Nice work, looking forward to see the results. Another idea would be to put an impulse on a line and then measure the resonance frequency of the line. Which I think is proportional to the square root of the tension.
Markus Luedin that's a really clever idea, didn't think of that. Might be tricky in practise as the line cascades up and branches off before it gets to the wing. But if it was like a guitar string like you say, pluck it and listen to the tone, will be somehow related to the tension
Andre Bandarra those branches are a lot shorter though, so there resonance frequency would be higher and could be filtered out. But I agree, the strain gauge is a lot simpler to apply. Just a question if it's sensitive enough.
@@AndreBandarra1 I would invest in this. A fully autonomous powered paraglider trike could become a feasible bussiness for cost effective: - Emergency evacuations - Remote payload delivery ( 2 to 400kg) - Endurance video/photography/ security surveillance/geotechnical surveys - Fire fighting, crop dusting While drones do this, fabric wings can do this more cost-effectively with more endurance/distance. Contact me....
I watched this video and also the first part .. I really would not like to fly a paraglider that acts by it's own... things can be so different of that a CPU things, 8 meter over your head. and maybee instead of a rapid brake, the glider need a hands-up to recover, and this for collapes.. furthermore , what happens when i do ears or bigears?. will it brake thinking that there is a collapse, as a pilot you well know that in this configuration the brakes must be released. Getting back to collapses, in siv clinics the teach us to look at the wing, and then act acordingly.. and accordingly can be a lot of things, wheight shift, brake input, or brake release. When i fly in bumpy air, and i feel that a collapse is next, i prepere for it, i put my legs closed under my bumm, fly with some brake to sense better the air, I assume an erect position, near the central harness fastner to have a smaller inertia in case of, other thing i do is to wheigtshift to compensate the bumps, listen the vario (collapses arrive often after a big thermal or so).. this as you know is called active flying. Remeber, a paraglider is designed to collapse.. and also to re-open quickly, depending from che EN class. Collapses dissipate the extra energy, rigid leading edge paragliders with bladders like kitesurfs were experimented in the past and were very dangerous, with the canopy flying under the pilot but i realize that this is not your case. As you know SWING is trying out the RAST system, that uses valves to keep trailing edge in pressure, meanwhile ther leading edge closes and dissipates the energy, this seems to work .. also if i would like to see how it reacts in real bumby air and not on a lake with calm air. Also hang gliders can suffer from severe turbolence, they the can tip (tumbling) and brakedown resulting in a rescue parachute launch, massimo pugi (check his channel) had this problem last summer, when his hang glider was tumbled inside a cloud. The best thing to do with paragliders is to fly a lot, and fly safe, make active flying and siv clincs atleast once a year, do not go in real bad places (venturi's, rotors and so on), in severe turbolence, ears or big ears can help to keep your wing open, remeber always of your big red handle on the right.. it can save your life.. some fatalites ths summer in italy happened beacuse the pilot did not launch his reserve.. ah, mabyee a reserve reminder (yes you forget you have it when your are in the shit) would be a better idea.. and easyer to make.. Anyway good luck with your experimentation.. but keep the active part (servos and so on) away from your K lines.
Very promissing idea. In my eyes I can see how "self-calling-pro-xc-paraglider-pwc-pilots" avoid using this thing as something that makes them less pro than uncle Ben who's not using it ;).
it doesn't help you searching thermals and making the right flight decisions, that's what makes them pro. 20% wing, 80% pilot remember (i'm not a self-calling-pro-xc-paraglider-pwc-pilot ;-) )
Interesting project! I'm not sure I'd want any automatic response but I'd definitely like an early warning on if I have a loss of tension in my A lines. If there's a very small "crush" type sensor you may be able to attach it to a small circular shape, then loop your A line around it, so when pressure is applied it's detected. Then wire that up to a light element of some kind so you can easily tell based on how bright the light is what your tension level is; and you could do so without any major modifications to your glider lines. I'd imagine such a thing costing very little to construct and installed in seconds. If desired you could also relay it to a sensor box for processing. I did have an idea of a "autopilot" type system that maintains heading and altitude by automatic control of your break lines and throttle; that may be a fun add-on once you work out the mechanism to pull the breaks. I wasn't sure how to pull this off exactly outside of an Android App connected to a raspberry pi via wifi which controlled some motors attached to lines that clipped on to the break toggles.
I'm going to be learning to fly come the end of April. I'll give this a try as well as acoustic measurement of the fs of the line if I can. Even if it does nothing other than create a data-set it could be fun and might result in magnified feedback for learning.
I think it cool what you're doing, it's something new - who knows what you'll find out? Be aware that if you succeed in removing the changes in line tension, you'll produce a wing with zero feedback, which prevents the pilot from sensing what is ahead of the leading edge and avoiding bad air or anticipating the collapses. Also you can't read microlift lines that lead you into thermals. I think you need the tension differentials in a paraglider! There are also situations where you lose tension on the A's but you don't want something pulling down on the rear risers to compensate - exiting a sharp thermal transition for instance, you want the wing to accelerate - pulling down when you've lost airspeed in a reduced G transition will produce a stall. I think the decision making tree for mechanical inputs is going to be extremely challenging to get right, and each wing and size and condition will need it's own parameters. in SIV situations, it's going to be wickedly complicated. Rather let the pilot have feeling, and so have the information to make the instinctive decision.
Greg Hamerton thanks for the insight. I'm definitely more interested in the process and learning than the final product if there will ever be one. It might be too heavy, too bulky, too expensive or more likely not fit for purpose in all/most situations. Or even it might only be suitable for when there isn't a person on board? But still I find it interesting and challenging to attempt and for sure will learn a lot, at the very least just by reading the comments section :)
So is it going to be an uncollapbeble wing couse sensors will let the pilot know the situation of the wing before it collapses but it could collapse any way or it's a new technology that will keep the wing always stable in the air and never collapse??
I honestly don't know. I don't think you can make a self driving car that will never crash at all ever. There will always be exceptions. I do think it's possible to make a self driving car that on average is better at driving than the average human driver.
Thank you for your reply. What I'm trying to say is that a hang glider can never collapse couse it's designed to be like that and of course what the pilot does during the flight is on it's own responsibility .but do you think there will be a new technology that will keep the wing always stable and not be that easly influenced by thermals or rotors that will collapse it or deflate it ? I think in many accidents it happens just after take off when there is not much time to recover for the wing if a collapse happens .
I understand the effort you putting into this and give you thumbs up. But why not invent a solution that prevent physically collapse(like with a sail with lightweight-spars or like a surfkite with airtubes). I think the solution should be rather simpel instead of high tech, but just my 2 cents...
That's a good point Alexander, but have a look at Greg Hammerton's onto why having a rigid paraglider structure might not be beneficial in certain situations
I understand where you are coming from and maybe a path will follow. One problem though with an air tube is that it works fine for kite-surfing but when to get to 10,000 feet or more in a para-glider the air expansion in the tube is HUGE.
Hi Andre, what about this vid? ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-LDzLM5Y0wA0.html looks quite interesting also! ;-) As I'm an old-skool kiter my old flexifoils had a narrow leading edge of mesh which also kept the wing inflated
ive got an idea for an uncollapsable paraglider... hang gliding. if u want your wing to not collapse then go to a solid wing. no need to overcomplicate paragliding. plus with enough training a pilot will most likely be better at dealing with collapses than a computer will ever be
