Vigil fire today

[wardo 0]

Got my A-license stamp today, did my 26th jump, throw my rig in a SUV, drive home, open door and see my reserve pilot chute popped out, vigil (2005) saying it fired. I just bought complete used rig a couple of weeks ago. The guy i bought it from said to turn it off when you put it in the car cause it still reads and kills the battery. I asked my instructor who also has one, and he said that he leaves his on cause it kills more battery turning it off. It was in student mode and i was going to go homeand put it in pro. I missed the tiny part it says in the manual about turning it off, but the elevation difference between where i live and my dropzone is less than 30 feet, 25 minutes all highway with no big hills. Is it good or bad that it fired? Pretty sure i didnt do the plus or minus 150ft to activate it as in the manual. Im thinking of no longer using it as it isnt required now, but was looking for more feedback.

[NWFlyer 2]

Quote

Im thinking of no longer using it as it isnt required now, but was looking for more feedback.

IMHO, you should make any decisions about which AAD you want completely separately from the decision of whether to use an AAD or not.

As for the Vigil itself - was it very hot today? Was the rig in your trunk for a long time? I seem to recall a Vigil service bulletin relating to extreme temperatures. This thread has some info and links.

http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=2420338

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[skysurfcam 0]

The Vigil manual specifically and clearly states that you must turn it off before transporting it in a car. IIRC it's because of the pressure differential when the doors/trunk close/open.

I've seen two cypres's fire when trunk lids were slammed shut.

Bottom line, turn off your AAD before you transport it if thats what the manual says.

C.

Brother Wayward's rule of the day...
"Never ever ever go skydiving without going parachuting immediately afterwards."
100% PURE ADRENALENS

[NickDG 23]

Or leave it turned on. Except thread both leg straps around a lid hinge, then if you inadvertently drive off a cliff, you simply pop the boot.

You'd sell a million of them to folks in cliffy terrain . . .

NickD BASE 194

[wardo 0]

Wasnt a hot day, rig was inside the DZ the whole time until i left. And it wasnt in a trunk, it was in a nissan xterra. I bought the rig used, so i didnt have a manual but i did go online and read it, but not good enough.

Could this happen in a plane? especially smaller ones like a 182, opening/closing door or window?

[PhreeZone 20]

Were any of the windows open in the car when you shut the door or was everything closed up including all the doors?

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[wardo 0]

pretty sure at least a door was open, i almost think it happened during the ride home cause i heard something in the back and just thought it was my rig shifting, my freind heard it too

[skysurfcam 0]

Quote

pretty sure at least a door was open

Does the cars manual recommend driving with a door open?

READ THE AAD MANUAL (REGARDLESS OF BRAND). THE KNOWLEDGE YOU GAIN MAY SAVE MY (or even your) LIFE!!!

Sheesh. Kids these days...

C.

Brother Wayward's rule of the day...
"Never ever ever go skydiving without going parachuting immediately afterwards."
100% PURE ADRENALENS

[Jumpah 0]

I know you've read the manual based on your OP...

The manual says that it should not be on in a closed vehicle..."To avoid unexpected firing, you must switch OFF your Vigil before traveling in a closed vehicle (car, bus, train,...) due to possible air pressure variation"

There are at least two possibilities in your case:
1) It worked as designed
2) It malfunctioned

It's a computer...it's not smart...and its got a very small view of the world (column of airspace from 0 - 13,500+ feet). The manual also says that it is "...necessary to switch your Vigil off and back on again so it can recalibrate itself when your landing zone differs more than 100Ft/30m with your initial takeoff zone and this landing zone becomes your new takeoff zone". I only include this to help illustrate that it's a sensitive piece of equipment, and changing its environment via car will skew its little world rather drastically.

Check with the manufacturer to figure out what occurred in your case. They can do diagnostics and get to the root of the issue for you. www.vigil.aero

[skysurfcam 0]

Quote

I missed the tiny part it says in the manual about turning it off,

Quote

I know you've read the manual based on your OP...

Nope.

Brother Wayward's rule of the day...
"Never ever ever go skydiving without going parachuting immediately afterwards."
100% PURE ADRENALENS

[riggerrob 643]

Did you drive BELOW airport altitude on your way home?

[linestretch 0]

it's possible that while driving, you can open/close a window and have very quick change of pressure....or turn on/off the vent which can do the same.

my pics & stuff!

[wardo 0]

Yeah i didnt read good enough, that "tiny" yet bold typed warning. Stupid noob. Anyways...

It has me wondering though. It cant tell the difference between a normal skydive and pressure changes in a car? I thought it would monitor your climb, exit altitude, altitude as you fall, speed, etc. (like a digital altimeter) and know it was a real jump, and when you hit 1040ft and below (student) at 45mph then activate.

This has to do with my question of being in a plane and opening and closing the door or window. If just a trunk door on a car being closed causes it to fire, could the same thing happen if i throw it in the cessna and slam the door shut? Or are planes not as airtight?

[pchapman 280]

Given the car door issues, I find it funny how the Vigil's web page mentions its patented, accurate calculation method, that computes time left until activation altitude, and then activates when the right altitude is reached if the speed exceeds 35 m/s.

I'm curious just what the pressure vs time graph is for a slamming car door. Exactly what kind of skydive does the Vigil think is happening? Flying along level in a plane and then accelerating downwards with a rocket attached, in order to exceed 35 m/s within a second? The whole car door pressure spike can't take very long.

Maybe I'm way off base as to how messy the pressure variations are during some car door slams, but it would seem simple enough to filter that sort of thing out.

Off the top of my head, the nearest kind of skydive, that could be confused with a door slam, would be a low bailout or low cutaway, where there might only be a few seconds between "OK" and "fire at 840 ft or less, and 35 m/s".

If it really is so tough to deal with car door slams, perhaps Advanced Aerospace could better explain to us why it really is so, instead of having so many people be sceptical.

[DougH 270]

Cars are far from sealed, the spike couldn't last for long at all!

"The restraining order says you're only allowed to touch me in freefall"
=P

[BrianM 1]

Quote

Given the car door issues, I find it funny how the Vigil's web page mentions its patented, accurate calculation method, that computes time left until activation altitude, and then activates when the right altitude is reached if the speed exceeds 35 m/s.

That description of their algorithm is very vague, and doesn't tell us much about what the AAD is doing or why - we can only guess about that. That description has never made a lot of sense to me anyway. What's the difference from firing based on time and firing based on altitude, when the time is simply calculated from the altitude measurement anyway? Seems like the same thing to me.

AAD's description states that the purpose of this algorithm is to achieve a more accurate firing altitude. I don't really buy that. How is:

if ((altitude - firing_altitude) / speed = 0) then fire

which will fire when (altitude = firing_altitude), more accurate than

if (altitude = firing_altitude) then fire

???

I realize that this is almost certainly much simpler than the actual algorithm, but I really don't see the difference. In fact, if anything, I think using time remaining (and hence speed) could only be less accurate (except in cases like my example above, where the firing decision doesn't actually depend on the value of the speed variable). The pressure transducer gives a direct reading of pressure (altitude), but there is no direct reading of speed. Speed must be calculated from at least two consecutive readings. The AAD can't know how fast it is falling right now, only how fast it was falling, on average. Variations in speed will cause inaccuracies.

It also seems unreasonable that a modern AAD would fire in a moving vehicle or when a trunk or door is closed. There is no way a car is going to descend fast enough to meet the firing parameters (remember, only vertical speed counts - you would need to be driving at 1000 km/h on an 8% grade to achieve the 35 m/s firing speed). Further, any good digital AAD ought to have some awareness of not only altitude and speed, but of where it is in the climb to altitude or in the skydive. A sudden pressure spike caused by closing a trunk shouldn't cause a fire when the AAD knows that it is sitting on the ground. Otherwise it is not much more than a glorified analog AAD.

So what is really going on inside the Vigil? I don't know, but I'm not convinced of quality of the algorithm.

"It's amazing what you can learn while you're not talking." - Skydivesg

[kelpdiver 2]

Quote

Cars are far from sealed, the spike couldn't last for long at all!

Your ears can feel the change when you close the windows on a car with good seals while going fast. Doesn't seem like it should be enough to set it off, but it is enough to be mildly uncomfortable.

[gearless_chris 1]

In a GM training video I watched for finding wind and water leaks, you tape over the door jamb vents and turn the heater on high with everything closed up. Spray soapy water over all the seams to find leaks by looking for bubbles. So they should be sealed enough to hold some pressure as long as you don't have rust holes like all my cars

"If it wasn't easy stupid people couldn't do it", Duane.

My momma said I could be anything I wanted when I grew up, so I became an a$$hole.

[deadwood 0]

I used to test FXCs by putting them in a plastc garbage bag with some air in it, holding the end closed and squeezing the bag. They would fire.

He who hesitates shall inherit the earth.

Deadwood
Skydive New Mexico Motorcycle Club, Touring Division

[hackish 8]

There were a number of vigils that fired on a large jump plane when they pressurised the cabin. I'm sure someone can point out the exact incident. I did see a pressure graph downloaded from an vigil that went off in that case and it did show a believable altitude (pressure) change. I would suggest having your rigger download the data from the vigil to see why and when it happened.

-Michael

[piisfish 140]

Quote

Cars are far from sealed, the spike couldn't last for long at all!

The problem doesn't seem to be by closing the door, but by driving below landing altitude.

To me this means that if he landed off 150ft below planned altitude, he would have been under 2 canopies.

This is the way I understand it, but I might be wrong.

scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM

[piisfish 140]

Quote

There were a number of vigils that fired on a large jump plane when they pressurised the cabin.

*devil advocating*
some Cypres1 froze, some other fired, in the same conditions. All Vigil fired. Which is the most homogeneous ?

scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM

[PhreeZone 20]

If you are talking about the C130's in Thialand I'm pretty sure the situation was the Cypres1's froze up and needed to be sent back, the Cypres2's kept right on working and the Vigil's all fired. I do not recall and can not find any info that a Cypres1 fired on the plane there.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[phoenixlpr 0]

Quote

If you are talking about the C130's in Thialand I'm pretty sure the situation was the Cypres1's froze up and needed to be sent back,

I would not call it froze up, they worked as they were designed. Older design considers unexpected pressure change as internal malfunction which requires check by the manufacturer.

[Jumpah 0]

One of the US magazines had a recent article about the Vigil explaining how it works...I can't remember if it was Parachutist or Skydiving Magazine. If someone has it can they post it?

An AAD is a gadget...it has a specific use under specific environmental circumstances. Most gadgets have environmental limits and guidelines around when it can and cannot be used.

I've included a page from the manual that illustrates the 150 feet rule. Why this is the way it is...I dunno for sure. If someone knows facts please post about it.