Releases

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=29415
Holy Crap

Lin Lyons - 2013/07/03 17:46:39 UTC

I also think that $15 for a spectra loop is a bit high.

It's a rip-off for cheap dangerous crap.

Particularly if it's simply sewn.

For fifteen bucks I can make you a Bridle Link:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8313800992/


http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerotowrelease/8313802304/

- combination bridle / weak link
- physically impossible for it to wrap
- 36 pound increments, around plus or minus five percent tolerances
- lasts and maintains its integrity forever
- always blows when you NEED it to
- never blows when you WANT it to (which, trust me, is a GOOD thing)

Another thing that's not obvious to me is the double release.
What are the two releases doing?

- Nothing.



If you have zero chance to get to a primary you have considerably less chance to get to a secondary.

- If you're nice and high and nothing else is going on you can pull the second barrel to send Davis's sewn ultra-thin Spectra bridle down with the tug and tow ring to which it's just welded itself. Well...

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

The barrel release wouldn't work because we had too much pressure on it.

As long as it doesn't have too much pressure on it (which - seeing as how the towline tension is no longer split - it almost certainly will).

Does the towline come right up to the mechanism?

After the bridle wraps and becomes an extension of the towline - yes. And don't worry about having a weak link on EACH end of the bridle. In hang gliding you only need weak links BEFORE bridle wraps. Ask ANY Dragonfly driver.

Is there something farther away that attaches to the towline?

Yeah. A fuckin':
- three strand Dragonfly tow mast breakaway protector
- Dragonfly tow mast breakaway
- safety conscious tug driver poised to fix whatever's going on back there by giving you the rope.

Davis Straub - 2013/07/03 18:08:03 UTC

I also think that $15 for a spectra loop is a bit high.

You are not forced to purchase them.

Just don't think about showing up at the flight line with...

http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=22308
Better mouse trap(release)?

Jim Rooney - 2010/12/16 18:47:05 UTC

A few years ago, I started refusing to tow people with home made gear.

...homemade gear that YOU made.

The sewing part is the key part for these ultra thin bridles.

And the bent pin is the is the key part for Bobby's ultra fat and equally stupid and dangerous barrel "releases".

The sewing part, you must understand, is what allows Davis to whip these things out in three percent of the time it would take to splice them and give you something with a fraction of the propensity to wrap.

What are the two releases doing?

The second release is used as a secondary.

Yeah Lin, make ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN you get a second barrel release. That way when your fifteen dollar sewn ultra-thin Spectra bridle welds itself to the tow ring and your backup release welds itself shut under the double loading they can report that there was no evidence that the pilot made an attempt to release from tow prior impact - the barrel was found closed on the Bailey-style tow release.

Indeed the tow line comes right to the bridle.

The fifteen dollar sewn, long, ultra-thin, Spectra bridle.

Only if you want to have a leader.

And if he wants to have a leader we should let him have a leader. Let's not stop with the stupid useless dangerous crap we're sending him up on at this point.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=29415
Holy Crap

Tom Lyon - 2013/07/03 19:31:57 UTC

Lin Lyons - 2013/07/03 17:46:39 UTC

I've looked at the barrel release, several times.
The price seems appropriate for the safety it provides, but not for the construction.
Unless there's something I don't understand.

Honestly (and I'm not exaggerating), I'd pay $100 or more for each of those barrel releases if that was the going rate for them and I was towing.

If I gave a flying fuck about you I'd pay you a hundred bucks apiece to lose the bent pin Davis crap and give you a pair of twenty dollar straight pin barrels capable of doing the job.

After you pulled the regular release and it failed, you'd have been able to pull once on each side up close to your chest and that would have ended your trouble with that flight.

Or... He could've

- eliminated the three-string altogether and just used two barrels.

- done the job the way all the sane people do and used a Koch two stage so why are we wasting time discussing other options especially ones which include the kind of shit Davis is peddling.

To me, those things are like parachutes. I don't care what they cost.

To me, a good release is a thousand times more important and fifty times more likely to work when you need it than a parachute.

At a tow operation a release is something that for EVERY FLIGHT you MAY NEED to save your life and WILL USE.

A parachute is something that only maybe one percent of non aerobatic pilots will ever pull - usually after doing something extra stupid - and the chances of it doing any good suck a good bit.

A good release can save your life inches off the deck on up to a couple of hundred feet - at which point it starts mattering a lot less.

A parachute tends to need a couple of hundred feet for anything good to happen and it may do you no good at a couple of thousand feet.

Insecurely stowed parachutes work when people don't want them to...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uegD4QeAc58


...and they can and do do a lot of damage. And when you average the damage caused by accidental deployments with the saves from deliberate deployments it's not real clear that they're doing the population at large a whole lot of good (although, yes, any halfway careful/responsible individual can easily ensure that an accidental deployment never occurs).

Releases that work when people don't tell them to CAN BE deadly but, in practice, seldom are - and, in fact, are considered safety enhancements by the vast majority of the total morons who infest and control this sport. (See the Birren Pitch Limiter Pat's making Lin use, for example.)

If you really had your shit together you'd look at my photos and documentation and duplicate my system yourself or pay fuckin' useless Appropriate-Weak-Link Wills Wing to build it and install the relevant stuff into a downtube. And if you paid them a thousand bucks you'd be getting twenty times the bang you're getting for your parachute dollar.

P.S.

You're about to get towed up at Cloud 9 by your buddy Trisa. Your choices are:
- bulletproof, both-hands-on-the-basetube, two point release, two G weak link, and hand deployed parachute with a 95 percent failure rate
- Quallaby or Lockout two point release, pair of Davis bent pin backups, Rooney Link, hook knife, and bulletproof ballistic parachute

Take your time thinking about them and get back to me.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=29415
Holy Crap

Lin Lyons - 2013/07/03 19:40:54 UTC

I was actually taking flying lessons, looking to get a sport pilot license.
(Flying a Flight Design CTLS, which is somewhat like a sports car, with a smaller engine.)
Doing okay, but some of the actions (flaring on landing) are opposite.

- ALL pitch actions are the opposite.
- In sport pilot training is a power failure on takeoff a good thing or a bad thing?
- Do you go with the equipment your instructor assures you is state-of-the-art or does everybody tend to use the same stuff?

I'm setting up a simulator at home to get my reactions correct.
I'm not going to take any more powered lessons until I get those reactions right.
Every time.

How 'bout your sport pilot flare timing?

At Hollister, without towing, you're pretty much limited to about twenty feet.
I'm not about to walk up a mountain, carrying a glider.
(Check out Talcott Mountain in Connecticut.)

(Really good place to do a hook-in check. But, hell, just keep stomping your left foot twice to let everyone know you're good to go. You'll be fine.)

But, if I can drive up, that's good.

Wasn't for Al Mulazzi on 1976/09/21. But that was a long time ago.

I do tow, and will again.
But, when normal mountain flying is available, that would be my choice.

I think that I actually prefer hang gliding to powered flight.

Really. Great.

What happened was that I was stuck a block from the flying school at an airport, twice a week.
With nothing else to do for three hours.
Other than pour money into flying lessons.
When I'm ready, I will try to get my license.
I think that I'll still prefer hang gliding though.

I think that I'm still blown away by your obvious passion for this sport.

Don Arsenault - 2013/07/03 20:02:00 UTC
Toronto

Hey Lin. Thanks for posting and discussing this with us.

Yeah, that's great that he's over there posting and discussing this with you - free from the disruptions of The Extremist One Percent.

I'm a fairly new pilot myself, also doing winch towing. I think I'll stick with my two stage chest release (Koch style).

Your current one...

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

Don Arsenault - 2012/09/05 01:09:41 UTC

Until this flight. The release just let go. My hands never left the down tubes, and it did not touch the base bar. It was the final straw. If I let the video keep rolling, you would have seen me quickly lose my cool, and yell and curse and march into the office to demand a new release. I got one, and my next flight went great.

...anyway.

That was horribly terrifying to watch! Glad you came out OK!

He didn't. He's discussing hook knives and parachutes, interacting with Davis, and continuing to fly with the crap Pat refers to as state-of-the-art equipment.

Tom Lyon - 2013/07/03 20:40:35 UTC

I'll say. I enjoy flying sailplanes, but they are nothing like the experience of pure flight I get form hang gliding. I'll never go back now, unless it's just for a ride or something.

Also, since sailplanes are more expensive, there just aren't as many in a club. I was constantly sitting on the ground waiting for my turn to fly. One guy in a club I used to belong to would go up during the best soaring conditions, turn the radio off (or ignore our calls) and soar for about 2.5 hours when the limit was one hour per person. That made me so angry. He always said he "almost got shot down" (i.e. I was low somewhere and trying to climb out). Maddening.

Yep. Pilots are assholes - especially when they're allowed to seize total control of a sport.

Not anymore! I'll be ordering a new Falcon 4 soon and I'm set for life!

So was Zack Marzec on 2013/02/02 at 15:20 at Quest when he hooked up behind Mark Frutiger's Dragonfly. Unfortunately for him his life was gonna be over - for all intents and purposes - a minute or so later.

Any thoughts on what went wrong? Maybe it was just a freak accident probably involving an invisible dust devil? Did you happen to get Trisa's take on it? (Funny that we haven't heard a peep from someone whose life is so centered on and dedicated to hang glider aerotowing safety.)

How many sailplane aerotow launches have you heard about that resulted in popped standard aerotow weak links and fatal whipstalls which were probably the result of invisible dust devils?

[Steve Davy]

Answer to problem. Dump the threader and shoot the guy making them. (That would be me in our club).

What is the threader?

[Tad Eareckson]

I'll hazard a guess on that one...

The split over/under towline extension used with a Koch two stage. If the under extension is too short...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMsIkAOeJ0I


...it restricts the basetube's aft travel range and you can experience a problem pretty much the same as that experienced by a pro toad who's just been pulled into a monster thermal. At that point your best hope is a focal point of a safe towing system that doesn't very clearly provide you protection from a high angle of attack.

[MikeLake]

Answer to problem. Dump the threader and shoot the guy making them. (That would be me in our club).

What is the threader?

A rope 'V' arrangement with one long leg and one short.

It's part of a twin release system.
Tow line, weak-link, apex of threader, long line under the bar, short line over the bar, chest release.

[Steve Davy]

Thanks. I was imagining something that threaded though a ring at the apex, and that didn't make any sense for a two stage.

[MikeLake]

Re Koch introduction to the world.

1985/06-03
Can you move it back any?)

I was invited to the first ever UK aerotow conference, about '84 I think. I have a newsletter somewhere with the exact date. This was a feasibility study and I helped draft the first set of procedures.
I saw an example of a well made chest release at that time I think it was a Koch but a single release version.

[MikeLake]

Thanks. I was imagining something that threaded though a ring at the apex, and that didn't make any sense for a two stage.

Ya, I don't know where that name came from, something like a splitter would be better.

[Tad Eareckson]

I was invited to the first ever UK aerotow conference...

Whoa! A national aerotow conference with a goal of IMPROVING procedures and technology? I wonder what that must've been like.

I saw an example of a well made chest release at that time I think it was a Koch but a single release version.

So there were no tug pilots available to keep people safe from homemade funky shit with virtually nothing in the way of track records? How many backhoes did you hafta use to dig the mass graves for the test pilots?

Ya, I don't know where that name came from, something like a splitter would be better.

Could've been worse. At least they didn't call it a (Towing Aloft, Pages 38-39) "Y bridle".