What happens when a line/lead out breaks?

[John Cralley]

Yesterday, I got the latest issue of Control Line World and, as usual, I read it from cover to cover. By the way, this is a great magazine and if you fly control line and don't subscribe you should check it out at the Brodak web site.

Anyway, one article covers repairs after a crash. I'm somewhat acquainted with the subject (see my signature below) and I read it with interest. One of the repair jobs followed the parting of the down control line/lead out. If the up control parts fail, unless you are in the upper part of the hemisphere, you are usually immediately toast. In this case, what was essentially a tethered model with only up elevator did a series of inside loops. Each loop with a lower bottom until pancake on concrete ended the flight. Hopefully this kind of failure is rare (don't we wish) but many years ago, 1949 to be exact, I had the same experience. No down only full up! My plane survived because I discovered that if I let the line go slack on the up leg of the loop the plane would gain altitude so I could control the height of the loops. When the fuel finally ran out I was able to land by controlling the tension on the line. Admittedly I was a whole heck of a lot quicker on my feet back then than now, so I'm sure I could not pull it off today.

The moral is, don't just stand there and and watch your plane loop its way into the ground, do the one line tension control bit and maybe you can save your model.

[Howard Rush]

Phil Granderson sometimes fakes a broken line in combat.  His opponent lets down his guard and Phil pounces on him.  The problem with this is that we all remember the trick afterward, so he has to wait ten years or so for us to forget it.  Then he does it again. 

[Leo Mehl]

Phil Granderson sometimes fakes a broken line in combat.  His opponent lets down his guard and Phil pounces on him.  The problem with this is that we all remember the trick afterward, so he has to wait ten years or so for us to forget it.  Then he does it again. 

I didn't know Phil was that crafty. It won't work in stunt tho. I like his enthusism for sculdugery!

[minnesotamodeler]

We did the one-line tension thing in combat many years ago; as you say, just throw some slack into the line on the "up" side of the loop and you can work it up as high as you need. If the other guy was in the dirt you could gain valuable air time that way. But we used swivels on our lines back then too (it was the 60s; things change).  I'm not sure how many twists a single line would hold up to today without them.

[George]

First time I had a line break was back in the late fifties while flying a Max-1 .15 powered, full-fuse flapped stunter (scaled-down Ruffy). Using an old set of non-stainless .012's that had apparently developed some rust since I had last used them...good for one pull test. 

Pulled full-up from level flight for that tight corner. Plane headed up, then went into a very tight outside loop...yup! the up line broke. After a couple of loops, each getting lower, I lunged forward to release tension in hopes that it would make a very shallow one-point landing for minimal damage. It worked and at home I made the necessary minor repairs...and threw out all my old lines and kept (and checked) only the new ones.

George