- #1
FloatingBones
- 3
- 0
The documentary "Man on Wire" covers Philippe Petit's 1974 crossing between the WTC towers. The movie is available on DVD and on Netflix's streaming service.
At 0:49:10, Petit describes the rigging his team planned for the walk:
An image of the rigging can be found on the http://www.imdb.com/media/rm2938738432/tt1155592" shows extensive images of tightrope rigging. Search for "cavalletti" on that page to see the how that line was secured to the tightrope. The small-diameter rope (a prusik cord?) is used with the cavalletti line to provide added torsional rigidity at the knot.
As far as I know, all tightropes are manufactured with some sort of helical cable. I presumed that Petit's torsion is happening because of the spiraling of the wires. Is that correct? If one made a tightrope out of monofilament line, would there still be a torque when walking on the line?
TIA
At 0:49:10, Petit describes the rigging his team planned for the walk:
The towers were not corners facing corners. They were askew, which was a problem for me to decide where to put my wire. [...] I decided to attach the cable to what I believe was the strongest beam at the top of the roof, and then I'm going to tie the wire to ... here ... on the south tower. A cable between two buildings of a long length ... it sways, it goes up and down, and there is almost an invisible move which is a torsion on itself. So, what we devise is called a cavalletti in the circus parlance. It's actually a guy line that is perpendicular to the axis of the wire and it goes down to the ground. Even with permission we couldn't go a quarter-mile to the ground, plus I needed a pair: here's one and here's two. We know they cannot go down. So, the solution was asymmetric rigging, which is like this. Here's the first attachment. Its cavalletti had two legs: a short one and a long one. So, this is what I decided was the best for the situation.
An image of the rigging can be found on the http://www.imdb.com/media/rm2938738432/tt1155592" shows extensive images of tightrope rigging. Search for "cavalletti" on that page to see the how that line was secured to the tightrope. The small-diameter rope (a prusik cord?) is used with the cavalletti line to provide added torsional rigidity at the knot.
As far as I know, all tightropes are manufactured with some sort of helical cable. I presumed that Petit's torsion is happening because of the spiraling of the wires. Is that correct? If one made a tightrope out of monofilament line, would there still be a torque when walking on the line?
TIA
Last edited by a moderator: