Video

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhSohtCnDro
2017 Green Swamp Sport Klassic

Steve Davy - 2017/05/19

The weak link broke at the carabiner.

Did you not have an upper release?

Steve Davy - 2017/05/19

So to answer your original question, in this setup there's just a weak link attaching the upper attachment point to the carabiner.

So what was your plan for getting off tow had the bridle wrapped onto the tow ring?

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24534
It's a wrap

Matt Pruett.

The bridle does not thread through the tow ring. Out front there is a quick link, between that and the tow carabiner there is a weak link with a linknife running through it.

And here I was thinking that the weak link would be running through the Linknife.

When the linknife is pulled...

...while the glider interrupts its lockout long enough for this easy action to be completed...

...the weaklink...

WHAT weak link? What's its strength, what's the "thinking" behind that strength, what are your EXPECTATIONS of it, how much safer does it get on every landing drag, how long is its track record, and what's Jim Keen-Intellect Rooney's OPINION of it?

...is cut and you are severed from the tow line.

Which is always a good thing.

http://www.birrendesign.com/LKAero.html

In a normal release situation the vbridle stays in-tact.

Whereas in EMERGENCY release situations:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/skysailingtowing/message/6726
Weaklinks

Peter Birren - 2008/10/27 23:41:49 UTC

You trying to tell me the pilot had time to release? Not a prayer.

I know about this type of accident because it happened to me, breaking 4 ribs and my larynx... and I was aerotowing using a dolly. The sh*t happened so fast there was no room for thought much less action. But I wasn't dragged because the weaklink did its job and broke immediately on impact.

You're focusing on AT but there's a lot more towing going on then at the flat/smooth-ground country club sites. On a crowned country road, off the back of a truck or trailer... ain't a place for a dolly or a threaded bridle of any type.

Imagine if you will, just coming off the cart and center punching a thermal which takes you instantly straight up while the tug is still on the ground. Know what happens? VERY high towline forces and an over-the-top lockout. You'll have both hands on the basetube pulling it well past your knees but the glider doesn't come down and still the weaklink doesn't break (.8G). So you pull whatever release you have but the one hand still on the basetube isn't enough to hold the nose down and you pop up and over into an unplanned semi-loop. Been there, done that... at maybe 200 feet agl.

If as in this case, there is either an upper or lower bridle failure of some kind...

Or a weak link SUCCESS - which is identical to a bridle failure 'cept a bridle failure can be deadly while a weak link success is at worst an inconvenience which increases the safety of the towing operation.

...the line connecting the linknife to the harness...

It's called a LANYARD - a term The Industry started using after Yours Truly introduced it. (They even followed my lead on "bent pin release". (Which would be the equivalent of the NAACP adopting the organization name of "National Association for the Advancement of Niggers".)

...pays out until it can no longer do so, and the linknife is pulled without action on my part.

Which is a good thing because in any towing emergency situation all of your actions will be dedicated to flying the glider in order the extend your life several additional seconds. (Think Jeff Bohl - same runway, a year minus two days ago.

If (and I have no idea how this could occur) somehow the upper attachment point became the sole connection point...

No, you're good on at least this much.

...the weaklink strength should be insufficient to remain attached under any tow pressure.

No brainer dude. Since your weaklink strength was insufficient for anything to remain attached on a normal tow in smooth air for more than thirteen seconds of roll and climb feeling a little over HALF the towline PRESSURE.

These motherfuckers are STILL using their Zack Marzec shit for a large percentage of their tows. Not all that much has changed 'cept:
- there's no longer rabid opposition to Tad-O-Links
- NOBODY's SAYING anything about weak link strength and its relation to safety anymore

So the crap he's using is less deadly than we believed when we assumed he was doing Paul Voight / Diev Hart mode but he's still a douchebag flying with and behind other douchebags and banning his ass pretty much immediately was still an excellent call - if I do say so myself.

[<BS>]

If (and I have no idea how this could occur) somehow the upper attachment point became the sole connection point...the weaklink strength should be insufficient to remain attached under any tow pressure.

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11655
Wrapping bridles around loops, rings, links and carabineers

First, as to the incident, this was actually a test and in the test Jim Prahl actually tied a rag to one end of the spectra rope on his shoulders so that it would be sure to catch and hold as the rope slid through the loop at the end of the V-bridle coming from the keel. He was trying to test to see if the weaklink at the keel end of the V-bridle line would break when the rag stuck. Well it didn't.

What happened when Jim released the barrel on his shoulder and the rag and bridle stuck in the line of the V-bridle, was that the nose of the Wills Wing Falcon pitched straight down instantly. Jim was left towing from the keel only at about a foot in front of the carabineer/hang loop.

Now Jim was not so dumb as to do this test without a backup plan (although he didn't expect the glider to pitch down so rapidly). He had the weaklink from the V-bridle line attached to a spinnaker shackle that was connected to a brake type release. He had his hand on the brake lever. When he released the barrel release, and the rag snagged the line, he didn't have time to hit the brake lever before the nose went over (and the weaklink didn't break). He then hit the brake lever and fortunately the glider recovered (it was a Falcon after all).

The point of this experiment was to see if it was okay to just release from the barrel release and do away with the expensive brake lever, cable assembly, and spinnaker release. Just connect the V-bridle line to the keel with a weaklink that would supposedly break if the shoulder line snagged in the loop (which I proved was possible). Jim proved that this was perhaps not a good idea.

Don't worry about it.

[<BS>]

...banning his ass pretty much immediately was still an excellent call - if I do say so myself.

What was the reason?

[Tad Eareckson]

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=47096
Aerotow primary releases?

Matt Pruett - 2016/03/23 06:27:30 UTC

I spent quite a bit of time reading Tad Erickson's posts (probably spent a full day at it honestly), prior to making this thread. The only thing I have to say about all of that is this: ideas are cheap, talk is cheap. If someone thinks they can improve on the status quo, make a product with good documentation and sell it, get it into peoples hands, if it's a notable improvement then it will be adopted and/or influence other designs.

I don't have the expertise to build a towing system, nor do I have the flight experience to be a test pilot. Which is why I only listed products, made for the purpose, that actually exist in this thread.

Can't begin to describe how infuriating I find that crap and its author.

Participants in that thread:
- Matt Pruett
- Davis Straub
- Jim Rooney
- JD Guillemette
- Swift
- Graeme Henderson
- Rich Diamond
- Jim Gaar
- Tom Lyon

Five Grade A total pieces o' shit, one Davis Show Douchebag In Good Standing, two stupid total wastes of space, one unknown ally.

Yeah, talk's cheap if you've never done anything useful and don't have anything to say. Hope that son of a bitch finds himself in a Peter Birren situation with a little less clearance back to the runway.

[Steve Davy]

Took me a long while to figure out what he was doing there as I could not imagine that anyone would install a weak link at the top end of a closed bridle. Let alone set it up such that the top weak link would break before the one at the release.

[Tad Eareckson]

Oh well...

He's built something within the range of his...

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=47096
Aerotow primary releases?

Matt Pruett - 2016/03/23 06:27:30 UTC

I don't have the expertise to build a towing system, nor do I have the flight experience to be a test pilot. Which is why I only listed products, made for the purpose, that actually exist in this thread.

...expertise. And while he doesn't have the flight experience necessary to be a TEST PILOT he OBVIOUSLY has WAY more expertise than what's necessary to make the easy reach to his release lanyard with one hand while fighting the lockout with the other.

http://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7077/27082298482_cda1aba01b_o.png

I don't have the expertise to build a towing system...

Catch that? A towing SYSTEM.

THIS:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8318603266/


http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8305308635/

is an aerotowing SYSTEM - lotsa different components going to maximize performance and survivability. Idiot fucking Peter Birren puts a hook knife on a string, declares all towing problems to be history, banks on his loop of magic fishing line to get him off tow whenever anything's going less than optimal.

Something else I just noticed as a real good rule of thumb...

The crappier the release "system" and the more dangerous the towing mode (foot launch, fixed line, aero) the more rabid the insistance on, use and defense of extra safe weak links. (Thanks for triggering that lightbulb moment, Matt.)

[<BS>]

Fortunately with all the expertise shortcomings he still has the ability to "only list products, made for the purpose, that actually exist in this thread."

[Steve Davy]

Fun to watch these guys rocket up to altitude.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42vTdXorm0U

[Tad Eareckson]

http://vimeo.com/48762486


http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=27044
Here's a scary one for ya!

[Steve Davy]

That was fun to read. I had started to forget how totally brain dead most of Jack Asshole's idiot asylum contributors are and forever will be.