam-ailes-Moyes-vol-libre.htm

Moyes RS - 7500 € TTC or $11,550.  (I assume that this includes the VAT, $9829 without VAT at 17.5%.)

http://www.ulteam-vol-libre.com/ulteam-ailes-airborne-vol-libre.htm

Airborne C4 - 7500 € TTC or $11,550.

http://www.ulteam-vol-libre.com/ulteam-ailes-icaro-2000-vol-libre.htm

Icaro Z9 - 7280 € TTC (This is the same price for the "basic" Z9 as on the Icaro web site, including VAT.)

http://www.ulteam-vol-libre.com/ulteam-ailes-aeros-vol-libre.htm

Aeros Combat L - 6390 € TTC ($8375 without VAT)

No word about the options if any included in these prices, but I assume that these are all for the basic model.  Notice how different they are from US prices, where the Z9 is much more expensive than the gliders from Australia and the Ukraine.  Combats are popular with the French national team as are Litespeeds.

The US price for the basic Aeros Combat L is $7101.  The Moyes RS, $6995.  The Airborne C4, $7288.

Again, tell me why the Euro is worth so much?  It sure isn't in term of Moyes RS gliders.  Here is it worth about $1.10, not $1.54.  In terms of Aeros gliders, it is $1.31.

Discuss Gliders in France at the Oz Report forum   link»

Easter Flying in Manilla, NSW, Australia

285 km triangle. (Kaputar, NSW, Australia) (Mt Borah, Upper Manilla, NSW, Australia)

Scott Barrett writes:

The four day Easter weekend was fun, with fifteen hang glider and seventy paraglider pilots at Manilla.  We had good flying every day.  I got the last of my photo collection of "mountain missions" from this season, going over Kaputar on Sunday.  Then I went back over it again on the way around a 285km triangle.

Discuss Easter at the Oz Report forum   link»

Hang gliding images

(This topic is in: Apr.1 Mar.20'05 )

In leaded glass

Cameron Tunbridge <cameron.tunbridge> writes:

Authentic hand crafted glasswork and led light, all custom made from photos, own colors and scenic background.  Hang gliders and paragliders.  Feature mirrors and lighting.  Contact <cameron.tunbridge>

Discuss Images at the Oz Report forum   link»

Tandem flying at Mt. Tamalpais

Above the shore (Mt. Tam, California)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93OOcjy8v14

Thanks to Teddy Mack.

Discuss Mt.  Tam at the Oz Report forum   link»

Video contest

(This topic is in: Apr.1 Oct.22'02 )

Check out and vote for the video (Lookout Mountain Launch, Georgia, USA)

Lucas Ridley <lucasridley> writes:

Thanks for posting my last video I sent, it got a lot of great responses.  You mentioned you thought it might be Ellenville, but its actually LMFP, that's where I live.

I've got another one for you.  I have made the top 20 finalist in a Youtube contest to win $25,000 and it features a HG clip at the end - more good exposure for HG, especially if I win, it would be used in web ads.  Here's the deal:

Go to www.youtube.com/schick and click on Vote then find my video called "Get the Schick and Get Experimental" by 'alta8bird.' Click the thumb's up icon to vote.  Where this would really help is that people can vote once EVERY day and voting ends April 8th!

Discuss Contest at the Oz Report forum   link»