Just pull the little red handle!

Originally Posted by Wayne Paul

"Walt Connelly" wrote in message ...

.... Snip ....

Talking with a friend of mine from Vietnam, an extra set of glasses in
the event of a bailout would be a good idea, along with trying to secure
those you are wearing to your head. The opening shock of a chute might
dislodge most common eyeglasses, if they made it that far after the
egress. Not sure I could see well enough then to avoid power lines
and the like. Heads up folks.

Good point Walt. I once lost the canopy of a HP-16 on takeoff. My hat was the first thing to leave the cockpit followed immediately by my glasses. (Both were found in the grass between the runway and taxiway. ) The chances of keeping your glasses during a bailout without the aid of an athletic strap are between slim and none.
http://www.soaridaho.com/Schreder/HP-16/nocan.htm

Wayne
http://www.soaridaho.com/

Wayne, read the account of your incident, wow. I am in the process of ordering a set of sport glasses to use while flying. While the chances of needing to bail are small, it makes sense to insure that all the bases are covered to insure success. I ride a motorcycle so they will be multipurpose. You can spend a lot of money on the "nice to have" aspects of this sport.

Walt

On Sep 1, 1:02*am, Walt Connelly Walt.Connelly.
wrote:
JJ Sinclair;739478 Wrote:



I have felt for some time now that my back-pack parachute provides
little more than a false sense of security..............I don't think
I would ever get out of a spinning, tumbling ship. The BRS has been
demonstrated to work as low as 260 feet during the FAA certification
of the Cirrus. This could save you from a mid-air in the pattern or
that all time biggest killer. stall/spin turning final. BRS also
provides a way out of structural failures or pilot incapacitation. How
about stuck low on the wrong side of the ridge with nothing but trees
in all directions?

The BRS descent rate is about like a normal parachute (like stepping
off a 7' ledge). The Genesis installation calls for a 4-point bridle
that attaches to all 4 lift fittings, this will result in *a wings-
level, slight nose down attitude under the chuts. *Lowering the gear
will absorb some of the landing forces.

Flarm is great and I'd buy it in heartbeat if everybody had it. Lets
not forget that 2 of the 4 mid-airs in the US last year involved a tow
plane and some of them still don't even have radios, let alone
transpponders, Pcas or Flarm.

Bottom line is; We are all the chairman of our own safety committee
and we must take the actions we believe to be the best course to keep
us out of harms way. For me that includes installing a BRS.
Cheers,
JJ

I have always felt that listening to those with greater experience than
myself is one of the best safety devices. *Seems that today people spend
more time flying with their heads inside the cockpit than outside. *With
a parachute, BRS, FLARM, survival kit, bail out bottle, knife, gun,
flares, medical kit, lunch, snacks, condoms and everything else one
could carry in a glider, it's a wonder these things can get off the
ground.

As a relative newbie to the world of gliding, I have in my some 100
flight had two close calls. I consider myself a heads up kind of guy and
try hard to keep my head on a swivel, my eyes wide open and paying
attention. *

I have asked a few local pilots why it seems that the preferred color
for gliders appears to be white. *I understand that the sun might
degrade a more brightly painted ship faster than a base white one. *Is
this really true? *It would seem to me that the cheapest form of
avoidance would be making ourselves more visible. * I am in the market
for an older, aluminum ship and would consider painting it bright red if
it would increase my visibility. *

I understand that FLARM only works if the other guy has one. *I guess
for the time being I will have to depend on my parachute and luck for
survival, along with a healthy dose of paying attention. *

Walt

--
Walt Connelly

There is a problem with darker colors on the majority of composite
sailplanes. The darker colors get hotter by absorbing more heat in the
sun, and at a certain temperature the glass/epoxy matrix will begin to
loose its structural integrity. Look up T sub G. Go to your glider
field in the midday sun and put your hand on a glass ship painted
white, do the same on a red 1-26.

Mike "0"

On Sep 1, 12:02*am, Walt Connelly Walt.Connelly.
wrote:
this really true? *It would seem to me that the cheapest form of
avoidance would be making ourselves more visible. * I am in the market
for an older, aluminum ship and would consider painting it bright red if
it would increase my visibility. *

The BGA did a study and bottom line is the only thing that really
helps is adding highly reflective bits to leading and trailing edges.
Bright colors and contrasting colors end up being worthless at
anything but close range, is my understanding.

-Tom

On 9/4/2010 11:47 AM, 5Z wrote:
On Sep 1, 12:02 am, Walt ConnellyWalt.Connelly.
wrote:
this really true? It would seem to me that the cheapest form of
avoidance would be making ourselves more visible. I am in the market
for an older, aluminum ship and would consider painting it bright red if
it would increase my visibility.

The BGA did a study and bottom line is the only thing that really
helps is adding highly reflective bits to leading and trailing edges.
Bright colors and contrasting colors end up being worthless at
anything but close range, is my understanding.

-Tom

One good test is worth a thousand considered opinions. But that's just my
opinion...

Seriously, I doubt there's any single color/device that is '100% visually
"best".' The devil's in the details. F'r'example...

Reflective tape is likely pretty ineffective unless in non-diffuse sunlight.

Solid yellow is definitely better/more visible than many other primary colors
I've seen on sailplanes under many lighting conditions...but virtually
disappears in certain conditions of beneath-cloud shadow. Both observations
true for distant sightings, too, at least with my eyes.

In 'essentially solid color terms', dark orange is probably 2nd-best IMHO,
with red less so. Blue and green not so good, though against certain
backgrounds both can stand out.

Shiny silver is mostly excellent camouflage.

So anyone looking for a 'panacea visibility scheme' is likely doomed to
disappointment...but anyone rationalizing 'white is as good as anything else'
is (arguably) - and easily personally testable by keeping a good lookout in an
environment of mixed sailplane colors - wrong.

YMMV.

Bob W.

Bob Whelan wrote:
So anyone looking for a 'panacea visibility scheme' is likely doomed
to disappointment...

High intensity flashing beacon powered from a solar-charged battery? ;-)

(Haven't checked to see if such a thing already exists.)

As regards conspicuity colour schemes - there was a study some years
ago by (IIRC) the RAF that concluded that black was the colour that
allowed earliest visual acquisition because it had the highest colour
density.

This is purely personal opinion but I think that there is a lot of
confusion between "attention keeping" and "ease of visual acquisition"
and I think that brightly coloured gliders are a positively bad
thing. They tend to attract and keep other pilots attention - partly
involuntarily and partly cognitively as you start to ponder what a
nice bright glider it is and how well it stands out against the
scenery, all the time reducing look out elsewhere. I discipline
myself to look elsewhere when I see a coloured glider. I have never
once thought that I have seen a coloured glider earlier than another
white one flying next to it - even flying against a snowy
backdrop.

We have several RAF cadet scheme gliders at our site over the summers
and they have large dayglow areas on the wings and reflective strips.
I have been studying from the ground whether I can see them in the air
any sooner than the similar white club gliders and I am completely
unconvinced.

Good lookout supplemented by Flarm are the best we have at present.

John Galloway