10% of brake is not good for paragliding - Bruce Goldsmith
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- Опубліковано 16 кві 2023
- Why you should not fly with little bit of brake on all the time. It used to be needed back in the day with older design wings, it is not true anymore.
I see this a lot during my courses, a lot of pilots are still being taught that it is a safe position to keep a bit of pressure on the glider at all times. This simply is not true anymore and dose the opposite, makes your wing a lot more pitch unstable and can and has created a lot of accidents close to the ground.
#paragliding #safty #flywithhandsup
@flybgd
What a controversy and how patient it is to explain the same thing 40 times. thanks for the video.
Music volume to load. No music would be best. Good information love to hear what is being said
Noted, thank you. I did notice this during the Premier, will make sure I turn it down for next ones.
@@FlyingKarlis +1 on that... Bed tracks are for boring stuff. It's what dayitme radio uses to keep you from noticing the rubbish you're listening too... Only hurts when the information is actually interesting and good!
@@mcbrite Noted! Working on improving this.
@@FlyingKarlis……..or just don’t put any music on at all! It is an instructional/information video.
Hey Karlis, great video as always, many thanks :)
Just a note, IMO the background music is a bit too loud, made it harder for me to focus on Bruce's speech.
Rock on! 🙏
Noted! I noticed that during the premier as well, I must of forgotten to lower the volume to the usual level during editing! Will make sure I don't do that again! ☺ Glad you enjoy the content!
Agreed. I could not follow the conversation. FWIW, I find music annoying especially the modern music that is not even musical.
Nice video. It would have been nice to distinguish between 10% brake and contact flying explicitly because it isn't entirely clear from the video that 'hands-up' means contact flying (without slack in the lines). Had to go to the comments to make sure I understood correctly. Small nitpick though. Again, nice video! :) Thanks!
Thank you, Jorma. After uploading the video, I relisted that it should have been made more clear. Unfortunately UA-cam dose not allow changing the video after uploading, I will make a follow video later on to make it more clear.
@@FlyingKarlis I think you can ad some kind of overlay in the section you want to amend
Why isn't anyone asking about arm fatigue? Brake line tension partly counters arm weight. Otherwise it's not possible to hold arms like that.
I can hold my arms up for up to 10 hour flight (I haven't flown longer than that in any one go so far) without relying on the brake lines to hold the weight of my arms. I guess it is matter of training and getting used to it.
Thank you for posting these great videos. I too trust what Bruce Goldsmith says and try to fly with my hands up and safe. Often I have been treated as a liar, but I will now explain this video as I introduce it to others.
Unfortunately there is quite a lot of misinformation out there. Especially on this topic, there are too many old school pilots who has not bothered to update their knowledge, this is one of the reasons I started to publish these interviews with industries experts, to pass on the knowledge to wider community.
@@FlyingKarlis I salute you for your boldness. I don't think there is anyone in Japan who can act like you. At least I don't know of any. I saw your post at a time when I was wondering why I was paragliding while being made fun of and wanted to quit paragliding already. I thought, I'll keep going just a little bit longer.
I am an inexperienced amateur and can't do anything about it, but I support your activities.
Thanks for this clever explanation about piloting modern wing's profiles 🙏 hoping that instructors and their instructors will get this obvious logical technique suiting reflex profiles ..! 😊 Fly safe and happy 🕊️
I hope so too! I would like to add, that Bruce are talking about regular free flight wings, not only full reflex wings.
Who can argue with the great Bruce Goldsmith..? I can. ;)
Not sure, what is the point of this comment?
Thank you for bringing this up. How do you prevent shoulder muscles from getting fatigued if no weight is applied to the brake handles at all?
You train them over time. I don't have any issue flying for up to 10 hours in one go.
Thanks, I'll bear this in mind from now on. Years ago I'd heard, fly with brakes a little engaged, when in active air in order to have more pressue in the glider. I don't know how much truth was in that.
I'm not sure if it was a good idea 15-20 years ago, it sure is not today.
One question: I fully support/use the "hands up" style of flying for engaged/advanced and pro pilots! The glide alone will be a lot better! - But on launch, I still keep a bit of brake for the first part... Too often you enter a stong thermal/upwind directly after launch (ie Bassano), I feel a lot safer with a bit of brake on that I can release to "punch through" the pitch back...
Same thing on entering a thermal, but that depends on the wing and other details, also you have tons of height/safety there...
Are you saying I'm still better off with hands up ALL the time and just correcting the pitch? Or can I still use brakes to hold a bit of acceleration in reserve to counter pitch back?
I also control my wing after take-off - it's contact positions (this is what Bruce meant by hands up) or active piloting meaning controlling the wing with more than say 10% brake input and releasing it back to contact position once the pitch control is done or the deflation avoided. What Bruce is talking here about is that floating around with your hands to your shoulders, is not a good idea with modern wings.
Dose this make it more clear?
interesting input never heard before. I think i´l experiment a little with this to see how much it is noticeable on my LM7 :-). In extreme turbulence i can´t judge right now how much brake i relay need to properly feel and react to the wing. but i´d guess something around 10%. My problem if i only pull out the slack i have just a few gr. "weight" to feel the glider. For 70-98% of the Conditions it´s enough. But in deep shit when it´s impossible to prevent just to soften/dempen big collapse, i´m way faster in pulling if i have good pressure, hands fall down more automatic if collaps comes in like thor´s hammer ;-). Still imported to actively feel the wing an differ between low pressure due to low air speed on profile / incoming collaps. (sometimes not so easy if changes in split seconds ;-) ) .
maybe i see something wrong but to me the video exampel´s do not show the effect well. The red wing was letting go of the brakes just when the glider was in the most backward position. / he open brakes during the shooting. once it´s above the pilot the brakes are around 10% than he brakes way to late when it´s already shooting and in front he apply relativ little brake instead of pulling full on. maybe not the best example since the reaction was overall not the best . I think in such a scenario it would have had the same result if he would have no brakes at all in the moment of shooting.
In your clip i see you most of the time with what i think is around 10% brake (trailing edge bend down most of the time) exapt for short moments when the glider is behind you and you want to let it fly. Or brake hard to stop it.
Would be Wonderfull to see professional pilots showing the effect with and without 10% brake on a correctly done stall / strong Pitch. Maybe thats something for Bruce and his company ?
Just have to mention that i realy enjoy Waching you videos thanks for the work and input Karlis! Hyperlapse is grate for learning and visualizing routs. A pitty i live so far away. maybe time for a grater vol biv to the western alps. :-)
Hey Ben, have a look at this video Bruce made some time ago - ua-cam.com/video/y7PHY1X6E-A/v-deo.html
To feel the wing the contact position is sufficient, meaning that you take the slack out of the brake lines while not bending the trailing edge. Of course when the air gets too rough we have to use the brakes or rare riser control to avoid collapses or control the pitch.
"The red wing was letting go of the brakes just when the glider was in the most backward position. / he open brakes during the shooting. once it´s above the pilot the brakes are around 10% than he brakes way to late when it´s already shooting and in front he apply relativ little brake instead of pulling full on. maybe not the best example since the reaction was overall not the best . I think in such a scenario it would have had the same result if he would have no brakes at all in the moment of shooting."
In this case if the pilot would have gone hands up all the way to contact position the collapse would have been a lot less aggressive.
"Would be Wonderfull to see professional pilots showing the effect with and without 10% brake on a correctly done stall / strong Pitch. Maybe thats something for Bruce and his company ?"
This is not a bad idea, I might do a video like this.
"Just have to mention that i realy enjoy Waching you videos thanks for the work and input Karlis! Hyperlapse is grate for learning and visualizing routs. A pitty i live so far away. maybe time for a grater vol biv to the western alps. :-)"
That would be quite a trip, would be happy to see you around Larange if you decide to come this way one of the days. Glad you find the content useful and educational!
Best of luck and let me know how your experimentation with different brake inputs goes.
Thanks for the great reply and caste good light on the video and I get to have a better guess when I get done ground handling.
in thermal flying : should we use the outside brake?
is it better to fly with minimum skink for better lift or the least use of brakes? thanks
I use outside brake all the time. Minimum sink for modern wings is close to contact position. I would say use as little brake input as posible and focuse on timming and anticipation.
How much does active flying on the rear risers disturb this profile? I tend to fly hands up a lot and try to only use back riser to stop small occilations and feel the air/wing. Also use bar to activly control pitch movement when i'm flying on bar. And if nessecary i will take over with little brake input, Or more if the glider is shooting forward faster off course.
To answer your question - it dose not disturbed the profile as much.
This is actually what I do as well. My Cure 2 has C/B steering, meaning that that the C risers are connected to B risers through a pulley system. Which helps controlling pitch a lot more effectively than if you only have your C risers. Even just with C risers for most small movements it is enough. Speed bar can also be used of-course. Basically, what you describe is active piloting as long as you let your wing fly after you fixed or avoided what neededs to be fixed or avoided.
@@FlyingKarlis, Good to hear i am doing the right thing😊 I fly a Swing Nyos RS. And i must say that i noticed the glide is much more efficient this way, And also the glider is less nervous if i just let it fly as much as possible. And it also has this connection between the riser groups.
I fly a Nyos RS as well! And am getting a lot more comfortable with using the c/b bridge. Absolutely love the wing though! Thanks for the Video Karlis! I have learned a lot by watching your channel!
@edwinlooy6551 Glad to hear! Yes the C/B steering is relatively new thing and has improved 3 liner riser control by a lot. I use the C/B steering all the time, sometimes I will even thermal with it and it works great on my Cure 2.
So happy that the content is helping you! ☺ I do love the C/B bridge as well, has made the control so much more effective!
Thanks a lot. Does it aplies to new c gliders concept?
Yes, it applies to all modern wings.
I think this means if an incident happens, like collapse or stall, go full hands up so when brake pressure returns the wings profile is correct. I have two older gliders that this isn't the case, but a brand new one that shoots like a bullet so I'll need to test this out for sure!
There is no simple answer what to do in case of an incident, as there are just so many variations of them. What Bruce is talking about is that you should not fly with constant shoulder position all the time, instead use contact positions, which is taking out the slack of the brake lines and not inducing any bending on trailing edge.
So, how do you fly actively then? If the hands are all the way up, how do you feel the wing and when to fly actively?
Contact position is where you feel the wing, which means you take out the slack from the brake lines, but do not induce bending on trailing edge. You use exactly as you say - actively to control the wing, instead of just floating around with brakes at your shoulder level - passively. To summaries - hands up means - contact position or hands down to actively pilot and always return back to hands up position. Bruce is not saying you should not use brakes, he's saying you use them when needed not just hold on to them all the time.
Dose this make it clearer?
@@FlyingKarlis right, so just a brief tension on the brakes, to feel the wing, not more.
My concern was that on some situations, especially bumpy air you might pull more, not intentionally and cause problems. Especially in turbulent conditions when the wing tends to go wild.
I am not having some major concerns here, as experience taught me the amount of tension I need to use, but some inexperienced pilot hearing this might, I'm afraid, avoid flying actively when necessary...
Right, as with everything in life so in paragliding, we have to take it step by step. If turbulent air is too scary then maybe it would be a better idea to fly in calmer conditions, till you figure out the controls and build experience as well as trust with your wing. Often having hands up (read contact position) will make the wing a lot more calm, then say holding your brake lines at your shoulder level.
In general avoiding active piloting is a bad idea, luck will run out eventually.
@@FlyingKarlis is this true on an A or a B glider?
Hi Karlis, please I think you need to edit the video with some writing on the screen to clarify this as this is going to cause a lot of confusion in the paragliding community... well it already has. I have had a student ask me about flying hands all the way up because he had heard Bruce say that's what you should do. I said that what he must have meant is at the contact position and not all the way up. It is really not clear in the video that hand up still means having contact with the wing and someone could get seriously hurt the next time they are in active air and they don't have contact with the wing and can't actively fly properly. Thanks for the good videos!
Absolutely correct, to 100%.
But they ain't listening anyway.
One pilot at the time, the culture is changing, it dose take time.
I’ve flown a number of (full reflex) paramotor wings on my motor setup but when i put my motor away and fly Paraglider wings (Ridge souring) I thought they we’re not reflex ? Can you tell me if the new Paraglider wings are starting to have full reflex on them ? Thanks and i agree less break better glide.
It's not about the reflex. What Bruce talks about is that by adding a bit of brakes you are creating a reversed reflex profile, opposite of a normal one, and this will create the pitch instability and will shoot a lot more agressive. This will hapen on any modern wing.
@@FlyingKarlis Sure I get that but I’m still not clear if the newer paraglider wing are Reflex there is a difference between standard versus reflex with paramotor wings so still need to do research on if new paragliding wing are reflex.
@@ChrisJewell7333 Most free flight wings has some of it, it might be in the wingtip a bit and nothing in the center or a bit in center and no reflex in the wing tips. It's relatively small procentige. That isn't the main reason the wings become more instable.
wonder how this applies to motor flying since our wings are trimmed for heavy reflex.
I don't fly motorized paragliding almost at all, but as it has stronger reflex and also has less line drag as it used to have back in the day, I would think it is even more important for paramotor wings.
@@FlyingKarlis I have the epsilon 9 and they show a special set of risers for para motors. Please compare and contrast these two sets of risers?
@@markmcgoveran6811 Good question, I'll have to look into this
@@markmcgoveran6811 but usually for free flight wings that are using ppg trimmers, there is a free flight position, which puts the wing in it's trim for free flight.
Normally paramotor risers, just add the option to accelerate the wing and as you say they have the regular trim setting for free flight, in this case you should fly with your hands at the contact position as Bruce talks about in this video.
How does one fly actively without pulling that 10% that adversely affect profile reflex? Also, how does a PG maintain reflex, without rigid battens and luff lines like a HG? Maybe just into a low but still positive AoA?? Great vids, thanks.
You keep contact position, which is when you take out the slack from the brake lines while not bending the trailing edge. This will allow you to feel the wing and it's movement, while not inducing any brakes. Then if the wing wants to pitch or deflate, you add as much brakes as needed to avoid any collapse or stop the wing from surging, right after that is done you go back to contact position.
Hope this makes it more clear.
@@FlyingKarlis Cool, thanks Karlis!
@@guyetlaurence7142 Bruce is an old HG pilot (like me) ;) but I cant help but think he has missed an important point (or two) here. :)) PG wings dont just rely on aerodynamic designs (reflex or negative reflex etc) but the key to what makes them safe to fly is the pendulum stability and pilot input (Wing designs are secondary to these primary two stability features). Adding 10% brakes does change the aerodynamic wing profile - in this case "negative reflex" (the lift profile of the wing changes resulting in a change in the center of lift etc) which is very undesirable in airfoil pitch stability - the effect is a pitch down moment in the wing. However the pendulum stability and the additional drag created by this over rides the negative effect Bruce is talking about. It is way more complex than just, dont add negative reflex as it makes the wing unstable, hypotheses. In the same manner I can say dont curve the tips down as it increases Anhedral and will make the wing way more role unstable and terrible to fly etc... But it doesnt - as long as we have weight (tight lines), the pendulum stability over rides that effect. The reality is the trouble starts when the pilot starts going weightless and then the "bad" aerodynamic design of the wing (terrible reflex etc) starts to show its presence... Oh Oh... ;) Better work more on those reflexes... :))
@@wild2flyparagliding160 That makes three of us!! Good points, thanks. Initially, I was struggling with how the profile reflex could resist negative AoA, à la HG. I then realized that PG reflex helps with low but still positive AoAs, not the negative AoA case of a HG. Accordingly, comments about letting the wing fly instead of deflecting the trailing edge down with some unnecessary tension, do indeed make sense. Of course, one also needs to fly actively as well!! Cheers
Aren't most PG flyers still on 3/4 liners? While this may apply to 2-line comp wings, most aren't flying those, and likely never will.
Most are on 3 liners these days, and even the 4 liners has a lot less lines compared to what it used to be. This is definitely important for any modern wing.
You could argue it's MORE important on 3-liner vs 2-liner... Because 2-liner has way better performance with brakes on... So that bit of brake will hurt you even more on a low wing...
@mcbrite What you are saying isn't true for 2-liners. These wings should be flown with as little brake input as possible even more so.
@@mcbritethat's not true, in fact we pilot 2 liners with the B lines and only use the brakes when turning in a thermal
So a 'safe' position in turbulence... Not 10pct on a modern wing... How about 30pct, wong flies slower, has more time to react to changing airmass, but no longer a reflec profioe.. akso. Is it safe to assume that any wing which is very pitch stable, has an element of reflex in it?
thx 4 rule this out
You're welcomed!
oh lord... this is massive!!!
😅😂 A conversation that is overdue in our paragliding community. Here's another video where Bruce talks about this - ua-cam.com/video/y7PHY1X6E-A/v-deo.html
I'm following this topic for a long time and even observed this pitch instability in many pilots around me but unfortunately there is a misunderstanding regarding keep brakes and active piloting... must of the time we cause the instability by reducing trim speed on our gliders...
@@Hemersonr Yes, I have seen it over and over as well, this is why I asked Bruce to sit down with me and talk about it. Bruce made a video about it allready 5 years ago - ua-cam.com/video/y7PHY1X6E-A/v-deo.html
@@FlyingKarlis yeap
this was a starting pointo for me on this subject
here in brasil we have many vintage wings still flying... 2007 and older... so the culture of applying some brake do ensure internal pressure and so on are spreaded through the country... but this concept of hand up and let it fly at trim speed sometimes cause some panic
But can you prevent a collapse without keeping a minimal pressure on the brakes ?
Yes, by adding more brake when needed and then letting it fly again.
@@FlyingKarlis but how to you feel the pressure loss without some brake pressure?
Just rest on back risers?
You keep contact position with the wing, meaning you take out the brake line slack without bending the railing edge, this is your contact position. You will feel the wing perfectly well this way and you'll be able to react as needed.
back risers work well for control as well, I switch between C's and brakes all the time.
Is this true with current day A Gliders as well?
Hi Christophe, yes it is true on all wings.
What about flying at minimum sink, do we not want to do that on modern gliders?
Most modern wings tent to fly better accelerated till about 30% bar, especially if it is thermic or some wind. If I want to be effective in conserve my altitude I'll fly at trim speed or a little bit of bar.
@@FlyingKarlis for any type of wing, minimum sink is a different speed than best L/D, by the law of physics. I seriously doubt you get min sink with a bit of bar, which is what David is asking. You can just check your instant vario rate and see you climb a bit faster with a tad of brakes, IMHO.
No. You want to fly at best glide, NOT at min sink. Best glide you get at trim, means hands up, or even a bit of acceleration. Depending on wing and trim.
OK to clarify, I do agree that when flying xc you do need to be hands up or fly quarter to half bar when on glide. Also with new c 2 liner most the time if not thermaling hands are resting on rear handles. However, say you are ridge soaring, and it’s a light/narrow band of lift and you don’t want to fall out of that lift I think you still need to fly at minimum sink correct me if I’m wrong?
@@davidberman8816 Min sink you want if you need to stretch the time. Best glide if you need to stretch distance.
Is he talking about conventional gliders without reflex or does he mean that the freeflight paragliders have some reflex in them now?
If they have reflex i see what he mean, if they dont i dont really see what he mean. Since hes talking about opposite to reflex, does he mean that pulling 10% brakes makes the wing wanna pich down?
Even if the wing dose not have a reflex build into it, which most free flight wings has some of it in different places and at different %. If you take a profile and add a bit of brake, you are creating a reverse reflex profile by that action. Reflex in it's simplest form means that the trailing edge is pointing upwards, which with brakes pulled a touch down dose the same just reversed. As Bruce talks about in this video, one of the main reasons is that modern wings has less line drag, and this is one of the contributing factors why the wings are more pitch unstable, when constantly adding about 10% brake input.
Dose this answer your question?
@@FlyingKarlis still a bit confusing. Relfex makes the wing wanna pitch up, if adding a bit of brake is the opposite of reflex then it should make the wing wanna pitch down/tuck. Is that what hes saying?
@@rickardjonsson4526 exactly! Another thing that normal reflex adds is that the wing dose not collapse as easy, this is why paramotor wings can go fast under full power and trims fully open, the trailing edge is bent upwards, and this forces the leading edge to stay open. Which in reverse state means during say a frontal collapse it will keep shooting longer and further down, compered to if you have no brakes at all. This is why it tis dangerous, it goes out of what certification test for, as they test collapses without any pilots input. The solution then is to control the wing with more brakes to stop the surge or to keep it at contact position to avoid the reflex reverse state, hands down or up actively as needed. Let me know if you have any more questions, happy to answer.
@@FlyingKarlis okey thanks then i understand. Very interesting!
@@rickardjonsson4526 Glad we could help
20% brake is better? Help just about to take off😢
Not sure what you're asking, there's more videos coming out where Theo De Blic and Malin Lobb is talking about this in more detail. Stay tuned!
Did it end?
The Premier did, the video is still available.
is this also true in mountain flying?
It's true with most modern wings, what Bruce means by hands up is "contact position" where you take out the slack from the brake lines while still not bending the trailing edge, this way you will be able to feel the wing, while still letting it fly.
@@FlyingKarlis alot like skydiving canopy- that makes sense! I know that mountains can be turbulent and I have been told that you want to keep a little brake on to increase the pressure in the wing which keeps it a bit more rigid through that turbulence. Bruce is saying to keep the wing in full flight- no brake pressure but also no slack in the brake lines. How does this work in turbulence?
@@logantorrence3906 In turbulence you should actively pilot the wing, meaning you use brake input when needed as much needed and once the wing is under control let it fly back to contact position. That's what active piloting is. And the more experience you get the less brake input you'll use to achieve the same result compared to lower airtime pilots, as it is about timing, the better the timming, the less brake input you'll need.
Floating around with constant pressure on brakes is the opposite of active piloting.
Dose this help?
@@FlyingKarlis perfect thank you!
@@logantorrence3906 🥰
Music far too loud, can't understand the message :(
Sorry about that, unfortunately I can't change that on this video, I will improve for the next ones!
Great video, really instructive. But lose the intrusive and inappropriate music!
Thank you, glad you like the video and thank you for your feed back about the music. For this video, I forgot to lower the back ground music's volume, for the future videos I will take it out all together.
@@FlyingKarlis brilliant. I didn't mean to sound rude. And a bit of quiet music in the background can sometimes add something to the video, but not while you're talking, just during the visuals only.
BTW, the last time I went paragliding was about 20 years ago. I'm sure my glider had too much drag to ever allow such wild oscillations! Keep the vids up, they're great!
-----> why this idiotic MUSIC in the " background " is it for " CULTURA " ?
No need to be rude. ☝ I did make a mistake with the volume for the background music and I will fix it for the future videos, unfortunately there is nothing I can do about it now as UA-cam dose not allow to change the video once uploaded.
HATE the background music. I want to hear what Bruce is saying!
do you need this stupid music background so one does not understand the words? what's the reason for that.
No need to be rude. ☝ I did make a mistake with the volume for the background music and I will fix it for the future videos, unfortunately there is nothing I can do about it now as UA-cam dose not allow to change the video once uploaded.
@@FlyingKarlis nothing rude about that: you can change the music probably like so: ua-cam.com/video/c9mXeZQFBHM/v-deo.html
@@pithoffstetter8970 Thank you for the video, this works if you have added the music through UA-cam Studio, I do all my editing on my laptop before posting, because of that in UA-cam Studio the background music is the same track as the main voice.
@@FlyingKarlis easy to change the audio from yt in the studio an then it seems to be adjustable, anyway good you work on that, nice vid
@@pithoffstetter8970 Actually, I might be able, to render just the adjusted audio from the original video and upload to UA-cam as extra audio file, that might work. Thank you for pointing this out, it might just work. Will attempt this later today.