Tow rope length?

It seems that most operations here in the USA use a 200' tow rope, and I've heard that some places in Europe even use a rope as short as 120'. Ropes at our operation are more like 275' because it seems safer and easier when it's longer. What is the rational behind using shorter ropes? I see no reason for short ropes unless you are towing out of a short field.

Boggs

In Europe, most places I've seen use 40 m / 120 ft. Why any longer ?!

A longer rope gives you much more time to react to everything. I think it is much safer.

Boggs

We start with a ~200' rope, it allows doing multiple new ends and still be a reasonable length, it also allows (when close to full length) more glider movement but keeping the angular distance to the tug reasonable.
When the rope gets towards 100', we either splice two short ropes together or use it for ground ops.

Short ropes are also useful when doing an aero retrieve from a short field.

On Tuesday, October 18, 2016 at 9:39:24 AM UTC-4, Charlie M. (UH & 002 owner/pilot) wrote:
We start with a ~200' rope, it allows doing multiple new ends and still be a reasonable length, it also allows (when close to full length) more glider movement but keeping the angular distance to the tug reasonable.
When the rope gets towards 100', we either splice two short ropes together or use it for ground ops.

Short ropes are also useful when doing an aero retrieve from a short field.

Correction Charlie- We start at 225 feet and add length when we get down to about 175 feet.
Short ropes make it harder, especially for students to keep rope angle to the towplane in the "safe " range for any given position error.
We believe we reduce the probability of a tug upset by not letting ropes get too short.
FWIW
UH

British Gliding Association recomendation is 180 to 200ft and we are
in Europe (for a little while yet).

On Tue, 18 Oct 2016 06:18:12 -0700 (PDT), Waveguru
wrote:

It seems that most operations here in the USA use a 200' tow rope, and I've heard that some places in Europe even use a rope as short as 120'. Ropes at our operation are more like 275' because it seems safer and easier when it's longer. What is the rational behind using shorter ropes? I see no reason for short ropes unless you are towing out of a short field.

Boggs

On Tuesday, October 18, 2016 at 4:18:15 PM UTC+3, Waveguru wrote:
It seems that most operations here in the USA use a 200' tow rope, and I've heard that some places in Europe even use a rope as short as 120'. Ropes at our operation are more like 275' because it seems safer and easier when it's longer. What is the rational behind using shorter ropes? I see no reason for short ropes unless you are towing out of a short field.

If you're towing out of a 1500+ ft field it's hard to see how 50 feet difference on the rope can make the difference between a clearly safe takeoff and a clearly unsafe takeoff.

Or, to look at it another way, if the tug climbs at a 1 in 10 angle (6 knots of climb at 60 knots forward speed), then 50 feet difference in the rope length makes 5 feet difference in clearance over the fence/trees.

Obviously I haven't been flying enough recently.......sigh......

Charlie M. (UH & 002 owner/pilot) wrote on 10/18/2016 6:39 AM:
We start with a ~200' rope, it allows doing multiple new ends and
still be a reasonable length, it also allows (when close to full
length) more glider movement but keeping the angular distance to the
tug reasonable. When the rope gets towards 100', we either splice two
short ropes together or use it for ground ops.

Short ropes are also useful when doing an aero retrieve from a short
field.

I do not want a tow out of a field where shorter rope is needed to make
it safe! An extra 100 feet is not enough safety margin. The best reason
I've read for a short rope out of a field is the dust kicks up behind
the glider, instead of in front of it.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"

https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1
- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Dec 2014a" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm

http://soaringsafety.org/prevention/...anes-2014A.pdf

On Tuesday, October 18, 2016 at 8:18:15 AM UTC-5, Waveguru wrote:
It seems that most operations here in the USA use a 200' tow rope, and I've heard that some places in Europe even use a rope as short as 120'. Ropes at our operation are more like 275' because it seems safer and easier when it's longer. What is the rational behind using shorter ropes? I see no reason for short ropes unless you are towing out of a short field.

Boggs

I believe in Poland the basic rope length is still 30 meters/100' when new. If it breaks again and again it might be reduced to 20 meters. In the ground school we were taught to make it as short as 10 meters or 33' for a tow from a short field following an outlanding, where there would be no wing runner. The wake would help to lift the wing immediately. Shorter than 100' ropes are also used for towing to a wave through a rotor.

Personally I never had an issue with the 30 m rope. No slacks plus the advantage of circling together in the 'team' towplane/glider in a search for a good thermal. Traditionally tow pilots feel responsible for helping the glider pilot and leaving them in a good upwind.

When, as a student pilot, I was flying my double silver distance Poznan-Leszno-Poznan (70 km) I intentionally landed in Leszno and was towed back in the air by the local tow plane, and it felt like the rope was longer than usual. For a student pilot, yes, admittedly, it felt a bit more comfortable, but not a big deal.

BravoMike