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TALONSKY

Safire size discrepancy

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I know that several times there has been a debate about Safire size being different than a PD of the same size. This weekend I had a chance to measure my Safire 169 against a Sabre 150(did a hop-n-pop in the rain). To measure the canopy here is what I did (I know this may not be extremely accurate but I feel it at least compare the two well):”all measurements were taken with the material pulled tight on flat on the ground”
1) I measured the length at the nose from seam to seam on both canopies ( Sabre 150 was 5” longer than a Safire 169)
2) I measured the center cell on each for width( Sabre was 4” shorter than the Safire)
3) Then because the Safire is lightly elliptical I measured the end cells for width(Safire tapers 13-1/2” center to end)
4) Then I created a 9” thick (flat) solid model of each in Cadkey and got a mass reading. Which stated the Sabre had a bigger mass(not by much)
So with this a Safire 169 is just a little smaller than a Sabre 150. Which verifies what Icuras had told me.
(both canopies were made in 2000)
Blue Skies
Kirk

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Well... thats by far not a fair compairson. What you should have been looking for instead of mass was surface area. The taper on the Safire is not a straight line and as such, it adds more surface area then a straight edge. The other thing is that the Icuras has tapered cells that are not the same height from edge to center span. By all acounts that I've heard the Safire should have read about 157 feet by PD's charts. A Safire should be about 7% smaller then its advertised size for canopies made before a certian date.
I want to touch the sky, I want to fly so high ~ Sonique

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>I know that several times there has been a debate about Safire size being different than a PD of the same size.
There are so many ways to do this - real area, projected area, bottom skin area, inflated area - that you can't even try to measure them against each other until you agree on what the measurement _is_.
-bill von

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I realize this is may not an acurate of comparison, and I also realize what billvon is saying too. There were sevral items I left out when doing this comparison do to the time it would take to get real acurate info such as the arc of each canopy. I also left out that Icuras tappers the height of their cell from center to the end (end being about half the height of the center cell) I feel this atleast show to some degree that Safire's are smaller than their stated size by atleast the 7% if not more. Icuras did tell me that a Safire 169 would be comparible to a Sabre 150. I just wanted to pass on what I found out and how I found it out.( I am sorry if it came across differently)
Thanks for the input too
Kirk

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