JSW SOARING GAME for 48K SPECTRUM (C) 1985 J S Williamson the jsw soaring game for 48K SPECTRUM (C) 1985 JSWilliamson LOAD ""; Loading Time 5 mins. The Soaring Game aims to teach a few fundamentals of Navigation; give practice in the use of the JSW Calculator; and to improve your decision- making in simulated cross-country situations. NAVIGATION GROUNDSCHOOL demonstrates to you the effect of the wind on the glider's progress, tabulated in terms of Wind Component and Drift. A second lesson asks you to estimate these values for yourself in ten situations chosen entirely at random by the computer. The third lesson offers real problems to be solved by use of the JSW Calculator. FLYING LESSONS. On the flying side there are five options. Two of these need not be taken seriously, being attempts to land out in a field, or on the airfield, avoiding cows, trees, the windsock and the hangar! These exercises will give you valuable practice at using the keyboard controls be- fore setting off on the more demanding cross-country flights. The next option is to complete a final glide from about 18 miles out. The weather and time of day are set randomly before you are let loose and it is usually quite late in the day! So don't hang around. Your speed over this last lap is calculated and reported after you have got back and landed. The final options are to fly triangles of up to 300km long. One has weather chosen quite at random and can include poor thermals, periods of 'clamp' which may or may not 'cycle', and wind from any direction and any strength. At least the forecasting is spot on! The last option has a guaranteed super day, worthy of Texas or South Africa, with the same wind each time, very strong thermals and no clamp! FLIGHT PRESENTATION All flights are presented in side-elevation. Normally progress on course is from left to right across the screen, although there is nothing to stop you going back to a good thermal. On the triangle flights it is useful to imagine you are watching each leg from the centre of the triangle. You then have to bear in mind the effect the wind will have on each leg, and make heading adjustments as necessary to get from left to right as quickly as possible. Each screen represents 33 1/3km (18n.m) and so a 100km triangle is flown three times across the screen: a 300km, nine times, that is with three times across the screen for each leg. As you leave the screen on the right you re- appear on the left. Your position on the screen is shown by a dot, plotted for height and distance about once every second. The dots remain in place until you leave the screen on the right, when they are wiped off. THERMALS Each thermal is 500 yards across and there are on average 18 thermals somewhere on each screen. Your job is to find them! Each has a vertical dimension of about 2000ft and as each reaches 4200ft a cloud forms. The cloud grows and finally fades as the last of the thermal reaches condensa- tion level. Below each thermal is a mixture of zero and sinking airmass before a new thermal appears at 500ft above the same thermal source. The thermal sources are not indicated on the ground. Sorry! Each thermal simulates the classic 'doughnut' shape with the core going up faster than the thermal as a whole. This means that you can quickly climb to the top of the bubble and must then decide whether to just sit on it as it goes slowly up, or press on and find another core. By putting together a greater number of cores, and being less content to ride on top of a bubble you will be able to achieve really high speeds. The thermals are visible only when a clud forms, and are also stronger at or near cloudbase. For this reason it is usually better to cruise in the upper band - say 2500 to 4000ft where you can actually see where the thermals are going to be. If you get there in time, and will be high enough! Decisions! If you get below 2000ft you won't contact any thermal which has already formed a cloud - it will be high above you and all you will find is sink. But you can still hope to find thermals off the ground. If there is a gap in the clouds you may be reasonably sure to find thermals in that area, in the green area of the screen. But it isn't guaranteed, and the thermals are poor- er below 1000ft. If desperate dump your water (key D). It improves the rate of climb, but not much! THERMALLING TECHNIQUE You must be sure to stay within the vertical column of the thermal. Unlike real life these thermals do not drift with the wind and you must make sure you stay put. By alternately circling and flying straight on an appropriate heading you should find a way of staying in your thermal. START LINE & TURNING POINTS The start line and the subsequent turning points are each on the right of the screen - a hangar with TP painted on it. To make a good start you must first call 'gate' (press G) and your call will be acknowledged. You must then cross the hangar (i.e. fly off the screen to the right) and you will get 'Good Start' - or 'Too High' if you were above 3280ft! You must get a good start for your flight to be properly timed. Otherwise you will be timed from takeoff and your speed will suffer. You can make as many starts as you wish but must call 'Gate' each time. Each Turning Point as you come to it will be acknowledged and your next course will be displayed. When you cross the finish line your time will be recorded to the nearest 10 seconds and your flight report and barograph trace will be ready soon after you have landed. INSTRUMENTS During the loading process you will be shown your instrument panel which, during the flight, will occupy the bottom four lines of the screen. You have two variometers, and ASI, altimeter and compass. One vario is netto - it always shows the airmass vertical movement. It has a speed ring which you can set between 0 and 6 at any time, whereupon it will show the best speed-to-fly as you encounter each patch of lift or sink. You should aim to match the speed ring with the ASI whenever you are cruising. When circl- ing, of course, you should slow down as much as you can. The second vario shows Rate of Climb (or Sink). AIRBRAKES Airbrakes (key B) increase the rate of sink by 4 knots in all configurations. FLIGHT ENVELOPE The Placard on the right of the panel shows Stall speed (Vs) and Never Exceed (Vne). If you stall, or circle into cloud, you will spin! You can only recover by pressing key 7 (stick forward) and holding it pressed. Even then it may take up to 1000ft to come out and then you will be going pretty fast. If too fast (Vne) it will flutter! Remedy - press 6 (stick back) before it breaks up and you have to bale out! LANDING To make a good landing you must dump water, slow down to less then 50kts on touch down, and not land down-wind! And not hit anything!! AIRSPACE RESTRICTION There is a TMA at 4500ft. If you infringe this you will be disqualified and the flight will terminate. KEY RESPONSE The programme is written entirely in Basic and some key responses are a bit slow. At least it gives you time to think and panic! In each case wait for the appropriate response. Speed increments are proportional, and once you have the computor's attention, are continuous so long as you hold the key pressed (6 or 7). Similarly with heading changes (5 or 8). To stop and circle, press 0 (not O); to press on again, press P. If at any time you use the wrong key, you will be told. Never use more than one key at a time. GLIDER TYPES There are ten gliders to choose from to correspond with the ten JSW Cal- culator models available. Some of the gliders have water ballast to suit the use of the Aquarius model Calculators. The choice of glider is made after you have been given the weather forecast. TIME FACTOR Each flight takes about half to a third in rear time. So a 1hr dash round a 100km triangle in an ASW20 would take about 25 minutes, while 300km in a Ka6 will take all day, and about 3 hours real time! So be prepared. There is hope, however. If you really need a break, then just press 'Break' and then CONT and 'Enter' to resume the flight. FLIGHT MODE INDICATOR A flashing glider symbol on the panel indicates the current mode of oper- ation. These are: moving left or right across the screen; circling; and approaching with brakes out. FALSE INPUTS If you manage to press keys so that the flight stops beyond recall, then GOTO 1900 will re-start the flight (but at the time you had got to when everything stopped) and GOTO 1025 will take you back to the options. DO NOT USE "RUN" - EVER! FLYING CONTROLS 5 TURN LEFT 6 SLOW DOWN 7 SPEED UP 8 TURN RIGHT FUNCTION CONTROLS 0 STOP AND CIRCLE P PRESS ON! R SET SPEED RING G CALL 'GATE' D DUMP WATER B BRAKES OUT/IN