ZigZagMarquis

Okay, so maybe this rant belongs in The Bonfire, but it is skydiving related, so I put it here... Anyway, my home DZ is totally disfunctional when it comes to Boogies... I don't know if its because: A) When the place gets more then its normal weekend's amount of up-jumpers and students on the DZ things seem to grind to a crawl... times between loads gets longer and longer... up-jumpers loose interest when its an hour or more between jumps & start crackin' beers early (okay, I'm guilty of that last part myself, but hey! ... its Beer!!! ... and its FREE!!! ). ... or... B) Folks organizing past boogies are left with a bad taste in their mouths because of "tension" and "disagreements" during pre-boogie planning meetings and gossip "folks not doing what they said they'd do" post-boogie. ... or... C) Folks not wanting to help organize a boogie unless they get a cut of the money that everyone is so certain every Drop Zone just rakes in... piles and piles of it every weekend... geeze, yeah, right. ... or... D) A combination of all of the above... * sigh * I go to all these other DZ Web-Sites and see their plan of events for the year and their list of events is orders of magnitude larger then what we do AND their arcive of pictures and videos of folks having fun at past year's events looks soooo cool! ... is there any hope to cure Boogie Disfunctional Syndrome???

If your in an otter burnig av gas I'd be shocked, are their piston powerd otters at any DZ?? should be JET fuel the TURBINE is burning (nit pick complete ... sorry ) ... ummmm... actually, you can burn AV Gas in a a turbine, like an Otter, it will run, maybe not quite right, but it will run... turbines are fairly forgiving when it comes to this, besides JetA, JP-4, JP-5, JP-8, Diesel, Kerosene, I'd bet they'ed all get a PT-6 to light and run (they just don't like water, solids or biologicals in their fuel)... anyway... there is usually a limit to how long you can do it though... about 50 hours seems to ring a bell in my mind... if you don't believe me, next time you're at the DZ, ask the DZO or Pilot to pull out the manual for the Otter, its in there somewhere, probably something like "alternate fuels" or "burning AV Gas" or "AV Gas use" would be words I'd key on looking for. Anyway... sorry for the nit-pick on a nit-pick... Now back to your regularly scheduled thread topic!

True... I hope I didn't add to a pile of SPAM-Mail that Sandy has to sort through... but then again... how many times have you seen folks here at DZ.Com be told to "call the manufacturer" or "read the manual" only to have the thread drone on and on and on; funny how lots of problems can be solved by doing that and funny how there's is seemingly lots of resistance here to do that... anyway, once I saw it said Sandy had a hand in writting this sought after Pub... I figured going and asking the man would be a logical thing to do... ... silly me.

I wouldn't hold my breath for the FAA to do something so useful. Anyway... I Googled "FAA-H-8083-17" and it does appear as a reference in "FAA-S-8081-25, Change 3, Parachute Rigger Practical Test Standards"... which I think someone up-post has already said... so, anyway, it looks like it exists... just there's not a soft copy to be had anywhere's that anyone's been able to come up with yet. I messed around on www.faa.gov for a bit trying to find it, like I think someone else up-post has also said, but no dice. Here's a thought... someone said Sandy Reid wrote it... I think I'll fire an email off to R.I. and see if he can add any intel. Worst that can happen is he won't reply...

I was going to say... but, CMan24's post pretty much beat me to it... ... if I may add my 2 cents though, back when I was an active SL Jumpmaster, we'd set the FXCs on the student rigs to 1500' and no lower. Given the +/- range that an FXC will fire in, IMO this was a prudent setting based on student pulls up at or above 3500' and that we put SL's out at 3500-4000' and I agree wiht CMan's statement that FXCs on student gear are fine... proper maintenance, checks, etc. being done, of course. Of course, Cypres (and I'd expect the Vigil) are now being seen more and more (maybe most) on student rigs. Anyway... back to the original topic... setting a Cypres 200' "up" where the landing area is about 200' up from the hangar. Well... if you didn't and you were over that +200' dirt... that would mean your Cypres would go off at about 550' AGL rather then 750'... that might make a difference between living and not if you need it... but I can see the "hastle factor" of setting it over and over again on jump after jump which is what I think you'd need to do? At Cal City... sometimes we jump into the Silver Saddle, which is about 500' higher in elevation then the airport / DZ where we're usually at. That's definitly enough of a difference to go through resetting your Cypres IMO.

Great picture! ... I need a copy to show to people when they ask why I don't do CRW....

Casurf.... Pretty much what Bill said... to which I'll add... I think what you experienced is more likely due to having dumped in a more "head-down" body position rather then line dump. Its kinda like not flaring out of a track and dumping, i.e. just dumping while in a track, can casue some real interesting openings. Personally (i.e. just my 2 cents) I think line dump is blamed far more then it being the actual cause of hard openings. Not to say that it cannot cause problems, but how likely do you think it that all of the line stows got stripped before the canopy got out of the bag? Even if some of them did, if any of the locking stows remained intact, then the canopy would still be bagged at line stretch. Same thing, different words, for line dump to be the true and absolute culprit, the canopy would have to get out of the bag before line strech; which would mean all of the stows would have to come un-done before line strech. Anyway, just my guess based on experience... to really prove it... you'd have to go do a series of test jumps... you could pack your canopy, bag it, never do any of the stows -- just neatly S-fold the lines in the bottom of the container, route the risers, put the bag in the tray, close the container in the normal manner and go jump it a few times packed this way while having someone video you. Anyone game for that!!??! Anyway, I was just kidding about jumping a main canopy packed like that. I wouldn't and wouldn't recommend anyone do so. Anyway, anyway, I noticed that Casurf says he's jumping a Sabre2-170. I found it interesting that he said he had a hard opening on this canopy. I to have been jumping a Sabre2-170 for quite some time now and don't think I can say I've ever had what I'd call a hard opening, as compared to a hard opening on an old Sabre... . Now I've had some Sabre2 openings that I'd call "firm" as compared to others, but not hard. In fact, as of late (since having my Sabre2 re-lined about 60 jumps ago) I've been trying to get the thing to open "more quickly"... didn't think you'd ever hear anyone say that, huh... but anyway, the thing likes to open about half-way, most of the canopy inflated except the end cells and the slider about a 1/3 of the way up and then you have to haul down on the rear risers to get the slider down the rest of the way, collapse the slider, unstow the breaks and pump the end cells open... snivels are okay, but only to a point!

Three words for you... "Bounce and Blend"

A lot of gear manufaturer's will recommend that you replace Type 17 risers every 500 jumps / or when ever you get a canopy relined (i.e. when the lines are old and worn out) and that's what I recommend to folks when asked. As for breaking... I've never seen a riser break at the point where the links attach, but if a riser was worn excessively there, I suppose it could happen. I have seen more then one Type 17 riser break down where the gromet is punched throuh the riser, but that was more frequent back before they were made with reinforcement where the gromet went through... and, in part, gave birth to the Type 17 - Integrity risers... but that's a different story. If you have Type 8 risers and if there is no excessive wear or damage to them, I wouldn't worry much replacing them after X-number of jumps.

Ah! Thanks for the second photo, that looks more like the way I do it and now that you mention it, and looking at the first a few more times, the first does look a bit "odd"... but frankly, without being able to discet it more in person, I really can't say its Black Death. Good on ya for noticing and thanks for sharing.

Are you kidding? I didn't even want to take Itermediate Mechanics...that tensor stuff is scary. eh, sorry, its kinda a requirement for us Aeronautical Engineer types... Software Engineer types only need to know that when fluids get into the hardware their software is running on... their software quits at the same time as does the hardware... that's why your computer doesn't work well after spilling a beer on it.

Telek, Bob, Fair enough. Just saying what I felt needed to be said... just my 2 cents... why did I bring it up... in part, because of this... years ago a friend of mine chased a student low... her AAD went off, she walked away, he didn't have one, he panic pulled his main, line stretch, impact, survived, remarkable, but lived out the next few years as a quadrapalegic (sp?) and recently passed. Now I'm not saying it was her fault by any means, the incident was a chain of events like all are, but post incident... pretty much every one who had jumped with her said something to the affect that her head wasn't in it and that she shouldn't be jumping, they figured she's quit because she wasn't progressing, but they didn't want to be the "bad guy" that brought it up and grounded her (take that with a grain, my analysis); it is possible that if she had been grounded, the chain would have been broken, maybe not, that's all. Anyway... Telek... I don't know what your means are, but if possible, maybe getting yourself to where a tunnel is would help. Maybe you can make a road trip to Eloy or Perris. Again, good luck, be safe.

Someone up-post suggested some tunnel time and that is a great suggestion... but, frankly, from your original post which I cut a snippet of above... its the last part that struck me as worry-some. Skydiving is done by many that have physical challenges... blind in one eye... amputees... parapelegics (sp?)... and you don't have to be a super-jock-body-builder-athlete either to skydive... look at me... ... but one thing skydiving isn't is forgiving of folks that cannot perform mentally in freefall. Sure, sensory overload is normal your first sevearl student jumps... and/or maybe its just your choice of words, but if you cannot cognitively think while in freefall, maybe skydiving isn't for you? I hate to take the wind out of your sails, but what I got from you post is that you have a larger problem dealing with the mental issues of skydiving then the physical that your previous accident has dealt you. Good luck. Be safe.

Bummer. I take it your doc wants to cut ya? Heal up quick. I'd say welcome to skydiving, but I see you only have 28 jumps... anyway, a lot of jumpers I know, especially those of us that do a lot of 4-Way have rotator cuff "issues".

That would work... dunno if gators are scared of camo though or not...

Superman... yep... what bob.dino is saying is true, bright colors, like red, tend to bleed on video and this can become a factor in judging... I don't know of any instances where a team has been busted because of their jumpsuit color choices casued "bad video", thus, something un-judge-able, but I suppose it could happen. As for the camo version of suits you designed... I suppose they're kinda cool... but be advised, depending on where you jump with them... they may be viewed as "Bounce and Blend"...

Vectran... http://www.swicofil.com/vectran.html Spectra... http://www.honeywell.com/sites/sm/afc/spectra_fiber.htm From PD's WebSite (note: MicroLine is made from Spectra, I believe). It talks about the Velocity towards the end and not a Safire, but the info is good and better then I could have written: From Icarus Canopies WebSite, I found this in their Safire Owners Manual:

high school physics, even at the AP level, is a world of frictionless planes and vacuums. It won't answer the question. DOESN'T ANYONE TAKE COMPUTATIONAL FLUID DYNAMICS ANYMORE!!!!!????!

* bangs head against wall * DOESN'T ANYONE TAKE PHYSICS IN HIGH-SCHOOL ANYMORE!!!!????!

What size?

Ummm... I don't want to hi-jack the thread, but seeing as how MR and RR have pretty much answered your original question and given you good direction on how to go forward... I have a question of my own... you say you bought this rig from someone at your DZ? ... yes, no? ... if "yes", ummm, you didn't try the rig on before you bought it?? ... or maybe you tried it on, but there were no canopies in it??

With guidance like that, I'm sure you'll be packin' like a pro in no-time.

Maybe practice packing does suck, but as with learning to play the piano, practice makes perfect. To you it's still new, still and adventure, and packing at home gives you something to look forward to for the weekend, so keep on doing it. Well, DUH! That was my point, the more jumps the more pack-jobs, the faster someone gets better at packing... if they want to drag their rig out and pack it over and over at home... that's good too... geeze... sometimes I think we need a sarcasm font around here...

I'll put $20 on DJL femur-ing in!

Well, its pretty straight forward. As I'm sure you know, its like an RSL, but it pulls the cut-away cable to the "other" riser if the riser to which the collin's lanyard is attached breaks. Its usually used in conjuntion with an RSL because one of the big arguements against an RSL is that if the riser it is attached to breaks it can fire your reserve while the other riser stays hooked up. Bill Booth's SkyHook incorporates a Collin's Lanyard as do some Tandem systems. So I'd imagine that you could gleen some intel there on how one should be made. Going out and just buying one... I'm not sure where to do that. Anyway, the first question and comment that came to my mind when I read your post was, "Why do you want one and what are you going to put it on?", and, "If you're going to put it on a rig that you're going to jump, it will have to be an approved alteration (mod) by the manufacturer and performed by the manuracturer or appropriately rated parachute rigger."