I don't like to make a lot of hasty adjustments to my gear.  I believe that when you're learning acro, it's typically time and training that takes you to the next level and not the gear that's holding you back.  Yesterday there was an exception to my rule.  I've always flown with brake pulleys and resisted changing over to free brakes.  I had the feeling that I may take a step backwards getting used to the different feel.  I had tried it a few times in the past but didn't stick with it.

I've been struggling to correct the oscillations from initialing entering into to heli.  The positive side has to accelerate and begin the rotation.  Your body always lags slightly behind and as it tries to match the speed of the wing, an oscillation begins.  If you don't dampen it right away, it continues to build with more amplitude until finally the glider collapses.    

Generally you see the pros hold their hands out when they heli and make slight adjustment, so that's what I've always done.  With pulleys attached, each movement of the hand initiates an increase or decrease on every upper brake cascade.  The first oscillation makes it difficult to hold your arms steady and induces input to the entire trailing edge.  This amplifies the oscillation and makes it more difficult to settle down.  Each turn gets more wobbly and it looks ugly.  If your going to fly pulleys, it's best to keep your hands close to the risers.

With free brakes, we can reduce the effective input to the entire trailing edge.  Acro glider brakes have very long cascades and short mains.  With arms out and hands spread wide,  the majority of the input is directed to the center brake cascades and work as a fine input since the center is rotating at a slower speed than the tips.  After initiating the first rotation from deep stall, I immediately felt more control matching my bodies rotation speed to the gliders.  

I still need more practice but definitely feel this equipment adjustment was well overdue.    

Ryan

This test was initiated from 1500' over water.  The parachute is a Raven 4 measuring 282 square feet with an all up weight of 125kg.  I used a fairly standard BASE packing method similar to what Supair shows in their video.  Round type shackles should connect to the risers, never use standard carabiners.  Investigations have shown that it's possible for the second ring to bind in the biner and prevent detachment.    Make 100% certain that the small link from the deployment bridle is attached to the hole in the shackle screw.  This could easily be overlooked.  Do not attach the bridle directly to the shackle as this could cause the second ring to bind when releasing.

After finishing 3 days of beginning acro on a Hook 2, Luke was ready for a more dynamic glider.  He chose the new Redout 19 freestyle wing by U-Turn.  I had no first hand experience with Redout and was excited to see how it performed.  I include over water training with the purchase of a glider so we scheduled a day and he got acquainted.

Redout fly's more like an acro glider than a freestyler.  Luke went from a sloppy rag to a solid air foil.  The glider builds plenty of energy and with less than a 360 turn it's nose down.  Luke noted short brake pull and  very responsive to weight shift.  We didn't get to deep stall and technical flying but as far as dynamic maneuvers, Redout works good!

Luke has already had several long mountain flights so Redout thermals and climbs too.  Looks like U-turn has got this one right and greatly improved over the Free Force 3 that I learned on.