I thought I’d add something of my experiences to this discussion, having moved into gliding from the powered world twice.
The first time (30 years ago) was after a couple of hundred hours power. It was fairly straightforward to fly the glider (went solo in fewer than 20 launches) but I didn’t do much more than some basic soaring and one 50km cross country.
I came back just over two years ago, wanting to do get into cross country, and having given up power a few years ago after the need to do it on business dried up. I’d stopped being excited about just going flying. Learning to fly cross country in a glider has been a blast. It is a real challenge, can be very frustrating, but can also be extremely rewarding. So far this season (third year in), I’ve done nine cross country flights covering about 1,700km (plus lots of miscellaneous other flying), and I’m still learning huge amounts.
My sense is each gliding club operates somewhat differently. I fly at Cambridge Gliding Centre, which is one of the larger clubs, and which operates seven days a week in the summer (five in the winter).
Some observations about the transition from power to gliding, based on what I’ve seen at Cambridge:
Gliding
is more time consuming. Cambridge has bookable training slots which are a big improvement on the list system I saw first time around. That means you can book an aircraft and instructor (2:1 pupil/student ratio) giving a good chance of doing a decent amount of flying in the half or full day slot. But it’s not turn up for a couple of hours and fly. Once solo, Cambridge also has a bookable single seater scheme (by the day), so again you can guarantee aircraft availability (and as Chris said, serious cross country pilots tend to take most or all of the day). Additionally, there are a lot more tasks to do, and there are rotas to be on to take your share. I’m a tug pilot and Basic Instructor too – so I get to fly on both mine – but it might be driving the winch, or running the launch point.
Gliding is more weather dependent. Learning isn’t too bad – you can do that pretty much any time of year. But good soaring days are not as frequent as they might be – so the serious arrange their diaries around the flying, not the other way around.
It’s also more uncertain. It’s entirely possible to end up in a field somewhere around the task, and get back somewhat later than you expected by road. (Clearly you understand this before you set off – if it’s a problem, you can always soar locally).
I
think Gliding is more sociable – that’s pretty much forced by the need to have lots of people working together to operate at all. Which is not to say that power clubs can’t be sociable – just that there’s less of a driver to do so. Against that, I have heard of gliding clubs that come across as cliquey.
The basics of the flying are pretty much the same. If you can fly power you can fly a glider. But there are some big differences after that.
- There’s much less procedure. Very few checks involved, circuits by visual judgement rather than the numbers, fly speed but not heading or height. No local ATC. You can end up landing at the same time as several other aircraft, and have to sort it out between you.
- There’s much more emphasis on handling. Flying cross country you’ll be switching from thermalling at up to 45 degrees of bank, a few knots above the stall, to flying between thermals at twice that speed. If the thermal is rough you might regularly be dealing with insipient spins.
- Flights are often much shorter than power, often much longer. A flight from a winch launch can be five minutes. On a good day, cross country flights can easily be four to six hours.
- Glider pilots are good at lookout. Two reasons for this – first there's that big canopy. Secondly, whilst power pilots tend to try and stay away from each other, glider pilots do the opposite. If you’re in a thermal with six other gliders all going around the same circle within a few hundred feet vertically, you don’t look in much! And between thermals we’re probably trying to use the same (small) piece of sky as everyone else – maybe going in all directions (quadrantal rules don’t work for gliders).
- Understanding what the air is doing becomes your way of staying airborne, rather than a slight bump that you can avoid by flying a bit higher. I don’t think you really stop learning about this – it’s really interesting to see how good the good guys are, and how much better than the rest of us. Learning a lot about met pays off.
- Gliding can be (for those who want it) more competitive than power. Clubs run competitions (essentially handicapped racing), and many people put their everyday flights up on the BGA Ladder (worth a look at Daily Scores) which is a sort of informal competition. That gives a really good feel of how other people got on compared with you on any given day. [Flying tasks usually involves deciding where you’re going to go before you get airborne, then doing it. The aim is to get the best from the day]. Cambridge is a very cross country orientated club, and a lot of the discussion is about where you’re planning to go, and later, where you got to.
All in all, it's a very different experience from pure powered flying - and one well worth doing.
I think Chris has the costs about right. A budget of a couple of £K gets you a serious amount of flying - whether owning your own or using club aircraft.
Paul