Interesting little chronology...
I'm at Ridgely's first day of public operation on 1999/05/28. At that time I have a spinnaker shackle up top actuated by a 205 leechline lanyard running through the port downtube to the basetube. At the bottom end of the primary bridle I've got a cotter pin, serving as a toggle, on a loop engaging a secondary weak link. Looked cool but was the worst idea I ever put into the air. I had assumed it would work under load but when I eventually tested it on the ground discovered, to my horror, that it wasn't even close.
So sometime in those early days - probably that season, very probably no later than the next, positively no later than than the 2002/06/08-09 fly-in 'cause I've got correspondence with Ric Niehaus who wants me to make a pair for him - I'm using twin straight pin barrels on my shoulders.
It's at that fly-in that Jeff Harper shows Ric in my absence how to lock one up by flipping the eye of the pin through the weak link. Took me three days to figure out how to duplicate it 'cause I couldn't conceive of anybody being stupid enough to do something like that.
I don't know when Jim Rooney first reared his ugly empty little head at Ridgely but I didn't have enough contact with him to know him from Adam's off ox until 2002/09/21, when he was on the very cusp of becoming God's Gift To Aviation.
2004/09/20 I waste a trip down to Blue Sky on the lunatic assumption that Steve Wendt might be interested in seeing something better than the shit tow equipment he sells. There are primary and secondary weak links on primary bridle ends, a thimble, twin straight pin barrel releases, short secondary bridle with tertiary weak links on both ends. The All Wise And All Knowing Lord Of Manquin pronounces my equipment ADEQUATE to fly at his park. (Fuck you Steve.)
2005/03 Steve Kinsley demos at Manquin his relaxed bite dead man's switch multi-string release, the forerunner of my Four-String. "Thanks Steve, that's real cute. Great seein' ya."
The evening of 2005/05/28 there's a little party to celebrate Steve Wendt's winning of the 2004 Instructor Of The Year Award. It's attended by many of his adoring students - including Holly Korzilius and Bill Priday.
2005/05/29, the next afternoon, Holly dolly launches her Litespeed behind Tex Forrest on the Flight Star. Forgets the primary bridle so she has a go at one point with her usual single bent pin barrel and no weak link - 'cause Steve, like Matt, doesn't believe in vampires, elves, gremlins, eskimos, or bridle wraps. After a few increasingly violent oscillations Tex gets bored, waits until she's maxed out, and cuts her loose. Nothing a little intensive care and fifteen hours of surgery can't deal with.
There's virtually no doubt that she'd have been fine with Steve Kinsley's release - which he was giving away for free.
2005/10/01 Bill Priday runs off the cliff without his glider 'cause his Instructor Of The Year doesn't believe in hook-in checks either. His friends gather up his gear and return it to his family.
The Press - 2006/03/15
The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is urgently pushing for new hang-gliding industry standards after learning a hang-gliding pilot who suffered serious injuries in a crash three weeks ago (2006/02/21) had not clipped himself on to the glider.
Extreme Air tandem gliding pilot James (Jim) Rooney safely clipped his passenger into the glider before departing from the Coronet Peak launch site, near Queenstown, CAA sports and recreation manager Rex Kenny said yesterday.
However, he took off without attaching himself.
In a video, he was seen to hold on to the glider for about fifty meters before hitting power lines.
Rooney and the passenger fell about fifteen meters to the ground.
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=17404
Aerotow barrel release - straight or curved pin?
Jim Rooney - 2010/05/31 01:53:13 UTC
BTW, Steve is exceptionally knowledgeable. Hell, he's the one that signed off my instructor rating.
Yeah Jim, we didn't hafta be rocket scientists to figure that one out. Total assholes gotta stick together.
2008/02 I'm trying to explain to the Ridgely area Neanderthals why it's a bad idea to use a a bent pin for an aerotow release.
http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3035
Tad's Barrel Release and maybe an alternative
Jim Rooney - 2008/02/13 09:06:35 UTC
Selective memory I see.
When you first showed me the straight pin release, I told you I wouldn't touch it because "I had to give instructions on how to use it so that people would not rig it wrong". I showed you how you could rotate the pin sideways and close the barrel... and pointed out how this was not possible on a Bailey release. I told you if you fixed that, then I'd use it.
No Jim, this whole post of yours is some combination of lies and the fact that Queensland neurosurgeons realized they had to leave at least five pounds of shit in your brain cavity to keep your skull from imploding. By the time I was three hours old there was nothing you'd ever be able to teach me. I made the release moron resistant in response to a request from one of the other little assholes at Ridgely - Adam, to be specific. And I've got the note to Ric telling him I figured out how some Darwin candidate could lock the thing up long before you slimed your way into the scene.
Oh..... in failing to answer my "what advantage does a straight pin have" question... you attempt to reverse it to "what advantage does a curved pin have".
Actually, I wrote twenty-five paragraphs answering your idiot question. But you had to have the reading comprehension level of a hookworm to be able to understand it.
Well, two things....
One... no one's trying to improve on your design. The bar was set with the Bailey... it is to YOU to "improve", which you have not done.
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=21033
barrels release without any tension except weight of rope..
Bart Weghorst - 2011/02/25 19:06:26 UTC
Cowboy Up Hang Gliding
Jackson Hole
Most of the time. But I've had it once where the pin had bent inside the barrel from excessive tow force. My weaklink was still intact. The tug pilot's weaklink broke so I had the rope. I had to use two hands to get the pin out of the barrel.
Yeah Bobby's a freakin' genius. And I, like Mitch...
http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=22660
What can be learned from this "scooter" towing accident?
Mitch Shipley - 2011/01/31 15:22:59 UTC
Enjoy your posts, as always, and find your comments solid, based on hundreds of hours / tows of experience and backed up by a keen intellect/knowledge of the issues when it comes to most things in general and hang gliding AT/Towing in particular. Wanted to go on record in case anyone reading wanted to know one persons comments they should give weight to.
Two... The advantage of a curved pin... it can handle differing thicknesses of materials. Yours can't. You have a very narrow range and then you run into the problem of that pesky stop. That's why yours have weaklinks on both ends... nice and thin.
http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3107
I have a tandem rating!!!
Lauren Tjaden - 2008/03/23 22:20:15 UTC
When Jim got me locked out to the right, I couldn't keep the pitch of the glider with one hand for more than a second (the pressure was a zillion pounds, more or less), but the F'ing release slid around when I tried to hit it. The barrel release wouldn't work because we had too much pressure on it.
Anyhow, the tandem can indeed perform big wingovers, as I demonstrated when I finally got separated from the tug.
Yeah Jim, what's really important is that it be able to handle differing thicknesses of material. It's OK if it locks up on Lauren at a hundred pounds ten days after your idiot post - as long as you can get it to close around a three thousand pound piece of rope.
Call it insignificant if you will, but YOU are the one that is the incumbent... the onus is on you, not Bobby.
Right.
But I've had it once where the pin had bent inside the barrel from excessive tow force.
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=17404
Aerotow barrel release - straight or curved pin?
Holger Selover-Stephan - 2010/05/28 22:16:33 UTC
Portland, Oregon
I ordered and received a few barrel releases from Blue Sky. They have straight pins, not the curved ones I'm used to. Steve at Blue Sky tells me this:
...they [the curved pins] don't release with as little tension on them as the straight pins. Otherwise, there is no difference. It makes it hard to put just a rope on the barrel end, which encourages a weak link. Just a good idea. That's why we've been shifting that way, as are many other manufacturers of these releases.
Yeah Steve, NO DIFFERENCE. As long as you don't count folding in half inside the barrel.
Anybody got an opinion on this matter? Thanks!
Sure. It's absolutely astounding that people as stupid as y'all are can manage to breathe unassisted.
Anyway, he doesn't sell junk. If he's selling it, he likes it.
So a decade before when I was using straight pin releases it was a BAD thing 'cause they couldn't handle differing thicknesses of materials and encouraged people to use weak links with them. But now when the exceptionally knowledgeable Steve Wendt uses straight pin releases it's a GOOD thing 'cause they can't handle differing thicknesses of materials and encourage people to use weak links with them.
Some day we should all get together and you guys can tell me how you got the idea for the Rogallo wing and the hot air balloon.
That goes a long way in my book ;)
How many different color crayons did you get with your book?