DrewEckhardt

If you don't trust it enough to jump it, then it doesn't count as a packjob. I trust reserves which I personally packed to open, most likely on heading. I trust mains with the fabric clear of the lines and slider at the stops to not damage themselves on opening or to open unreasonably hard for the canopy type. That combination would give me a competitive advantage over some one who has to trust the main to not malfunction. For recreational use, I have higher standards because 1) I don't want to risk loosing the main or even spending hours inspecting and repacking the reserve and 2) I like soft, consistant on-heading openings 3) Pretty pack jobs appeal to my sense of aesthetics.

Brian Germain would disagree with you, and actually so do I. That depends on how you define "optimal" For competition "optimal" means "the longest swoop possible" where needing to apply "a little" toggle input to plane out is the right answer. For recreation under a canopy (example: Stiletto) which will level out without toggle or rear riser input, "optimal" probably means "the best combination of safety and chances for a long swoop".' Under that definition, the approach requiring no toggle/riser input is "optimal." It's relatively easy to confuse "a little too much" toggle input with "a little," When that happens you reduce both your margin of error and distance covered.

Dollar cost averaging. You have time. With hyper inflation decades of savings in the devalued currency quickly become worthless. 20X your annual pay is a nice number to save for retirement if you don't want to count on what the government decides your social security benefit will be. One month of hyper inflation could leave you with a single paycheck worth in the bank.

Jobs will be scarce enough that landing one is a big deal. Argentina even had a TV game show in which the prize was a job. Although if you DO get one it'll pay you more than today's highest paid CEO. You'll get paid mountains of cash once or twice a day that are so big you need wheelbarrows to get them home. That's hugely optomistic. Your money won't be worth enough to buy a beer. While hyper inflation starts at 50% monthly (your savings loose half their value every 51 days) it gets a lot worse. For example, as the Weimar Republic was failing in the 1920s German inflation hit 3,250,000% a month (three million percent is not a typo, your money looses half its value every 49 hours). The government had to print 100,000,000,000,000 (one hundred trillion is not a typo) mark bank notes. The exchange rate hit 80,000,000,000 (eighty billion is not a typo) marks for one US dollar. Nope. Anything happening more than 2 or 6 years out is irrelevant to my congress people. It makes me want to have hard currency (you can't devalue gold by making more of it) and own property outside the first world (where it's already cheap to live and salaries correspondingly low the leveling out of pay and resulting conflict with existing costs won't be as severe as first and third world economies merge). The coming crash had a lot to do with why I had an inexpensive property that would have been paid off in a dozen years.

Tube exit. The first person lies on their back with their butt & feet on the edge of the door. Second person straddles them and grabs the first person's ankles. Third person stands behind and grabs the second person's ankles. First person grabs third person's ankles. The second person rolls out the door and everyone else follows. It's easier with just two people.

The problem is two-sided. Increasing numbers of new skydivers don't buy their beer. Since they don't buy their beer they don't become friends with the old skydivers who pass on information like how to pack to their newer skydiving friends. So they learn how to pack from people whose interest in skydiving is more commercial than recreational. That means packers and riggers who are teaching instead of getting $5 for a sport rig or $45 for a reserve. A lot of us met the old skydivers in our first few dozen jumps when we bought our first case of beer for graduation or second case for new gear.

Right. For a given control input, you'll get more response at a higher airspeed. You have the potential to set down with the same forward and vertical speed whether you started at full flight, with some induced speed, or reasonable braked flight where the limit of "reasonable" varies with canopy and wingloading. However the control input options availble to get there vary depending on your starting speed. While you found this easier to do with some induced forward speed it's still possible from a full-flight or braked approach. The ideal landing under a modern ZP canopy involves flying it so that your feet would be below ground level, maintaining that altitude as it looses energy, and finishing the flare with sharper input that causes the canopy to pitch behind you such that it's stopping you and lifting you back to the ground level. Waiting about X seconds before doing this with induced speed means less input is needed than if you waited your normal X seconds from a full-flight approach. From experience, you probably have an intuitive feel for "X" seconds from a full-flight approach. On a full flight approach staying planed out for less time and applying the same input, or being more agressive on the toggles after surfing for similar time will get you the same stopping speed. Have some one with experience flying canopies and teaching go over your landing on video.

#1: If I don't rush things it takes me about 7 minutes to pack a skydiving main which is good enough to make every other load at the majority of DZs that have one or fewer turbine aircraft flying at a time. If I wait for a packer in a lot of places their 5 minute pack jobs will be preceeded by a long wait that'll have me on fewer loads. #2: I don't like to trust other people to pack my gear (did 5 out of 6 of my last reserve pack jobs too).

Neither. For home use you want a 12 gauge shotgun that'll put over an ounce of lead into whatever you're trying to stop. No handgun comes close. A big gun doesn't do you any good when you can't take it with you. You need something pocket sized which a 1911 isn't. Even baby glocks are chunky. I'd take a Kel-Tec P3AT in .380. Many .25 pistols are bigger.

Skratch Garrison taught me how to pack with the understanding I'd teach two more people.

I'm safe. My home computer doesn't run windows and the browser doesn't have permission to install software.

Skydiving is probably safer than being in the Army in a country where people hate you and are willing to to die killing you.

Pay by paypal and have the shipper use USPS global express. Paypal will reverse a transfer if the seller can't prove the goods were delivered. The least expensive shipping method with confirmed receipt for the seller is USPS global express mail. Shipping should run about $100 and change for 25 pounds. To get that rate you need to fit your goods within the length + girth limit which is 79 inches for the UK. In theory, the seller could send you a box of bricks. In practice, if you buy from known people (you can cross check their contact information with public phone listings) you shouldn't have problems.

In December 2000 I bought a 1998 Audi A4 with 37,000 miles on it. I now have 77,000 miles on it. At 7000 miles a year I figure that it'll be good for at least one more decade.

Software startup, first solo plane flight, back country snowboarding (think steep), telling the sushi chef to feed us until we're full (sea urchin genitalia and monk fish liver are surprisingly good), the 1100' winch ride up from the bottom of Sotano de los Golondrinas, being an invited (free trips to Germany) lecturer with a few hundred people in the crowd, BASE jumping (including freeclimbs up and 50x100' landing areas with no outs and a helicopter at one end), voluntarily leaving a decent job for another (in another state, selling one house, buying another, and being stuck for at least a year).

The requirement is waiverable by the S&TA. Since your skills are known by the DZO and he has a working relationship with the S&TA you shouldn't have any problems.

I discovered that skydiving and dehydration don't mix on a 90 degree summer day with a DZ elevation arround 6000 feet MSL (meaning jump runs arround 18,000 feet MSL without oxygen). I didn't drink any water, made a few jumps and pack jobs, and then went up on a birdman jump. I flew off from my 2-way, couldn't figure out where the airport was, and landed in a farmer's field 3 miles off the DZ. I set my helmet and pro-track down, promptly forgot about both, and walked to the road to hitch a ride. Was definately farther gone than if I'd been drunk. I was a little thirsty but didn't realize what had happened until I was still thirsty after drinking a few bottles of water and went through over a gallon before I had to relieve myself.

My first canopy was a Turbo Z 205 which was F111 with a ZP topskin. It planed out OK and landed about like a Sabre or Monarch of similar size. My wiing loading was under 1 pound/square foot. The Robo-Z was the model Para Flite built before the Turbo Z. No idea how they compare. You're loading it a lot higher than was common when the canopy was designed and can't expect it to land as well as a more modern design.

Disregarding shipping - For $600 + $85 (batteries) - $80 (trade-in value) that Cypres 1 will cost you $172 a year for the 3.5 years left (it's good through 10/2009 + 3 months). For $1200 + $160 * 2 (4-year checks) - $80 the Cypres 2 will cost you $120 a year. While you'll be out less cash for the Cypres 1 it will cost you $182 more over that time than if you'd bought a Cypres 2. This assumes you make fewer than 250 jumps a year (Cypres 1 batteries are legal foir 500 jumps), don't get it wet (Cypres 1 is not water proof), etc.

That's the easy part. With the right equipment it takes about five minutes to replace the power jack that usually breaks. Taking it apart is harder. Getting the stupid short cables plugged back together when you're holding things a finger width apart is most difficult.

Aerodynamics. While a conventional bike + rider don't have much frontal area they do have a lousy Cd. A funky recumbant fully-enclosed Anime style bike would be able to do a lot better than 3-4X what your car gets.

PD should price its products such that [units sold] * [price per unit] - opportunity costs is maximized. Whether it costs them $1000 or $100 in materials and labor is not directly relevant to that price, although it does set a lower bound on what the competitors can charge for similar products which would then cut into PD's sales.

Samurai.

Building such a car isn't hard. Getting a large number of Americans to buy them isn't practical. The energy used traveling at steady speed on level ground is a function of speed (we don't want to drive 30 MPH), frontal area (people don't want a small car where they have to sit behind each other like bob sledders), and aerodynamics (they don't want bullet shaped cars). Energy used accelerating and climbing hills is a function of weight, although people don't want to be on the loosing end in an accident between a 1000 pound car and 6000 pound SUV. College students have built cars which get 3000 MPG (yes, 3 zeros); although running 30 MPH (doing 60 MPH would quadruple drag), requiring drivers to lie down, having just a .050 liter (yes, 1/20th of a liter) engine, and only 80 pounds of materials providing crash protection aren't things the average buyer will like.

Or not. I made my first two AFF jumps in Colorado, the next four while on a business trip in California, and graduation jump in Colorado. Both DZs were using the same deployment system (ROL ripcord) so there was no transition there. That may depend on scheduling. A lot of students but not a lot of equipment and instructors meant that I couldn't make more than one jump a weekend in Colorado; being able to make three single-instructor jumps in a row definately helped. Talk to the dropzones in question and see what their policy is.