http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=26870
weak links
Chris McKeon - 2012/09/23 16:36:10 UTC
California
Safe towing release setup
Why would you want a SAFE towing release setup when you can get an Industry Standard one with a huge track record from an operation that's been perfecting aerotowing for decades?
I realize that I am asking a question that is not on task, so to speak. But, I figure if all of you are into towing. Maybe one of you could turn me on to system, a set-up as in how the towing force/line is released. It has always seemed to me that one would not want to being taking one's hands off the control frame while things are getting out of shape, providing they are.
Sorry Chris, this is utter nonsense. But you're from California where there isn't a lot of towing done so your naivety can be forgiven.
So, please show me your systems for disconnecting yourself from the Tow Line.
Well, we'd like to but...
No posts or links about Bob K, Scott C Wise, Tad Eareckson and related people, or their material. ALL SUCH POSTS WILL BE IMMEDIATELY DELETED. These people are poison to this sport and are permanently banned from this site in every possible way imaginable.
...rules are rules, dude.
Carole Sherrington - 2012/09/23 23:52:53 UTC
Chelmsford, Essex
Re: Safe towing realese set up
If it's got to the point where you have to release because of an impending lock-out, taking your hands off the control bar won't make much of a difference.
Yeah Carole, you'd THINK that when flying a weight-shift aircraft over which your control authority is a bit marginal to begin with, hooking it up to a rope to make it REALLY roll unstable, getting into a thermal induced, critical, rapidly degrading situation near the surface in which what control authority you have is being overwhelmed while you're straining to resist with every ounce of muscle you can muster, that there'd be some downside to taking a hand off the controls - which, in hang gliding, is pretty much the same as taking both hands off the controls.
But the good news is that this is hang gliding. And in hang gliding Newtonian physics and reality in general always take back seats to our expectations. And our expectations of a hang glider release are that...
Doug Hildreth - 1991/06
Pilot with some tow experience was towing on a new glider which was a little small for him. Good launch, but at about fifty feet the glider nosed up, stalled, and the pilot released by letting go of the basetube with right hand. Glider did a wingover to the left and crashed into a field next to the tow road. Amazingly, there were minimal injuries.
Comment: This scenario has been reported numerous times. Obviously, the primary problem is the lack of pilot skill and experience in avoiding low-level, post-launch, nose-high stalls. The emphasis by countless reporters that the pilot lets go of the glider with his right hand to activate the release seems to indicate that we need a better hands-on way to release.
I know, I know, "If they would just do it right. Our current system is really okay." I'm just telling you what's going on in the real world. They are not doing it right and it's up to us to fix the problem.
Steve Kinsley - 1996/05/09 15:50
Personal opinion. While I don't know the circumstances of Frank's death and I am not an awesome tow type dude, I think tow releases, all of them, stink on ice. Reason: You need two hands to drive a hang glider. You 'specially need two hands if it starts to turn on tow. If you let go to release, the glider can almost instantly assume a radical attitude. We need a release that is held in the mouth. A clothespin. Open your mouth and you're off.
...experienced pilots will always be able to hold things together so well with one hand that there's really no point in looking at existing technologies which allow one to release with both hands on the controls at all times - even in aerotowing in which you're hooked up on a short fixed length towline to a vehicle with very limited options for adjusting speed.
And besides, we're using an appropriate weak link which is the focal point of a safe towing system. And our expectations for an appropriate weak link are...
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/skysailingtowing/message/6726
Weaklinks
Peter Birren - 2008/10/27 23:41:49 UTC
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.
Dennis Pagen - 2005/01
I pulled in all the way, but could see that I wasn't going to come down unless something changed. I hung on and resisted the tendency to roll to the side with as strong a roll input as I could, given that the bar was at my knees.
I didn't want to release, because I was so close to the ground and I knew that the glider would be in a compromised attitude. In addition, there were hangars and trees on the left, which is the way the glider was tending.
By the time we gained about sixty feet I could no longer hold the glider centered - I was probably at a twenty degree bank - so I quickly released before the lockout to the side progressed. The glider instantly whipped to the side in a wingover maneuver.
...that it will:
- if you fail to maintain the correct tow position (centered, with the wheels of the tug on the horizon), break before you can get into too much trouble;
- clearly provide protection from excessive angles of attack, high bank turns, and the like for this form of towing;
- break as early as possible in lockout situations, but be strong and reliable enough to avoid frequent breaks from turbulence;
- function as an instant hands free release when you increase your roll and push out.
Think about it, Carole. If there were really any advantages to having both hands on the basetube at all times, would not...
Manned Kiting
The Basic Handbook of Tow Launched Hang Gliding
by Daniel F. Poynter
1974
"Never take your hands off the bar." - Tom Peghiny
- everybody be using equipment which allowed him to keep both hands on the basetube at all times instead of the Quallaby crap that virtually everyone and his dog has been surviving with for the past couple of decades?
- Donnell Hewett, inventor of the center of mass towing system, have included a point about uninterrupted glider control in his criteria for safe towing systems?
- Bobby Bender Bailey, who's a fucking genius when it comes to this shit, have developed release equipment for the glider comparable to what he designed into the Bailey-Moyes Dragonfly in which he spends just about all of his time?
- Bill Moyes...
http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1143
Death at Tocumwal
Davis Straub - 2006/01/24 12:27:32 UTC
Bill Moyes argues that you should not have to move your hand from the base bar to release. That is because your natural inclination is to continue to hold onto the base bar in tough conditions and to try to fly the glider when you should be releasing.
...be offering good, built-in, two point release systems with his gliders?
- Peter Birren, inventor of the most reliable release system...
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/skysailingtowing/message/6726
Weaklinks
Peter Birren - 2008/10/27 23:41:49 UTC
I know about this type of accident because it happened to me, breaking four ribs and my larynx... and I was aerotowing using a dolly. The shit happened so fast there was no room for thought much less action.
...known to mankind, developer of the Birren Pitch and Lockout Limiter, tireless advocate of...
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/skysailingtowing/message/7066
AT SOPs - proposed revisions
Peter Birren - 2009/05/10 01:33:57 UTC
If you want a truly foolproof release, it's got to be one that eliminates the pilot from the equation with a release that operates automatically.
...eliminating the pilot from the equation, and recipient of the 2006 USHGA NAA Safety Award, have incorporated something along those lines in one of his configurations?
- the excellent book, Towing Aloft, by Dennis Pagen and Bill Bryden, have included a mention of such an advantage at least once in the course of its 374 pages?
Just talk to Christopher...
http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=26800
Sport 2 VG lessons learned IMHO!
Christopher LeFay - 2012/08/06 05:30:55 UTC
Training yourself to transition in the first second of launch will kill you eventually.
It may be deadly to move a hand from a down to a base tube at a time of your chosing when the glider's flying trim and everything's under control during a free flight launch. But in any imaginable situation on a tow launch... Don't sweat it, dude.
http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14221
Tad's release
Tad Eareckson - 2008/12/16 16:14:02 UTC
Anybody else ever notice that the ONLY AT pilots we hurt or kill are the ones who have to reach for their release actuators?
Paul Farina - 2008/12/16 16:42:24 UTC
I rest my case.
Well...
British Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association Technical Manual - 2003/04
On tow the Pilot in Command must have his hand actually on the release at all times. 'Near' the release is not close enough! When you have two hands completely full of locked-out glider, taking one off to go looking for the release guarantees that your situation is going to get worse before it gets better.
The situation CAN get worse if you take a hand off the control frame to go looking for a release when you're trying to deal with a locked out glider - but just for tandems and just in the UK.
If it's got to the point where you have to release because of an impending lock-out, taking your hands off the control bar won't make much of a difference.
And lemme tell ya sumpin' else - asshole.
Having a release setup that doesn't stink on ice allows a PILOT...
- NOT to get the point at which he HAS TO release because of an impending lock-out
- abort a tow for a whole bunch of reasons other than lockout threat such as...
-- dolly stability issue
-- dolly snag
-- crosswind gust
-- thermal blast
-- blown launch
-- incompetent driver
Yeah, if everybody's careful an individual pilot can get away with flying releases that stink on ice for a decades long career just as he can get away with skipping hook-in checks and standup landings. But don't be so shitheaded as to think for a nanosecond that safety margins won't be butchered and we won't be maiming and killing people we don't have to.
Most people in the UK who tow with a static winch use a Koch-type 2-lever release and use that for aerotowing too.
Using a Koch two - or one - stage for aerotowing is moronic. It's engineered for a job it doesn't need to do for aerotowing and NOT engineered for a job it DOES.
And lemme ask ya sumpin' - asshole.
If there's no particular disadvantage to flying with a release that stink on ice, why are the shitheads who use them so terrified of not being able to blow tow with both hands on the basetube that...
http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24846
Is this a joke ?
Marc Fink - 2011/08/31 08:11:05 UTC
I was actually in the process of reaching for the release and just about to pull it when the weaklink blew. If procedures were amended to "insist" on stronger weaklinks I would simply stop towing.
...they're all so happily using standard aerotow weaklinks that blow every other tow or more and crash them on regular bases on the desperate hope that they'll blow early enough in lockouts to keep them from breaking their stupid fucking necks?
