.

[Nicos]

Rough edit from the maiden flight... footage mostly failed, but hey.

Harness works GREAT!!

[Charlie Romeo]

You sure have my attention with your clever trick harness Nico!...That"s certainly something I have never seen before. Well done to follow through from concept to working model, maybe when I get older I will need one?....I can think up some advantages to your Morph"design", time will tell, good luck Col

[billpain]

Nic has been doing a great job of giving me feedback in the development of this product. Full info can be found at www.cloud9morph.com
Here is another video link

[Roadrunner71]

Hi Nico:

That Harness you have looks cool, well I think it looks Cool anyways. bet it is fun to be able to re-position your body while in flight.

[Nicos]

Yeah, it's an old idea that's come of age. Not at all something I'm responsible for, but have made some contributions to its development along the way. More info about the harness and its history at https://www.cloud9morph.com

I found that seated alone just wasn't enough. There are times you want to be flying prone.

Pretty awesome being able to choose both inflight... best of both worlds. Bill is working a boot attachment module such that the harness will be fully enclosed too — the hope is that many pilots like me (limited by injury/age) will keep on flying. We'll see.

Go buy one, spread the word through your networks, go fourth!

[USHPA7]

Often time change comes about with several different people working independently toward a common goal. Anthropologists have determined that the bow and arrow was simultaneously developed in different parts of the world by totally different cultures.

I always flew seated during the 1970's, no desire to go prone, and when I returned to hang gliding in 2015 I really missed flying in the seated position but didn't try to change that.

Then i joined Jim Fenison helping to develop his suprone system in conjunction with High Energy Sports. One day i brought in my 1973 Eipper swing seat to show Mike Berge what we used to fly in. Betty was there and asked me how high I had been in that and I said: "I don't know, probably 3000 or 5000 feet". her concern was because of the way i had attached a spreader bar.

That day the ide hit me to develop a modern version of the old Sears swing seat and i worked with HES through 3 generations of the design to come up with what i'm flying now.

I also developed a control bar adapter so that a prone rigged glider could be flown with a swing seat. Since the base tube is still in the forward prone position it eliminates one of the old problems with seated flying - not being able to get far enough forward for high speed.

The seated harness was made custom for me but High Energy Sports will be making them available for sale in the future. This harness has a chest strap so a pilot could get in the forward leaning position of prone, with arms inside the hang straps, but it is not designed as dual purpose harness. I did not see a need to convert seated or prone in one harness. I like specific deigns to serve the purpose they are most likely to be used in.

I've attached a photo of the bar adapters and the harness.

Frank Colver

finished version.JPG (241.49 KiB) Viewed 1856 times

Finished design 3rd of the seat harness.JPG (299.05 KiB) Viewed 1856 times

[Nicos]

Looks good Frank — I also like the workshop!

[USHPA7]

I'm going to be at Point of the Mountain next week with it (the swing seat not the shop). I was hoping to get Jim Fenison over there with his suprone system but he has sent his stuff back to HES for more mods.

I see a new future for hang gliding where pilots choose from several different ways of flying position depending on what they desire. This should help breath new life into our sport. Jim has had several different PG pilots tell him that they are switching to hang gliding as soon as his suprone system is available.

I didn't want to fly prone when I was 40 I sure don't want the neck problems it would bring at 83! And the hang glider pilots are aging.

Kudos to you for your efforts in this direction, its time has come.

Frank

[Nicos]

I hope its time has come. I'm optimistic. Thanks to folks like yourself and Jim – we ain't doing this for the money.

For me, there's just no getting around the fact that sometimes I want/need to fly prone:

• scratching close to the hill

• eeking out a glide to get somewhere

• needing to penetrate when the wind picks up too much

• fast flying fun

• aerobatics

• racing

But from this point onwards I can chose in a moment what position to use.. I imagine it'll be 90% seated. If enough folk get into it maybe we can start having a seated class at comps too, why not!

The more options we have, the better I'd say

[dbotos]

Sweet! I remember seeing Bill's video of an early prototype a while back on YouTube. Does the harness have provisions for platform (truck/boat) towing and/or aerotowing? I'm currently truck towing as part of my training and have been wanting to try flying suprone. If I could fly prone while on tow and then transition to suprone after release, that would be great.

[Nicos]

Launching and landing is pretty much exactly the same as in a standard pod/stirrup harness. I can't see any issues with aerotowing, though I've not truck towed before so can't say much there — but I don't see why not.

I guess that's the magic here, there is no learning curve required, launch, landing and prone flying is exactly the same. The design is elegant in its simplicity. And it negates the process I went through of spending time/money/energy making bars etc, and launching with fingers tightly crossed. This process led me to the disappointing realization that I couldn't have 100% control authority in a seated position compared to prone. Others say they have full control flying seated, but I can't see it and physics too suggests otherwise. Perhaps full control authority is not a big deal for some, but was for me.

Once you are away from terrain, you can start practicing transitions and seated flying itself. Transitioning is quite quick and easy, but I'd recommend practicing hanging from a tree for a while before heading to launch (and you know the old rule about not introducing more than one new thing at a time). Either way, you want to have it properly adjusted beforehand so that it fits your preferred setup and you are familiar with it's functionality. There should be an instructional setup video released soon, along with one about the finer points of transitioning.

The glider still flies the same, though weightshifting while seated uses a different set of muscles and requires a little practice to commit to muscle memory... it just feels a bit unfamiliar and strange at first. As you would expect. It's a different perspective to see your wing ahead of you flying along, and you hear different noises coming off the wing. It's cool. And of course when flying seated, you don't need to use your hands/arms

It's so nice to be able to boat around so effortlessly and without pain... and when you feel like going fast, just drop into prone and stuff the bar — perfect! This thing ain't like a bog standard PG harness, in that you can adjust angles inflight and end up with a pretty aerodynamic position that is comfortable.

I'm extremely grateful to Bill for his efforts in getting this to market, so that others have an easy and quite economical way to get into seated flying. Oh, and so I can keep on flying safely for another few decades. It's changed everything for me.

[USHPA7]

Here I am at the 47th anniversary of hang gliding Otto Lilienthal meet at Dockweiler 5-27-2018 flying the 1st version of the seat harness. This seat was too wide among other things and is now in its 3rd generation design which seems to be the final version.

The 1st generation also had square corners on the bar adapters which are now curved.

Several pilots soared the bluff in the seat that day including Erica, the new USHPA communications director. The seated position is great for working close (dune grooming) because it is so easy to watch the tip that is inches from the bluff top or to pick up your feet if too close (or put them down and run to relaunch)

Frank

I'm flying my new swing seat & no hands.jpg (231.47 KiB) Viewed 1647 times

[Nicos]

Looks nice n' comfy! Nice one

[billpain]

Super simple, nice. That WW glider looks like a real super floater.

[billpain]

Sweet! I remember seeing Bill's video of an early prototype a while back on YouTube. Does the harness have provisions for platform (truck/boat) towing and/or aerotowing? I'm currently truck towing as part of my training and have been wanting to try flying suprone. If I could fly prone while on tow and then transition to suprone after release, that would be great.

Simple answer is yes. I just need to get with a towing pilot to make sure we get it right. Also retro fitting should be easy. There is already a continuous line of webbing running both sides down the front of the harness so attaching towing loops should be real easy.

[USHPA7]

I just got back from High Energy Sports where i had foot stirrup attachment hardware added to my swing seat harness. That will make it more comfortable for longer flights.

Yes, the WW Condor 330 is a real floater and does a beautiful job of soaring the 25 feet high dune bluff at Dockweiler. Especially when it isn't an 83 year old fat guy like me in the hands off photo.

F

[billpain]

I just got back from High Energy Sports where i had foot stirrup attachment hardware added to my swing seat harness. That will make it more comfortable for longer flights.

Yes, the WW Condor 330 is a real floater and does a beautiful job of soaring the 25 feet high dune bluff at Dockweiler. Especially when it isn't an 83 year old fat guy like me in the hands off photo.

F

Wow, 330 sq feet. In contrast I made a 130 sq foot prototype back in the 80s.

[USHPA7]

Many of us were a lot lighter back in the 80's.

[dbotos]

Sweet! I remember seeing Bill's video of an early prototype a while back on YouTube. Does the harness have provisions for platform (truck/boat) towing and/or aerotowing? I'm currently truck towing as part of my training and have been wanting to try flying suprone. If I could fly prone while on tow and then transition to suprone after release, that would be great.

Simple answer is yes. I just need to get with a towing pilot to make sure we get it right. Also retro fitting should be easy. There is already a continuous line of webbing running both sides down the front of the harness so attaching towing loops should be real easy.

Cool.

[billpain]

Morph info video just posted.