Glossary

Acro: aerobatics

Back: the lee side of a slope

Backside: the lee side of a slope

Bottom Turn: a 180 degree turn performed after diving into the backside that results in the glider pointing upwind and heading to the top of the ridge

Bowman Foam: EPP

Bowman Hinge: easy to apply tape hinge that involves the use of corplast spacers and a rounded leading edge of the control surface, similar to a center bevel hinge.

Clevis: specialized connector that attaches the push rod to the servo arm or control horn.

Control Horn: the specialized component that protrudes from the control surface and provides holes to which the clevis and push rod are connected.

Dark Side: the lee side of a slope

Dead Stick: what an RC pilot calls out when his glow engine stalls; in DS a pilot calls this out when the plane is stalled as it ballisticaly exits the backside of the hill into the wind and the pilot has no control authority due to insufficient airspeed

DS: dynamic soaring

DS Acro: aerobatics performed while dynamic soaring

DS Junkie: slang term for an RC pilot who is addicted to dynamic soaring

Dub: short for 'J-Dub'

Dynamic Soaring: a flying technique where an unpowered radio control glider is flown on the lee side of a ridge resulting in very high speeds

Elevon: the wood control surface that combines the function of the ailerons and elevator

EPP: expanded polypropylene foam

Foamy: any airplane with a foam airframe, typically EPP foam

Fuselage: the body of an airplane

Groove: the optimal path for the glider to take while DS'ing

J-Dub: short for 'JW', similar to how V-Dub is short 'VW'

Joiner: Aluminum tube that joins the right and left carbon spars

LE: short for 'leading ede'

Leading Edge: the forward edge of a wing or tail

Liquefaction: the effects of food poisoning while on a remote DS hill

Ninja Star: violent maneuver where sticks are crossed as plane exits the groove vertically causing plane to flat spin at high speed as it continues to climb

Nuking: used to describe extremely windy conditions

Pushrod: the metal rod that connects the servo to the control surface

Receiver: electrical component that receives radio wave commands from the transmitter and sends those commands to the servos

Rotor: turbulent vortices of air that sometimes form on the lee side of a hill

RX: short for 'receiver'

Servo: electrical component that receives commands from the on board radio receiver and moves an arm in response to those commands in order to provide a means of control movement to the aircraft

Shear: the turbulent layer of air separating the upper wind flow from the lower still air on the lee side of a hill

Spanked: when a small plane gets violently tossed around while DS'ing in rough air, i.e. "My Tweety is getting spanked!"

Spankin': used to describe high wind with strong DS acceleration, i.e. "The wind is spankin'!"

Spar: structural reinforcing member added to a wing that runs spanwise from tip to tip in order to give the wing bending resistance

Suck Down: effect where the plane is rolled into the back of the hill as it enters the bottom turn despite corrective input from the pilot

TE: short for 'trailing edge'

Trailing Edge: the rearward edge of a wing or tail

Transmitter: radio component that is held by the pilot and sends command inputs to the receiver on the aircraft to enable remote control of the aircraft

TX: short for 'transmitter'

Whacro: Crazy aerobatic DS, conjunction of 'wacky' and 'acro'

Whacrobatics: see whackro