evan are u familiar with bucks county? know where van sant airport is?
i flew gliders there.. gliders use a long tow rope from a tow plane to the glider with 2 "weak links) added the weak link at the gliders end i think has to be between 150 and 200% of the gliders weight and the weak link at the tow plane end something like 50% stronger this is a safety feature so if the rope breaks it breaks at the glider so the glider can safely land cause if theres a 150 foot rope hanging from the nose it can tangle round wings or tail or catch on fences or trees while landing causing a cfrash also it alows you to intentionaly break it there if the tow rope release fails to release
now the point of this lesson is that the tow rope itself has to be significantly stronger then the 2 weak links so it wont break in the middle
now the 1st thing you do before hooking the tow rop to the plane is inspect it for knots as a knot can form when the tow plane lands so the groundsman will take the rope and run it through his hands from the tow plan to the weak link while the glider pilot watches from the cockpit looking for knots
a single knot in the tow rope can cause a rope break..and possibly a crash
1 knot weakens the tow rope a minumum of 30% sometimes more
srry long way of explaing wwhy tying a knot to fix a weak spot actualy weakens the weak spot more
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My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1