Tie down knot

brien23

brien23

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Brien
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How to tie down a airplane, lots of slip knots worthless, gordian knot. use of chain tie down hopeless, do pilots not know how to use them. How can so many pilots not know how to use a tie down rope or chain. AC 20-35c is a great information on how to tie down a airplane.
 
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^^^ That is THE knot to use. Unfortunately what i see is, "If you don't know the right knot, tie a lot of them."
 
brien23 said:
How can so many pilots not know how to use a tie down rope or chain.
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wrbix said:
Yeah, hate it when I assiduously tie down and the planes on each side are free to fly.
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What? Humans lulled into complacency rather than expending effort trying to learn anything above and beyond the minimum? Say it ain’t so...

The flight school where I got my start made the midshipman’s knot a mandatory part of their early training curriculum. Can’t agree more for it’s benefits, not just with my airplane.
 
I'll admit I'm one of those guys, never could tie a decent knot. I very seldom need to tie down, I have hanger space at 2 airports, one is home base the other is near our cabin, so my plane is parked inside 99% of the time. For the rare occasion that I need to tie down I carry a set of ratchet straps. IMO easier to use and I always have them, most small airports that I land at don't have chain or ropes anyway.
 
Hurricane knot works , too.

But I use one that is visually more satisfying: make the loop, run the working end three times around the staying rope then the working end through the loop and back through the last run around the rope.

The end result is secure and has a certain presence -- if wind were a person it would be intimidated.
 
wrbix said:
Yeah, hate it when I assiduously tie down and the planes on each side are free to fly. It's not that hard or time consuming!
Midshipman's knot is my fav: https://www.netknots.com/rope_knots/midshipmans-hitch
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I think the diagram doesn't do a good job of explaining how that 2nd wrap is supposed to look. I see a lot of incorrectly tied midshipman's hitches where the 2nd wrap is not laid into the first, and will slip in a gust.
 
Scott@KTYR said:
I use the Tautline hitch knot
https://www.netknots.com/rope_knots/tautline-hitch
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I used to do this, they held up my tents for years. But one time my not-so-crusty CFI tied one wing and I did the other. Much to my surprise, my wing was loose the next day, and her "loop it through twice and pull" wasn't. So I have reluctantly converted to the nameless thing repeated as many times as there is rope.

Since I don't like mesing with ratchet straps, and because they are heavy, I carry a set of tie down ropes in the back. An eye splice in one end, and end splice for the other, tying down is easy if there are no ropes when I travel. And I can have all three put away (loop the long ones for the wing, wrap the short tail line around them) before you can get your first ratchet strap straightened out . . .
 
Been using three strand line with marine SS shackles which attach to the ramp, chain or cable, eyespliced on the end, and a back splice on the other end that I tie a bowline onto the plane with, works well, the hitch also works well.

I don't touch metal from onto my plane, not chains or hooks from straps
 
I've always used the midshipman's hitch as my first CFI taught me.

I would never use a ratchet strap for tiedown. The hook can fall out of the tiedown ring on the plane if it shakes and isn't tight... and it's easy to put enough tension on the ratchet to actually damage the plane. Too many times I've walked by other people's planes with ratchet straps on the ground after they fell out.
 
brien23 said:
How to tie down a airplane, lots of slip knots worthless, gordian knot. use of chain tie down hopeless, do pilots not know how to use them. How can so many pilots not know how to use a tie down rope or chain. AC 20-35c is a great information on how to tie down a airplane.
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One of the reasons I bought a plane was because of how bad people tie down planes. Sometimes people just don’t use any common sense and can take 2 people and/or 15 minutes to get the plane untied...
Two examples I have come across in the last month.

A new member in our club decided that that chain needed to be tight, I found this (two people to undo)
64811124c3b34280f2b220474858f5b3.jpg


Somebody decided to shorten the chain at hook that attaches to the plane. This was incredibly difficult to undo.
ffb3891aaa7ceda64245a219a5c2b5c5.jpg
 
People can't even tie their shoes with a square knot (double slipped reef knot if you prefer) instead of a granny - and you expect them to tie down and airplane?

Just look at peoples shoes next time you go to the store...
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
People can't even tie their shoes with a square knot (double slipped reef knot if you prefer) instead of a granny - and you expect them to tie down and airplane?

Just look at peoples shoes next time you go to the store...
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Geoffrey,

I have to tell an embarrassing tale on myself.

I must be a bit slow on some things, but one day in my mid twenties while home sick I got to wondering why my damn shoes kept coming untied. Sat there tying them and analyzing.
It suddenly dawned on me that I was not tying a square knot.

I'm predominately left-handed and even though people had demonstrated the proper square knot I was following their motions and not doing it properly. Right over left, left over right. I could always tie other knots but that eluded me for a time. o_O
 
Norman said:
Geoffrey,

I have to tell an embarrassing tale on myself.

I must be a bit slow on some things, but one day in my mid twenties while home sick I got to wondering why my damn shoes kept coming untied. Sat there tying them and analyzing.
It suddenly dawned on me that I was not tying a square knot.

I'm predominately left-handed and even though people had demonstrated the proper square knot I was following their motions and not doing it properly. Right over left, left over right. I could always tie other knots but that eluded me for a time. o_O
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I was making sure that I was tying my shoes with a square "knot" (actually a square bow, I guess), but was still having trouble with my shoes coming untied. Finally I tried replacing the laces, and it seems much better now. The ones I was using had kind of a stretchy/springy quality, which caused them to work loose pretty quickly.
 
Zeldman said:
Man, my wife gets all pizzed when I bring the tie down ropes out......
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How long you been married? She should be used to it by now. Try something new, chains, handcuffs, duct tape...
 
Apparently you guys aren't going to run for political office.
 
tinerj said:
Apparently you guys aren't going to run for political office.
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That ship sailed decades ago for some of us, present company included (regardless of how reformed we may be now...or not).

Also, that saying doesn't really apply any more, look at some of our politicians today!
 
Anyone find a good picture or video of the way to use chains at a airport to tie you plane down. So many just use the hook and not push the link through another and hook the other side to keep it from falling out.
 
SkyDog58 said:
If Roy Moore wins, I just might give it a go.
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In this nutty state he probably will win. Hell he's been kicked out of office twice and fools keep voting him back in.
 
Judge (me not) Moore - Teflon coated rubber ...... nothing sticks and keeps bouncing back.
 
......re tying shoes: my Google-fu is currently failing me (rarely does), but Lefty Kreh wrote a book entirely of fishing knots, with the single exception of a knot with which to tie one's shoes - never seems to self fail and still untied with pulls on free ends (won't even try to step-by-step here).
 
I like to make my tie down ropes 20' long with an eye in one end. then pass the bitter end thru the tie down ring on the aircraft. next the bitter end goes thru the pad eye in the ramp and then thru the eye end of the rope. Pull the rope tight, form a half hitch to bind it.
 
Moore may be a sleaze ball, but the way this accusation came about. smacks of election fraud.
 
Tom-D said:
Moore may be a sleaze ball, but the way this accusation came about. smacks of election fraud.
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A little closer to all this I live here, and folks in Gadsden (where he's from I think) say everyone in town knows he'd cruise the mall for under aged girls. Supposedly mall management banned him from the mall at one time. He's definitely different.
 
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