Thrilling Hand-Launched Glider Flights: Battling to Gain Altitude in tight Circles! Explorer NAN 

I’m amazed how rc gliders have changed within last 20-30 years😮 Thanks guys!

Rc airplanes saved my life I love this addiction ❤

The energy retention just defies logic! Love it.

The strength and what that enables is what amazes me about this. We've all seen light things fly, but to have the strength to maneuver and not flex massively is wild to see.

The gliders of today are incredible. Watching these videos really makes me want to get back into soaring. Thanks!

There is something special about hand launching. It feels like a more pure form of flying

28 years ago i built my first glider, a great planes 2 meter spirit. Launched by high start, I'll never forget the day I realized it wasn't coming down because I had encountered a thermal. This video brought back fond memories of that unforgettable day. Thank you.

Best comment I ever heard to this matter. Finding a thermal out of a handstart, the best ting that can happen to any gliderpilot!

what an incredible glider, used to build wood and paper gliders in 70s as kid, no rc then. sometimes come home with no glider

That was amazing to see. Thanks to that skillful pilot and his model. My longest RC soaring flight was 1:47h with a 2m wingspan 2kg somewhere in the early 90`s and I am in RC flying since 1980. Cheers Marc

WOW...like WOW! This guy can really fly.

Watching Julian fly and build models is an inspiration. I hope to have some flights like this from a hand launch.

amazing flying...genius flier

Amazing flying skills and top performance glider. Thanks for the video!

I love the V-tail, it is always really elegant!

Very nice footage ! It would be nice to make a video to explain how you read the air, and how you keep the glider centered in the thermal.

That wingspan is just amazing

Always jaw dropping performance with the right materials & design and of course....a good pilot👏

Always a pleasure seeing you fly Julian. 👌

Great flying and awareness of conditions, thanks for the narration too.

Beautiful. Thanks for the video.

Awesome👍👍👍

Those Kst servos are awesome

INCREDIBLE! What a skill!

4 hours, but we all had a go! I had lunch and went for a pee while dad had a go, at some point mum had a go to!

great video. thank you!

I fly Rc planes ,and I have never flown a glider, your videos inspired me to get involved, thank you for what you do and for what you will keep doing , looking forward on all your new videos ,and I love the simplicity you explain it with , very educational, God bless❤

Great pilot skills - awesome glider - Thanks for sharing

Beautiful!

I last built a glider about 50 years back. Things have changed so much. Sure looks like fun!

Fantastic!! looks like an epic machine.

Enjoyed that!

Awesome !

its a beautiful thing! Great reading of that lift! I saw the response indicating where the lift was as well.

Beautiful glider and great flying!

Great model and flying.

My recor was 7 hours. But, it was a real glier) Nice video. Thank you.

Thanks for the great video, you're a real master with that ship.

Beautiful

Amazing pilot skills and a beautiful model. The intuition to "feel" the thermal is outstanding

Impressive flying skills, always a pleasure to watch!

Very impressive flying and glider, that was great!

Hello Julian, a wonderful demonstration of the outstanding performance of the pilot and the unbelievably good performance of the NAN Explorer F5J aircraft. Thank you, I look forward to further contributions

just amazing !

I got a beat up (literally in pieces) balsa 2 channel glider for free, ripped out the 30 year old electronics, rebuilt the broken parts, and upon putting modern electronics in it, it decreased the weight so much the main wing mount had to be moved about 1 foot back on the fuselage. This meant other bits on the design had to change, had to add strength to some places, change the rudder since it had less leverage, but after months of fixing things as they broke, I've managed to come out of it with a stellar glider. I've managed several 10 minute plus flights using a 150ft high start bungee, with my best time being roughly 11 minutes 48 seconds, starting the timer after the bungee dropped off the plane. I've yet to experience a modern composite glider like this one, but to anyone wishing they could get their hands on a better glider, go build one yourself with like 30$ worth of balsa, glue, and wing covering, 60$ worth of electronics, launch it with some medical tubing with a 150ft string attached to it, and just have fun, a 300mah 2s goes for over 5 hours while running two cheap 9 gram servos, and while frustrating at times, there's truly nothing like it.

beautiful glider! looks light as a feather.

Amazing glider and pilot 👍👍👍

What an amazing plane!

I am the only surviving Alberta 1982 HangGliding champion who then placed 12th of of 60 in the National championships in Mont St. Pierre Quebec Canada. I thermalled from Mount Swansea BC up to cloud base at 9800 feet ASL before flying along a cloud street 19 miles north to Edgewater before landing with a bad case of hypothermia. Those were non-events compared to subsequent years as hang glider l/d ratios rapidly improved. But on a final landing approach less than 150 feet from the ground I also thermalled up to the peak of Mount Swansea 2600 feet above the valley. Obviously the variometer provided the feedback needed to help core those thermals.

totally beautiful flying

AMAZING !

Wow. Nice plane and flying

I tried a discus RC glider. Alot of the time when there were no thermals around it was like playing frisbee with yourself.

amazing flying !

Just bought a second hand f5j but this will be very useful tuition so thanks!

Amazing flying skills and an impressive aircraft!

Nice!

Great flights and comnentary!!

Excellent low level work to keep the turns flat and drifting with the thermal.

WOW just wow. Nothing like the balsa wood and dope with no remote that I made as a kid back in the '70s. Beautiful.

Great Video Julian

Yeah, impressive!

Super cooler Flug Julian

Impressive flying skills and an impressive model. Great content.

Finding thermals with a 1,5m dlg is one thing... But a 4m hlg? Looks surreal hahaha. Greetings from Germany :)

Excellent flying skills

Those servos would look good in my plane. 🤗

Great video! I have this plane, and I've only ever sloped it, but now I'm going to try and hand launch it off the flat. No backup motor though!

its interesting that person so much used to fly as you get sick in the glider, makes me feel less bad about when i do :D

Wie immer, ein sehr gelungener Beitrag👏👍

Nice gliding!!! 😊

Nice flying :)

My first 2 channel build (balsa) was a Sig Riser 2m. Still have it after 25 years. Flew it for close to 2 hours once in very good thermal conditions. Brought it down to land as my neck was getting quite uncomfortable.

Cool. Thermaling straight out of the hand. Can‘t compete with that. Just ridge/mountain flying with much heavier FS (Flying Special) gliders.

Bucket list model!

Beutiful!!! I wish I can do that. I would love to see the radio inputs to better understand how to keep on the thermal. Great flight.

My longest thermal flight wasn't with a glider. Believe it or not it was with a Goldberg Eagle 2 with an Astro-Flight geared 25 running on 14 sub C ni-cads. I thermalled for almost 20 minutes with the motor off, and each time I tried to enter a landing pattern to come down, the plane was sucked back up. I had to go far out in the landing pattern and fly 5 feet off the deck to land.

You are correct! Things really have changed 🙌.... you can still build balsa if you want but now we also have this insanity and it's amazing😮

Nice

Great plane, but the piloting ability is unbelievable!

Cooles Video 😃👍🏻

Such great flying! We have had such bad weather all winter with rain and strong winds. No chance of fun F3K or F5J.

Amazing video! I'm in!

i own a xplorer version 1 which is flying great. i love to take it to the field !

thats nuts I LOVE THERMALS! I am out here with a pug dlg and have had several flights around 5 minutes! commenting to join the raffle!

I like the ones that you grab by the end of the wing and launch it like a discus. but this plane seems a little too big to do that :D great flying!

Clicked because that thumbnail is amazing, commenting because of the raffle: I would love these servos for my f22 I am designing and building from scratch! The thin profile is perfect to fit in the wings. Thanks for the opportunity 😌

That Explorer is still the king of F5J!

I am thinking about building a F5J, looks nice for none windy days when the slope doesn't work

Wow. Thats fantastic. Those launches are serious. ~ Russ

The glide ratio of that must be over 100

Wow! This would be a real challenge - no engines to get you "out of a hole" as it were! Wonderful skills being shown here!

impressive

nice

I'm basically Stevie Wonder when it comes to finding lift. Hopefully, the tips in this video will help 🤞

Nice! My longest thermal flights with both DLGs and gliders have been in the 1 hour range, and only ended due to battery concerns and boredom.I cheat and get help from my bird friends though!😜👍

The usual JB magic.

I am a 1.5m DLG guy but these bigger ships are impressive especially in the tight circles - my max thermal duration from a hand launch is 12min 20sec..

Thumbs up 😉

i stayed up over 30 min with a umx radian years ago at a sand mine with water at the botom