All begin with coming in faster than trim. Period.
Let's review the cardinal rule of landing a hang glider. Stall the tips.
A glider is twisted. So the root is always a higher angle of attack than the
tips. This means that the nose of the glider will stall before the tips.
Once the nose stalls, it's no longer lifting. If this happens and the tail is
still lifting, guess what? You're going to whack.
So, you've got to overpower this. Since the nose will stall first, you want the
tips to stall very quickly after. You've got momentum and sheer weight on your
side, but only for a second. After that, if the tips are still flying, they're
going to win.
You're trying to get the glider to tail slide. They are designed to resist this
tendency, so you need to work to make it happen. (You wouldn't want one that
likes to tail slide as it would be very unpleasant to fly.)
Here's the million dollar question, When do you flare?
If you can answer that (with confidence), then you will have no problem landing
well. If you only have some wishy washy, abstract answer, you're going to whack.
How many times have I heard "you just feel it," or my favorite, "when the glider
is out of energy". Excuse me, but just how the hell do you determine that one?
Is there some "energy meter" that I'm unaware of? I need to send all my gliders
in for warranty, because none of mine came with one. The real answer is they're
guessing. They've maybe gotten good at guessing (mostly not), but they're
guessing.
So, let's start with the easiest landing technique. It's easy because it cheats
this question.
The moonwalk hinges on the fact that a heavily loaded glider stalls at a higher
speed than a lightly loaded glider. When the glider is supporting your weight,
it's more heavily loaded than when it's not. A glider without you under it can
fly at a (much) slower speed than if it's carrying you. (This is also a huge
concept for good takeoffs, but that's an other story.)
So when you're landing, as soon as your foot hits the ground, the glider's stall
speed drops considerably, because it's not holding you.
Approach the ground faster than trim (as always). Round out into ground effect.
There are various methods for when to get upright and whatnot but that doesn't
matter. All that matters here is that you approach the ground faster than trim
and round out into ground effect. I couldn't care less how.
In ground effect, you will naturally start to trade speed for altitude. In other
words, to continue to fly level with the ground, instead of smashing into it,
you will be slowing down.
With a glider supporting your weight, you can run faster than humanly possible.
You do this every time you takeoff. You know that "moonwalk" run at the end of a
takeoff run? That's the same run we're talking about.
When you get to that speed, start moonwalk running. As you do this, start
pushing the glider up.
You will immediately start to slow down because your feet are hitting the ground
and because you're slowing the glider. As you slow down, keep pushing up. The
slower you get, the faster you push up.
The glider will "fall off your back" and it will also stop you from running. It
will land on it's keel. This is correct.
If you allow it to settle onto your shoulders, you have failed. Put it on it's
keel!
This is key. All the other landing techniques rely on understanding this. We are
making the glider tail slide! The glider stops us, not the other way around.
