On Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 4:33:29 PM UTC-5, Kenz Dale wrote:
I understand that CG hooks are designed to autorelease when the angle of pull passes a certain critical angle. Is this a very reliable disconnect, or is more of an "Eh, it's nice to have but I've seen it fail too many times to trust it"?

From the PW-5 Flight manual:

"RELEASING

The sailplane is equipped with the self-releasing hook.

Two releasing techniques exist:

1) before the intended releasing release the stick to lower the cable
tension then pull the releasing handle in the cockpit;

2) before the intended releasing hold the stick in position till the selfreleasing occurs. After releasing recover immediately the glide and
check the cable releasing pulling the control handle."

It results that self-releasing is considered a normal and reliable procedure.