![]() ![]() He was the guy that imported the Cirrus 5. Roly Lewis-Evans remembers Quote way back when I started at Birdman Ken Messenger supplied me with a brand new knee hanger harness supplied by Brian Harrison of Scot Kites. We had all seen guys flying prone in the Groundskimmer magazines, so all the early designs were based on the knee-hanger type. A quick stroll through the early ‘Wings’ magazines should prove the case. Mark Woodhams believes quote “John James of Wasp used to fly prone lying down on a seated harness, but I think the first commercial prone harness was introduced by Hiway, which I did the original add for. Both were manufactured for Scot Kites to a very high standard of quality by 'Troll', a mountaineering equipment company, and they went on to sell several hundred of each model, especially the ''2'', too other hang glider manufacturers in the UK, USA, and Europe. This was followed by Proneweb 2 which was a stirrup harness with two parallel alloy bars at the body sides to hold the shape. At that time Brian was running Scot Kites, and designed the Proneweb, a knee-hanger harness with a semi-solid body 'web'. He also says that UP and other USA manufacturers were also using a knee-hanger system. It’s believed that Hiway also made the first stirrup harness which was a great success and lasted many years till the Cocoon harness’s came along.īrian Harrison remembers that prone harnesses were being used, mainly by the Americans, Aussies and NZ flyers at Kossen in 1974. The Hiway Company also came up with the idea of a plastic seat to provide rigid support of the upper thighs, and a stirrup. At first it looked a little weird but was very functional idea. If you look at photos of his wasp at the time, you will see that he also increased the size of the ‘A’ frame for the reason mentioned above.īy the end of 1974 along came the knee hanger harnesses and gliders with larger ‘A’ frames. After seeing Terry Haynes flying, Frank, who at the time was working for the Duracel Batteries company in Crawley, also informs me that he altered a safety harness, and converted to flying prone. That's how the steering was achieved during those early days, as the ‘A’ frames were too narrow and pilot movement was very limited. It’s also worth mentioning that on the front cover of 1974 May issue of ‘Flypaper’ there is a photo of someone flying prone with his legs on the rear wires. Terry is reported to have made the harness after seeing a photo on the front cover of a US hang gliding magazine. ![]() Which he flew while connected to a Wasp 229. The prone harness first appeared in the UK during the early part of 1974.įrank Tarjanyi recalls that in early 1974 Terry Haynes from Waspair was the first to use a prone harness. ![]()
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