Safety modification for ring sights.....

[jose 0]

Hey all.... I am the kind of person that cannot leave well enough alone. I have to mess with everything as to leave my mark on it, call it personalization, call it too much time on my hands, or call it bored.

As I set my my new ring sight on my Hawkeye, I found that if I wanted to use my helmet for freeflying and tandem vids, I needed to figure out a way to rid my helmet of that nasty steel post thats such a hazard to everyone during big group freeflying. I didn't want to have to unscrew the mount every time I wanted to take it off, so I made some modifications to the whole extension post.

First, I drilled out the holes in the helmet to accept the threaded backing washers that I epoxyied to the inside of the helmet. Of course, that meant drilling out the threads in the articulating ring sight and milling the aluminum where the screw runs thru down about 3mm for a low profile. After shaving off the excess of the threaded backing washers that protruded thru the helmet, I bolted the mount to the helmet and epoxied the washers to the inside of the helmet. I let that set for 24 hours.

Now on to the articulating ring sight's post. Punch out the pins on it and take it to a machine shop. Have them mill a groove 30 thousands of an inch side at the second pin hole, the one closest to the end where the spring pressure is. This will accept a 1/4 inch E-clip. I techincally could have used a 1.8 inch e-clip, but getting that baby on an off would have been a bitch. So because the 1/4 inch e-clip would interfere with the inside dimension of the ring sight mount, I had to shave out the area around the outside of the e-clip where it sits in the mount. This allowed the clip to rotate when the sight is moved. I also had to shave a minor amount off the ears of the e-clip to clear the helmet when it rotated.

So, when I want to take the sight off, instead of unscrewing it, I just pop off the e-clip and the whole thing comes off and all that is left is the mount that will not cause harm to anyone.

Hopefully the pics will clear up any obscurity that I have created with my inability to explain anything techinical.

[mr2mk1g 10]

Nicely done mod. You realise the reason most people attach their ringsight bracket with nylon screws is that in the event of a line snag the nylon screws will simply break and all you lose is your ringsight. Your setup would mean a line snag would attach the canopy to your head.

But I guess this sport is all about balancing risks so in your case the risk of injuring another person with a ringsight on a bigway FF is greater than the risk of a line snag on your helmet. It's something to consider though.

How about getting some nylon lock nuts, machining the metal part of the nut away from the nylon section and epoxying those to the inside of the helmet. They’d only put maybe a 1-2mm on the inside which would be covered by the padding and in the event of a line snag would hopefully fail in the same way as nylon screws.

Just a thought.

[chachi 0]

jose,...... your gay. maybe you should be spending more of your home time with your wife, that way, when i call you and ask if you can come out and play i don't have to listen to, man...she'll kill me........hahahahahahahahahaahahahahah

back to your regularily scheduled "safety meeting."

~chachi

[jose 0]

Ya know, I forgot about the nylon bolts. I will replace those stainless screws ASAP, as in, before I jump it. Thanks for the heads up. I also read the fatality reports associated with camera jumpers, and that ring sight is responsible for alot of fatalities. That and bad body position during reserve deployment. Gives me more respect for what I am putting on my head and the hazards that come with it.

Later..