Harness (paraglider)
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The harness the Paragliding is a relatively comfortable seat on carabiner to the risers of the paraglider is connected. The pilot is strapped to the harness with leg and chest straps. The pilot can steer the paraglider by shifting his weight in the harness by shifting his weight on the seat board. The seat of the harness must be designed in such a way that it does not restrict the pilot's freedom of movement too much during take-off and landing, but offers the pilot a pleasant and comfortable seat during the flight (see hanging trauma ).
The rescue parachute and the accelerator system are connected to or integrated into the harness . The tow latch can also be attached to the harness or the carabiners for a winch launch .
Harness types
A safe harness is equipped with a protector under the seat board and on the back , which is intended to prevent back injuries in the event of a mislanding. Such protectors consist of foam or an airbag inflated by the airstream , or a combination of both systems. Such protectors are mandatory in Germany and Austria and must be type- tested . Harnesses with side protectors have also recently become available.
In the past, you therefore had to choose between low weight without passive safety or high passive safety with great weight and packing volume.
Seat harness
The seat harness is the normal harness described above. The pilot is in an upright sitting position with his legs hanging freely. Corresponding harnesses are used in training and by the majority of recreational pilots. The transition between seat and light harness is now fluid. Most seat harnesses allow the use of various accessories. The most common ones include the cockpit, which is a strap for flight electronics, radios, cameras or the like, which is usually attached to the carabiners, the leg extension, a belt-like device that holds the pilot's legs in a horizontal position during flight , which lowers the air resistance and the leg bag, which is normally only used in conjunction with a leg extension. The combination of a leg bag and leg extension system lowers the air resistance to a level that is between that of a recumbent harness and a normal seat harness, but without all of the disadvantages of a recumbent harness described below. However, this is only recommended for experienced pilots, as there have been repeated incidents in which pilots assumed they were seated correctly due to the tight connection in the leg bag, but the leg straps were actually open.
Light harnesses
There are also harnesses that have as little material as possible and therefore also weight. The lightest harnesses weigh less than 500 grams; However, they dispense entirely with the above-mentioned safety features and in some cases also with a fixed seat board, which means that some of the extremely weight-reduced harnesses are not officially approved in Germany.
Reversible harnesses
A new category of light harness offers a successful compromise and a lot of comfort: reversible harnesses with or without an airbag. The amazingly comfortable airbag or non-airbag harnesses can be turned into a rucksack by simply turning them around and offer space for a normal-sized paraglider, emergency parachute and helmet. At the same time there is no need for a pack sack, which saves an additional 1–2 kilos. The safety of these harnesses corresponds to that of conventional harnesses. This was invented and patented (patent DE-19918599) by the inventor Oliver Schubert. In 1999 he made the first ever flyable prototype available to the market. The focus of his reversible harness invention is on the comfort and safety advantage that it achieves over a normal harness through significantly improved ergonomics, weight savings and improved handling.
Recumbent harnesses
Competition pilots mainly use aerodynamically optimized harnesses, which manifests itself in extensive coverage of the legs and a lying flight position. However, such harnesses are more prone to twisting , which is why they should only be flown by experienced pilots. Interestingly, with a recumbent harness the air resistance of the pilot decreases, which results in a higher angle of attack of the paraglider canopy, which leads to a lower speed but a smaller minimum sink, furthermore the glide ratio increases by approx. 1, which means that one meter sinks into one is converted by 1 m more sliding distance. The effect of the slower sinking and the correspondingly slower forward travel is partially compensated by (competition) pilots on thermally active days with additional weights in the harness, which causes the sinking and the speed to shift back to the original situation, but the pilot gains glide performance.
history
The modern paraglider harnesses developed from the harnesses of the parachutists. Since only short flight times were possible at the beginning, the associated upright hanging position was the logical consequence.
The extension of flight times meant that more and more comfort was required. Attaching a plywood seat board also resulted in a more sitting flight position. Later "airbags" and aerodynamic panels were added, which led to today's reclining harnesses.