http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=31811
Weak link material
Brian Scharp - 2014/09/16 20:15:43 UTC
How about the fear of being an additional danger - as in to the tug operator - is that also illogical?
It must be. For the vast majority of the history of hang glider aerotowing USHGA SOPs and, since 2004/09, FAA regulations have stated twice flying weight and twice max certified operating weight as the upper limit for the glider weak link and something heavier - up to 25 percent - on the front end. And there has never been one single peep of a call from one single douchebag tug driver to specify anything one percent lower. And USHGA could easily do that. Nothing says it couldn't specify a narrower range within the legal range - which is exactly what all sailplane manufacturers do when they specify 1.3 to 1.4 G weak links for their birds.
Mike Lake - 2014/09/17 00:03:40 UTC
Tug operators seem happy to tow tandem gliders, the equivalent the biggest fattest solo pilot you are ever likely to encounter, so yes illogical.
Well yeah, but, as we all know...
http://ozreport.com/3.066
Weaklinks
Davis Straub - 1999/06/06
During the US Nationals I wrote a bit about weaklinks and the gag weaklinks that someone tied at Quest Air. A few days after I wrote about them, Bobby Bailey, designer and builder of the Bailey-Moyes Dragon Fly tug, approached me visibly upset about what I and James Freeman had written about weaklinks. He was especially upset that I had written that I had doubled my weaklink after three weaklinks in a row had broken on me.
The problem with strong links (neither Bobby Bailey nor I was aware at the time of the US Nationals that pilots were doing this) is that they endanger the tug pilot. If the hang glider pilot goes into a lock out, and doesn't break the weaklink (because there isn't one), they can stall the tug.
http://www.chgpa.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2467
weak links
Jim Rooney - 2007/07/22 22:30:28 UTC
I've heard it a million times before from comp pilots insisting on towing with even doubled up weaklinks (some want no weaklink). I tell them the same thing I'm telling you... suck it up. You're not the only one on the line. I didn't ask to be a test pilot. I can live with your inconvenience.
...heavier weak links on solo gliders are a hundred times more dangerous to the tug than they are on tandem gliders.
Look at what can happen to Dragonflies with just Rooney Links holding the glider in position:
http://ozreport.com/forum/files/2_264.jpg
Can you even begin to imagine how much more seriously they would be stalled with Tad-O-Links?
Sailplanes...
Dr. Trisa Tilletti - 2012/06
You and I have flown sailplanes for almost as long as we have flown hang gliders. We own two sailplanes and have two airplanes that we use for towing full-size sailplanes. In all the time that we have flown and towed sailplanes, we have not experienced or even seen a sailplane weak link break.
It's not that it doesn't happen, but it is a rare occurrence. Russell Brown, a founder of Quest Air in Florida and a well-known Dragonfly tug pilot, is also a sailplane pilot, tug pilot, and A&P mechanic for a large commercial sailplane towing operation in Florida. He told us that, like us, he has never seen a sailplane weak link break, either.
...never break weak links. That means that you could replace their 1.4 G weak links with twenty G weak links and nobody would notice the difference. Wanna make things safer for the tugs?
http://ozreport.com/13.238
Adam Parer on his tuck and tumble
Adam Parer - 2009/11/25
Due to the rough conditions weak links were breaking just about every other tow and the two tugs worked hard to eventually get everyone off the ground successfully.
Use one and a half G weak links that never break so they only hafta do ONE takeoff and landing cycle per glider and use a release that doesn't stink on ice so's you can terminate the tow BEFORE things go to the kind of hell...
15-2421
11-1814
12-1915
...a Rooney Link will allow before it decides to start saving anyone's bacon.