Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!cbnews!cbnews!military From: wmartin@STL-06SIMA.ARMY.MIL (Will Martin) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Aircraft brake/drag chutes Message-ID: <1991Feb4.052210.14959@cbnews.att.com> Date: 4 Feb 91 05:22:10 GMT Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker) Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories Lines: 36 Approved: military@att.att.com From: Will Martin Regarding aircraft that have braking or drag parachutes that can be deployed during landing: 1) Are they regularly used every landing, or only in exceptional circumstances, such as on runways too short for a chute-less landing? 2) Can they be re-used, or are they destroyed by a single use? (Exhaust melts or ignites lines or fabric, or the strain of one use renders them unsafe for future reliability?) 3) If they are re-used, how are they re-packed? Do any aircraft have a mechanical roll-back-in device that sucks the chute back into the housing without manual intervention, making it reusable automatically? Or do they have to be gathered up and re-packed by ground crew or a rigger? Is that done while the chute is still attached to the aircraft, or is it removed? If the latter, are pre-packed chute packages a standard replacement part, where the crew just grabs one off the shelf and plugs it into the aircraft? Are these then a standard part used on many different models of aircraft, or are such chutes unique to each specific type? 4) Are there many different methods of housing such chutes on aircraft? That is, do some extrude from orifices, while others come out of clamshell-door pods? Are they deployed with explosive mechanisms, or just let fall into the airstream and open by that wind? 5) Where do they fasten to the airframe? It would seem the tip of the tail isn't all that strong, but aircraft with arresting hooks would need some sort of main-structure spar to hang that on, so the chute could be linked to that in those models. Is the existence of such a strongpoint the determining factor in whether an aircraft is equipped with a drag chute? Regards, Will wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil