LittleCloud Urubu

Technical data

Colours

Standard colours: Red, Yellow, Lime, Orange.

Package

• Wing
• Simple and light fast packing bag
• Compression strap
• Manual
• Control sheet

Related Products (optional extras)

• Paragliding Backpacks
• Concertina Packing Bags
• Fast Packing Bags
• Speed Systems
• Clothing

Urubu: advanced pilot, in one word: FUN

Design

• As a base LittleCloud kept the Gracchio plan form (57 cells), but reworked its shape, increased its aspect ratio to 6.15, and used a new airfoil (Air intakes thinner and more on the back). 

The construction remains extremely simple and without gimmicks… 
The design was pushed far to control all dimensions of the wing’s fabric tension.
• The weight stays very light, only 3.8kg for the 24, which makes it a great wing for Hike and Fly. The glider keeps the compact feeling of the Gracchio, but has incredible damping abilities for this class of wing, while still having a very high thermal sniffingcapacity. Brazilian strong wind take off have always been a piece of cake! Stunning!
• The span increase doesn’t affect the Urubu’s handling, it remains very direct and precise, offering a very tight turn possibility thanks to the work done on the arch.
• The Urubu is made for flying safely and with peace of mind. XC, soaring, Hike and Fly, the Urubu is a very funny wing to fly. It’s very difficult to upset the wing, thanks to its huge brake travel, very heavy stall point, and very damped reactions (pitch stable as usual at LC).
• They’ve been testing it in very difficult conditions this 2019 summer at the office, and it always gives this incredible feeling of serenity. The winter tests in Brazil just confirmed this feeling.
• The Urubu’s feedback is always crystal clear and gives you a real idea of the air conditions. The glider can be used all along its weight range, without considering the handling or speed but more the conditions the pilot will use it. For flatland, the pilot should be in the low part of the weight range to optimize the float and the climb, with no inflexion of the handling.
• A pilot flying strong conditions will use the middle/top part of the weight range. 

Target

The Urubu is dedicated to EN C pilot who’s capable of making decisions and cope with their consequences. Thanks to its great handling, the Urubu is a great machine for soaring, fast, sharp… in one word: FUN! 

In my eyes, this is the most accomplished glider I've ever designed, and the most versatile! I flew at least 200h with it and I'm always astonished at each flight about its compromise between safety/performance/serenity!

 - Tom's words

Chart

Reviews

"The wing rises easily in all conditions from light wind to stronger. Even in strong gusty conditions the wing still rose smoothly with no sudden acceleration. The couple of forward launches I did were equally easy. Once in the air the wing feels nicely responsive, turning easily and immediately when brakes are applied. Roll feels a bit more controlled than on the original and, while it will happily flick up on a wing-tip, it is a little easier to keep flat when you need it.

Going on bar the wing accelerates smoothly with no massive increase in sink rate. At trim speed it’s maybe not as fast as the latest high-B wings but was in line with other mid-B wings I was flying with. The bar gave a good 12km/h extra when going pulley-to-pulley and I felt comfortable using the whole range. It was then an into-wind push along the ridges back to the car. Here again the pitch stability showed as the wing smoothly pushed through broken lift. What could have been an uncomfortable glide was marked for its smoothness with the wing neither getting knocked back or surging: this is great behaviour for a wing aimed at pilots starting their cross-country explorations.

The Gracchio has matured, and has become less demanding of its pilot, giving the same levels of performance with true B-style demands. Little Cloud’s inherent pitch stability make it an easy wing to fly, even in big air. I was impressed with its into-wind performance: not getting knocked around really seems to help this in real air. The light weight and good low-speed behaviour also makes it suitable for vol-biv adventures, with more than enough performance for early adventures. If you are not worried about the lack of EN certification, give the wing a try – you might just fall in love."

— Marcus King , CROSS COUNTRY MAGAZINE (Issue 216 (Dec 2020 / Jan 2021)

LittleCloud Philosophy

It all started in 2008… with Tom’s vision of being able to enjoy flying as much as possible, all year long, and with maximum pleasure, LittleCloud was born. Pleasure, it seems, is something that is often lost in flying… because of the never-ending quest for performance and maximum distance. It has become their mission and philosophy at LittleCloud to deny this quest and focus their efforts on creating products for a community of pilots that pursue the pleasure of flight

Find out more here.

Materials

FABRIC DOMINICOTEX

• Top and Bottom: Dominico 20D
• Ribs: Porcher 32 hard

SUSPENSION (LINES)

• Uppers: 7850 Edlerid
• Mids: 7850 Elderid
• Lowers: 7343 Edelrid

RISERS

• 12cm

Certification

LittleCloud decided a long time ago to no play the “certification game” (except for some exceptions). 

FAQ

Why LC doesn’t follow up with this EN norm (Test flying one)?

As a responsible manufacturer, they want to offer wings with maximum safety for the pilots. They are very careful to whom they dedicate each model; checking and intensively testing each wing's reaction in varied real-life conditions. The improvements, made on understanding the mechanisms of the wings in the last years, helped to design gliders with mellow reactions. There is a huge gap between pilot-induced maneuvers and real-life situations. The dynamics are very different, recovery in still air or in messy air able to make collapse your wing are a world apart, and pilot inputs are not taken into account in the EN evaluation! Their new airfoil is giving some incredible results in real life in keeping pressure very high all along the collapse process. It’s almost impossible to produce an EN type front collapse with their new Kagoo2/The Spiruline. The skin tensions/shaping is a major feature that provides outstanding results in reducing propagation and the magnitude of collapse, but makes the 45° angle required by the EN on the large asymmetric collapse very hard to achieve. Does that make these wings more dangerous? Experience/Tests show that it’s a real benefit for the pilot's safety!

They would have to step away from their latest findings regarding collapse resistance and collapse mechanisms in order to be able to perform the EN tests according to its description. This is why they made the choice to fly long-term testing in a very wide range of flying conditions to know really how the wing will react. This is, of course, time-consuming, sometimes tricky, but in their opinion, it’s the only way to really find out the true characteristics of their wings. Time has demonstrated that their approach is as valuable as the “normal” way (EN). None of their products has shown some dangerous behavior. None of their products have been mis-targeted to the wrong pilot group because they define and aim their wings to the right public, with a very honest approach. They believe that it’s not the induced maneuvers' reactions that give the classification of a glider, but its capability/performance. A wing that helps compensate for the lack of skills to fly higher and farther is just pushing back the moment when trouble would happen. On top of that, thinking a glider will save pilots from the consequences of their poor decisions is a very dangerous approach to safety. The actual very high accident rate increase is just highlighting these facts. Most of the accidents happen on EN rated/certificated wings. In the end, they have to bear in mind that the EN process is a very detailed and strict process on paper, but more approximative in its realization (Air mass- evaluation of the reactions of the glider).

What consequences does this have for your daily life?

Let’s face it, it can be problematic in certain country to get an insurance to cover you. Anyway, in most of the case, solutions always exist. Bear in mind that Paragliding is considered as a high risk activity.  Therefore, with a certified glider or not, you won’t be covered in certain cases (Travel Insurance, Mortgage insurance…).

LittleCloud Technology

They use a lot of invisible technologies at LittleCloud. They don’t have special names or logos for them, but they are here for emphasing your flying experience…

Light by essence

Since the birth of LittleCloud, they are focus on optimisation. Smart design allows us to keep their gliders simple. No material is lighter than any light material available.

Lines drag reduction

Always using optimised line plans on their gliders, especially with a shorter distance between the canopy and the pilot. For the same aspect ratio/size they use up to 25% less lines than their competitors. This way, they keep good efficiency upwind, even with lower aspect ratio/lower class gliders. Free extra performance without any cost on the safety side.

Since 2012, they use a floating cell on the tips

This unsupported tip is helping to keep intrados and extrados meeting flux more optimized.  Again, this helps efficiency on upwind courses.

Tom kite design experience showed real benefit in terms of stability by having a linear lines distribution. It helps reducing the line consumption too. And don’t worry, it doesn’t affect the capacity to get rid of a cravat in the case you managed to get one (other methods are available- not only full-stall! ).

Since 2012 they have developed specific high-pressure airfoil hold in shape a single rod

The principal is very different from the original shark nose which requires 2 rods to get in shape. They use a venturi effect on the air intakes, allowing higher internal pressure, a wider variation of angle of attack (especially at high AOA).
During a collapse, the air intakes are still feeding the canopy, offering a bigger resistance. Since 2018, these inhouse airfoils are combined with very reduce air intake area, giving a great increase of efficiency on the performance side without altering the recovery in flying incidents or stalls.

Skin tensions balance

Using the internal pressure to keep a better 3D shape of the canopy offers a direct gain in efficiency and a very intuitive and progressive control of the canopies, even at higher wingloads. The complex ballooning control of their gliders is one invisible technology that affect the most their behaviours.
They have a low leading edge tension that help stopping the collapses spread. It might not look as tight as some competitors, but the loss in performance is insignificant compared to the benefit in terms of safety! When the wingload is increasing rapidly (during a collapse for example), they manage to temporally reduce the performance of their airfoil to reduce the power therefore the shooting.

The legendary LittleCloud pitch stability!

Again, an invisible technology that is changing the whole the game on the safety side. On all LittleCloud gliders since day one! Easier in flight, in stronger wind take off, safer during flying incidents in reducing the hight loss drastically. Thanks to their great understand of airfoil development they have the capacity to define a very pitch stability at low angle of attack and still keep a bitey behaviour, essential to have a great feeling in thermals.

LittleCloud downloads

Find downloads for LittleCloud products here.