After hauling a new Wills Wing T2C 144 from San Bernardino,
California to Groveland, Florida I had the opportunity to fly it in light wind
conditions on Wednesday. Florida had been a little windy on Sunday through
Tuesday, not enough to keep one from flying, but not so sweet that you wanted to
get into the air ASAP.

On tow I noticed right away that there was a different feel from the previous
glider that I flew in Australia, one that wasn't appropriate for me. Very light
control inputs were required. I had the VG set at one half.

Already on the ground I saw that it was so much easier to pull on the VG with
its 24:1 ratio (with the pulley in the right down tube) than the previous
version of the T2C I used which was 16:1. Now in the air I really appreciated
now easy it was to pull on full VG. Lots of line to pull, but no struggle at all
going to full VG and undoing it quickly. This was very much like the Moyes
Litespeed RS 3.5 that I flew back in early January (but even easier). The RS
also has a pulley in the right down tube. If you are getting a new T2, be sure
to get it with the 24:1 VG (the standard now). You can also retrofit your
existing T2 with the 24:1 VG.

After getting off tow,
I zoomed over to a nearby cumulus cloud west of Quest, found the weak and broken lift and
started turning. Oh, this glider is so easy to fly and turn. Unlike
the previous
inappropriate glider I was flying I was in charge of the glider. I had no
problem climbing up and controlling the glider in broken conditions and
searching around for the moving core. I felt great confidence.

We flew to the north of Mascotte and saw that the cu's ended a little bit to the
north due to the "lake effect" from Lake Apopka and a east north east wind. We
turned around and headed south toward the sailplane port at Seminole Lake. I
kept leading out when the lift got weak.

Just north of the sailplane port I didn't stop when I found weak lift under a
dark cloud and headed for the next dark cloud. Unfortunately that cloud didn't
pan out and I had to find a friendly field to land in. There were plenty around
so I picked out the best looking one at the last moment coming in over a tree
filled swamp to land between the fences.

The wind was very light and I was so happy to find that as before the T2C was so
easy to land. I had to learn how to land theIcaro 2000 Laminar Z9 13.7 last summer and I was having trouble at first
landing the Moyes Litespeed RS 3.5 and S 4 in January in Australia, even though
I had flown these models previously. But I don't seem to have any difficulty
landing T2C's even after not flying it for many months and flying different
gliders prior to it. Is it just my muscle memory? Or is the T2C just that much
easier to land? It seems the latter.

I haven't had the opportunity to drop the sprogs down at all from the stock
setting. I will fly it a while before I do, if I do. I will see how much bar
pressure I feel at high speeds before I take them down a turn or two. The whole point is
to feel comfortable at full VG at 50 mph and actually want to go to the setting.
I found this to be the case with the RS 3.5 and I'll see if it is true with the
T2C-144 after I set or reset the sprogs. The RS 3.5 that I was flying had been
flown extensively in competition and was set correctly.