poz

On the other hand another back specialist said my back problems only showed up as a result of a routine scan to check a slipped disc and that lots of people have similar problems but dont know it.

Absolutely!!!

The last thing you should do with a bad back is less movement, because then the muscles that support the spine start to atrophies (waste away) and the problems get worse and as a result encourage more inactivity. It's a nasty downward spiral.

As a sports therapist with a big interest in backs for over 25 years, my advice, (in a nut shell):

Walking is the one activity you need to be able to do, pain free, for the rest of your life. So practice it EVERYDAY. Preferably up and down hills.

Running is for fools. Name an animal in the wild that would run for 26 miles of it's own accord. Animals walk long distances and sprint short distances.

Morning is your most vulnerable time. Your back (muscles and joints) is unlubricted, cold, unresponsive and decompressed. Perfect for injury, especially spasm related.

Therefore in the morning, get in the habit of a piss followed IMMEDIATELY by a very hot shower, then a simple 5 minute stretching routine (lying down a on a carpet). This before ANYTHING else.

Computers (aka back killers). Get a kitchen timer on your desk, set it to 15-20 minutes. Walk around or stretch for 2 minutes.

Giving up PPG flying isn't necessaraly necessary, if you learn to manage your back issues.

I can definitely recommend this book:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sarah-Keys-Back-Sufferers-Bible/dp/0091814944/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1278360027&sr=8-4

If I can help you anymore pm me.

Cheers

Dan

You spotted the cloud with no name AKA Asperatus clouds:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1189877/The-cloud-Meteorologists-campaign-classify-unique-Asperatus-clouds-seen-world.html

Dan

I think I'll have a go at making one of these:

http://www.aerocorsair.com/id47.htm

Dan

My childhood dream just took a great leap forward towards reality....

http://www.gizmag.com/terrafugia-transition-flying-car/15584/?utm_source=Gizmag+Subscribers&utm_campaign=7adab72b9d-UA-2235360-4&utm_medium=email

Can you imagine the day the CAA allows this on our roads...hmmmm

Maybe 10 years away, but then the flood gates should open and the price should drop.

Dan

I just want to say thank you all so much for helping to make me feel something like I'd hoped to feel after my first flight

I love this time of year for flying in the evenings low over the crops smelling the corn in buoyant conditions, lots of large cut fields with golden bales of hay. Watching the cricket teams playing in the English rural setting from our vantage point in the sky, as the train meanders down the valley following the stream. Looking down at the church with its ancient spire and grave stones wondering why a church was built in such a rural remote location. Flying the cliffs gaining advantage from the slight ridge lift the sea breeze produces allowing the motor to purrrr along nicely. Watching the kestrels dive away from their stationary hover as you approach. The sea gulls with thousands of years evolutionary advantage over you making you feel clumsy for a moment as they effortlessly soar the ridges. Flying for home over the towns and villages looking into peoples gardens wondering what stories are happening in the lives of those people below. Driving home after this amazing flight feeling so relaxed in the knowledge that you have experienced something only a few people have. And the wife just doesn’t understand what its all about.

Whitters...true aviation poetry. As I was reading your words, I could feel my heart rate dropping and blood pressure decreasing. Wonderful!

Dan

Ahh Ive just seen your other post (lost bottle).....if its a carbon prop fitted to your machine Mr Pap is telling you a Porky Pie.......I know of another that did this ....and the prop fitted to my new pap

(shall we say ) it must have been made on a Friday afternoon at 5-55pm......Ive had to do a repair job on it to stop it delaminating...so I can keep flying.....(wooden one on order for a replacement)

Hi Gary.

I've posted a couple of pics of the prop in an album called, funnily enough, 'Broken Prop' (Gallery, 2nd page in, at the bottom). I'm not sure how to get the pics from there onto this post. (if anyone can do it, please go ahead).

It looks like a stike of some kind, but how does it compare to your damage? I have a wooden prop fitted now.

Dan

Yesterday evening I went to practice some ground handling and to run-in my engine on my own at a field near to where I live. This field is far from ideal, in that it's pretty rough, hard ground, with long grass and lots of weeds, shrubs, and rocks strewn around, but it's about as good as it gets around here and I haven't enough experience to fly from the soft sandy beaches yet.

I had been up there a couple of days before with the strimmer and secateurs and did my best to prepare a launch area.

Things went really well. The wing was popping up nicely, the engine was running very smoothly, there was a nice 4knt wind and I thought ...why not.

So, I set up, did all my checks, decided to go for a forward launch and just went for it.

The wing came up overhead nice and square, full throttle, run run run, just lifting off.....BANG...JUDDER, Ohhh shit! but too late, I'm airbourne with paramotor that is trying to shake itself and me apart. If I had really been on the ball and had some mental capacity to spare, I could have landed straight ahead, but the land is really rough, and to be honest I didn't know what was happening until I was to high to land ahead.

So, I'm now up at about 300 ft with so much vibration that I can't see straight. I've decided to do a circuit and try to land.

This is awful, disorientating and pretty frightening

It's my first flight since training 8 months ago, having had a total of 8 short flights on my course. I'm on a very different machine and a smaller wing which seems to be travelling very fast. As I turn onto final approach I realise that this piece of land is a fraction of the size of my training field, so I've got to do a pretty good job of spot landing. I cut the throttle and plummeted at what felt like a tremendous speed. My nice friendly breeze had gone and it was all happening too quickly for me, so I decided to go around and try again...and again....and again.

On the fifth attempt I managed to land on my feet although really shuck up, both physically and mentally.

When I inspected my prop I found massive damage, but to one side only. (I just tried to post a couple of pics, but not sure how)

The tips are intact, so there was definitely no ground strike. I can only assume that I kicked up a stone just as I took off. You can imagine the vibration.

I feel very sad that this was my first experience of flying on my own not to mention the knock to my confidence.

So, I'm wondering that if I had had someone with me, would it have made any difference, apart from a good YouTube vid? Probably not because I was airbourne when the problem occurred.

I spoke to Pierre Aubert (PAP) tonight. He said he'd never seen damage like that to just one side of a prop and agreed that it probably was a stone, then he relieved me of €165 for another prop . But one of the guys at the factory is coming with me tomorrow evening and hopefully I will be able to report something a little more positive.

There really isn't much that's worse than being in the air wishing you were on the ground.

Dan

Go friendly, but don't go on your own

Also, I would be tempted to covertly video or record the conversation. If he starts talking guns or gun related threats, at least it won't be just your word against his and you'll have something to go to the police with.

Remember, at the moment he needs to be considered hostile until he proves otherwise.

Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

Dan

Hi

Question for you GoPro HD owners.

Just ordered mine and have been looking for a suitable SD card to go with it.

I gather there have been a few issues with compatability.

Just wondering what you use and whether you rate it. Do I need to buy a really high spec card and if the battery only lasts a couple of hours, is it worth me getting anything bigger than 8gb?

Cheers

Dan

As an aside, a very good crop circle

So, gun incident aside.....what's the script with these crop circles? Who's making them, and how do they do it so quietly

How far from Alex are you, could you drive down there for a day?

Tom, I would love to take my kit over to Alex's for the day, except it's 1300km away!

My local school is closed until August, so it's just me, my PAP and my Revo

I agree with the general concensus, to have faith in my training, do my checks, make sure the wing is squarely above me and, as Ian put it JFDI!

Thanks for the support guys, it really helps.

Dan

it was definitely an irate adult and he definitely pointed the gun at me and gestured for me to leave

Bignos, if it really occurred exactly how you described it above, ie irate adult, gesturing you to leave, then we shouldn't even be debating this matter, you should have reported the incident to the police and the CAA immediately on landing.

The reason? Well apart from the obvious, who will he point his gun at next, someone else who, in his distorted opinion, deserves to have a gun pointed at him.

Dan

Brilliant! Thanks Pete.

As I'm reading your post, I'm thinking yes, of course. I'm sure that's how it's going to be....

Will update over next few days.

Cheers

Dan

Thanks for the wise words Alan.

I know that once I've got that 1st flight under my belt everything will be fine.

Cheers

Dan

If you do report it, you can be sure that the police will take it very seriously. They are under a lot of pressure to take anything gun related seriously.

However, you will probably find it was a teenager with an air rifle/pistol.

In a previous life I used to be in the cops and confiscated more air weapons from teenagers than I care to remember. Normally they were brought to my attention by people who had had them pointed at them.

I find it very unlikely it will be a farmer with a shotgun, unless he's completely stupid....but you never know.

Dan

I now have all my equipment ready to go, but for the life of me I cannot seem to locate my balls

I think that part of the worry is that I learned on a Parajet with a small cage compared to (what feels like) the massive 1400 cage on the PAP, and a Revo 28 compared to my Revo2 26, which I guess is going to be a lot faster and more dynamic (weight 83kg).

Could do with another PPG pilot or instructor with me for that first flight, just to double check that I've not forgotten something crucial.

Anyone happen to be in the Marbella area over the next week or so?

It is nice however to be able to air my concerns amongst those who I know will have been in my position

Dan

I'm sure that between all of us who read this, a few hundred or even thousand hours PPG flying have been clocked up over the past couple of years.

Just out of interest, does anyone know of any reserve deployments in this time? If so, how many?

The reason I ask is that, in conversation with a world famous paramotor manufacturer the last month I asked his advice about purchasing a reserve along with my my motor and wing. He told me don't bother. In all the years that he has been involved with the sport ie right from the start in the 80's, he has never needed a reserve and he has never seen one deployed.

I try not to buy into the 'what happens if' hysteria. If I did, I would end up freaking out about everything I do that has an element of danger. Instead I would limit myself to walking to the local newsagent to buy a lottery ticket (which I have never done in my life, for the same reason)

Que sera sera

Dan

Thanks for the input guys. Something to work towards

Dan

Thanks Matt.

The problem is that although we have a great climate here in Spain, unlike the UK, but we don't have any nice green and soft fields to ground handle a nice new wing like you have. I know I'm being a big sissy, but I don't want to drag my new Revo2 along an abrasive sandy beach....just yet, so trying to negotiate the use of a large field nearby...well I would try to negotiate if I could find the bloody owner

Will update this post as and when I get airborne.

Dan

In the Paramotor mag Febuary - March 2010....Page 52 .......there is a piccy of the greenpeace people flying with a banner......

Funnily enough I've just been asked by a friend if I could tow a banner along the coast at Marbella, advertising her Ice Cream shop (as a non-payment favour of course). So, I've just reread this post and noticed that it didn't get very far.

Would appreciate it if anyone has any info or knows how it can be done safely.

I haven't got a copy of Feb - March 2010 Paramotor mag (difficult to get in Spain). Is the picture clear? Can you see how/where the banner attaches?

Thanks

Dan

All good things come to those who wait.

I agree. I waited and something good came in the post today, in the form of a Revo 2

Serial number: 0610001 I feel very honoured to get the first one.

Very excited. Just need the wind to drop so I can have a play.

Dan

Its 250 metres, Ikn ow because I helped pick Pascys up at the Nats on Saterday

As I said

Due to collect mine on Tuesday

It's really nice to watch a video on the subject you love, made by someone who really knows what they're doing. From filming (angles, variety, lighting etc) to editing, to production. It's a great bit of professional marketing for Alex. I'd imagine he's well chuffed.

I hope that my video making skills will improve to that level some day.

Well done sir!

Dan

Deano's 'Chasing The Dragon' is the closest I've seen to banner towing. I watched him wind it up afterwards It's longer than you think.

[youtubevideo]

Dan