mathrick

That is not from a US dropzone. Most, if not all, countries other than the US don't limit tandem passengers to 18+, and are content with parental consent and their own evaluation of the suitability of the student. The "of age" requirement in the US is very recent and has, to the best of my knowledge, nothing to do with the inherent danger for young passengers, and everything to do with the US liability laws and lawsuits which have rendered guardian-signed waivers worthless. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

It has another failure mode, however, where the line hasn't shrunk enough to be impossible to cock, but it will uncock very easily during the course of normal packing. Of course, you can and should spot this, but we're talking about skydivers here. "Guaranteed to develop problems which can be spotted if the owner is diligent" is always worse than "unlikely to develop problems in the lifetime of the system, and if it does, it will be obviously but harmlessly broken". Maintenance burden would be similar (or possibly less, if Dacron lives long enough to outlive the PC fabric, which it should because I expect the actual loads on a kill line to be way lower than the design pull force of the PC), but the failure to maintain & operate properly would lead to much less dangerous outcomes. Additionally, kill line shrinkage has the even more insidious and dangerous property of being a creeping change on top of the already creeping PC wear. So a fairly worn out (but still mostly cockable) kill line will exacerbate a fairly worn out (but not yet cheesecloth) PC, possibly resulting in PC in tow or nasty line twists, whereas a non-shrinking one will keep the problem to worn out PC fabric only. So, to make sure I'm perfectly clear on this, the reason is not so much "it can't be done with 200lb Dacron", but rather "nobody has done it with 200lb Dacron before, so everyone is going to be very cautious about even trying"? Understandable, but in that case, why wasn't it tried back when kill lines were being introduced (and manufacturers warned about mounting a kill line system of any kind), when all materials were a novelty by definition? The shrinkage is a well-known property of Spectra, and surely if you're willing to invent and try completely new materials like Spectra or Vectran for structural lines, you could consider using a slightly different variety of the already well-known and widely-used material like Dacron for non-structural applications where Spectra has obvious downsides. I'm not saying that it definitely can be done, but if we're spending time and effort educating people about the dangers of shrinkage and manufacturing slightly out-of-specs components to offset it, then it'd be really nice to know that somebody smart has investigated the possibility and rejected it for reasons that I failed to consider, and not "it's the way it's always been done". "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I meant more specifically the shrinkage aspect, rather than more general "longevity". If a kill line is worn out and breaks on deployment, that is a bummer, but you still have a functional deployment system. If it shrinks too much and you fail to catch that, it will look normal but the deployment won't be, and will lead to a potentially very serious malfunction. If both types last the same number of jumps, the one that breaks visibly but works correctly up until that point is the safer one. What kind of strength does a kill line need to have? If we were to halve the bulk of the Dacron line to match typical spectra, we have ~200lbs left, which is still 2.5x the pull force of a PC. My naive understanding certainly would believe that to be sufficient. And related, why is a thinner bridle better? Is it only about the lifting weight the PC has to contend with, or are the physical dimensions also important? If the latter, I'm rather surprised, as reserve bridles are purposefully made wide (not, as the urban legend has it, to replace a failed lift by the PC, but to stabilise it once the PC has caught air). "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Why not something like dacron? It seems to have the properties we want, and since kill line shouldn't (?) experience significant loads (plus dacron's stretchy), its lower strength for the same bulk compared to spectra wouldn't matter that much. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

And what is the value in that? You didn't say "easily removable", you said "universal", so that you can do what, swap it between each of your 70 helmets, all with different curvatures? That it took you so long to see the problem and that you still show signs of not actually getting what the core issues are points towards a different, but extremely universal solution: don't jump with a camera. On any helmet. You are not ready for it. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

But why does that matter for a GrellFab mount? The entire thing is designed to disappear if you cut it, leaving you with nothing but the unmodified helmet. I'm very much not a fan of the "I will just add some cord to my G3 and call it a cutaway" school of thought, but GrellFab makes it pretty much exactly as safe as a G3 with no camera in the first place. Are you suggesting that stock G3s with no camera mounted are prone to snags and might need to be cut away? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Poland requires hook a hook knife for all jumpers, period. You will *not* be allowed to jump without one (so if you ever plan to jump in PL, make sure you have a knife). That is not where I was trained though. Denmark doesn't require (aside from CRW) or even mention hook knives at any point during education. Anecdotally, most jumpers seem to have a knife on their rig, but it's far from 100%, and I've never seen a student rig with one. Personally, I'm uneasy about not having a knife; it weighs nothing, it doesn't require any of my attention, and it'd be stupid to learn when one is needed by not having it then. The fact it's never mentioned also means that far too many people never even know it's a choice they're making. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I've kinda been looking into making a detachable mount for Sony action cam for my Rev2. Loosely along the lines of GrellFab, but for a side-mounted camera, with rubberbands being the main element holding the pieces together. I've got a couple ideas on how to approach it, but none 100% convincing, and I just realised that perhaps nylon screws could provide an adequate amount of fail-fast functionality while radically simplifying the design. Does anyone know the breakaway force on those? I've been googling, but I found exactly nothing of use. Then again, perhaps I could use DHemer's design and go with a GoPro. The advantage of a side-mounted camera is that it doesn't swivel when the faceplate does. But I don't actually open it under canopy, so it wouldn't be such a big problem in practice. A more real gain would be that I already tend to bump into things a lot with my helmet in smaller planes, and the extra protrusion added by GoPro would make it pretty much unavoidable. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Paypal is notorious for being a bag of dicks and randomly freezing people's account with no recourse or explanation. They can and will freeze and often confiscate (that is, steal) your funds if they consider your account suspect (which, as far as anyone can tell, is equivalent to saying "when they feel like it"). Unfortunately there's not much precedent I've seen in people dealing with Paypal where the user succeeded. The best case scenario often amounts to Paypal graciously "refunding" the payer, after taking their cut of course, and leaving you to deal with the fallout. The worst case scenario is that money gets frozen for 6 months (they can do that according to their ToS), you never hear anything during that time, then finally all the money is lost because Paypal seizes it. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Good to know FAA also defines this requirement. I find it perfectly sensible, just amusing. However, what do you mean by a copy and paste? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

That's only an educated guess, but I imagine it's one of two things: field repacks after a ride, and given that reserve packers are generally on their way to being riggers, you do it while apprenticing for a rigger and thus still can serve as time saving labour in their workshop without being able to do a full inspection. Edit: actually, I managed to mislead myself and you by being sloppy with my translation. What the rules reserve for riggers+ is the yearly control of airworthiness for gear, not ordinary inspections you do during repack. Note also that controls under Danish rules are more stringent than in many other places, with mains also being effectively a TSO'd component (unlike in the US) and thus subject to inspection. The data card is also more involved, with a card for the whole rig (defined by the harness), plus an extra card for each of reserve, main and AAD (required for everyone). And a fun fact: one requirement for the MR level I didn't copy over from the official rulebook is "access to a properly equipped workshop". Really :) "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Huh! Good find, thanks. I was initially confused as to how it could possibly operate, given that it's mounted on the shackle rather than RSL itself, but from reading the manual, it's apparently mounted so that pulling it up first opens the shackle, letting you then extract the RSL. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I'm intrigued now. Is that an actual thing, and if so, what does it do? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

How transferable are paragliding skills though? I know that skydivers generally make lousy paraglider pilots (on account of us assuming it'd be just like piloting our mains), but how about the other way around? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

DK has a handy system in place for these things. Our rigging qualifications go like this: Packer - can pack mains, attach 3-rings after a cutaway, change pre-made loops and teach basic packing. Required for any active licensed jumper. Obtained by doing 20 supervised (by a packer or higher) packjobs + 5 exam packs by senior packer or higher (those include untangling non-cut mains, cut mains, pre-jump inspection of creatively misassembled rigs and teaching others). Senior packer - can attach risers, PCs/D-bags/bridles, make closing loops, teach more advanced elements of packer education and supervise exams for packers. Required for class I instructors (essentially S&TA). Obtained after at least 2 years as a packer + course. Reserve packer - can pack (but not inspect) reserves, extend senior packer certificates. 1 year as a senior packer, apprenticeship and exam. Rigger - can inspect and assembly reserves, modify gear other than essential parts of the reserve system or critical parts of the harness, teach senior and reserve packers. 1 year as a reserve packer, apprenticeship and exam. Master rigger - can do anything, including manufacturing all gear (within the relevant TSOs of course), teach riggers. 2 years as a rigger, apprenticeship and exam. Admittedly it's a very extensive system, but on the upside it makes it clear who can do what, and equally importantly, whom to ask when in doubt. It also ensures that every licensed jumper has at least a basic understanding of the gear involved. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to be able to say it lasts, because the fit is excellent, so are the looks, and I'm very comfortable flying in it. But based on a large-ish sample of different models (see above), I have to say it's more than just incidental damage in a single faulty suit. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I didn't have a chance to compare them to an RWC, so no idea there. My own suit got a gash on the arm in one of the layers, even though I can't recall any event that'd lead to it happening. We've ordered a tonne (around 15) student suits, plus people ordering their individual RW and freefly suits. 2 or 3 of the student ones had their zippers start falling apart within ~3 months. At least one person's DBC freefly suit started developing problems very soon after purchase, with threads and fabric thinning all over the place. Granted, he was tunnel-flying in it, but it was also the very first time he used it and it immediately had problems. Lastly, my own suit came with wrong washing instructions. I washed it once in 30° with no problems, then on second wash I went with 40° as the label states. This resulted in all the white parts getting dyed from the booties. Except the cordura butt, so now I have a classy diaper there. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

The Viso menu system is a bit silly. It's totally possible to learn it, but it's telling that I'd sometimes need to play "the Viso expert" for people who've had theirs for much longer than I've been jumping. I happen to have a knack for remembering random trivia and going through manuals several times, and I still found it difficult to figure out. Most people seem to give up and just find someone else who already knows how to do things whenever they need to do more than just turn it on. It should be hard to change your alti's settings accidentally, but Viso makes it frustrating. Also, ProTrack's lack of canopy warnings is complete bullshit. With L&B's lineup, I'm simply not allowed to have logs downloadable to a PC and canopy alarms unless I either get an alti with analogue display (don't wanna) or get two audibles. Why the hell would you make so much functionality exclusive to a specific type of display? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I have Intrudair RW. They're inexpensive, pretty, fly very nicely, and the customer service is good, but durability is a problem. The suits simply don't last, and it's an observation based on more than just my own. P.S. Ease up on the emotes. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

There are people who don't wear prescription glasses and use no goggles, so I can totally imagine that. I've been meaning to try some jumps without flipping my visor down, but so far I've always found the blast annoying enough that I did anyway. Personally I'm really happy about a fullface, but not everyone is and I know people who went back to using open face because they don't like the lack of wind feeling. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

My eyes don't really agree with contacts, so after beginning in the sport with contacts, I went to OTG goggles until I got my licence, then I bit the bullet and ordered me a Bonehead Rev2 full-face. I'm extremely happy that I did and can absolutely recommend it. It's more comfortable than conventional full-face or open face, as it removes all the fiddling with the goggles when it's time to gear up at altitude. Just put it on, then pull the faceplate down before climbing out. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Pulse fits perfectly, I demoed it before I learnt to fly the Sabre2 I own. Opens beautifully, nice to fly and will get you home from a long spot, no-effort landings. Very easy to pack. I hear Silhouette is basically the same (modulo extra easy packjobs), Pulse being its newer, low bulk successor. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

Ooh, neat, how does that work? "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I don't have an Optima, but I do have a Pro-Dytter. Now it turns out that Pro-Dytter had two distinct revisions, and the second added the ability to switch to what they call "econo-mode" (essentially what Optima does standard) and turn it off. First gen hardware, which is what I have, has no such ability and is always on. They advertise battery life of at least a year in such a setup, and I've been using mine for a couple of months (since mid-May I think?) after installing working batteries. No problems so far other than the slight annoyance of having to manage your luggage carefully during flights so that it doesn't end up in carry-on and go off during landing scaring the shit out of fellow passengers. So whatever is the case for the Optima, I don't expect it to be less efficient in standby than the old Pro-Dytter which didn't even have dedicated standby. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."

I got it directly from the horse's mouth, so to say, so it's about as authoritative as you're gonna get it :). Not that asking directly is ever wrong, and the answer arrived more than promptly when I asked, but I think it's good to have it in a reasonably centralised form in a searchable place, so that people don't have to email every single manufacturer individually just to learn what is available on the market. "Skydivers are highly emotional people. They get all excited about their magical black box full of mysterious life saving forces."