The111

You can't PLF without a P. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Ah ok. Even then I suspect it is still hard to see the canopy when it first opens since that is most likely behind you. Could always flip the camera the other way if you want to see for sure though. :-) Haven't done one in a long time actually, haha. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Are the results posted anywhere? www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Out of curiosity, where did you hear that? With any other wingsuit thumbloops always existed only to make unzipping easier. I've never known of a suit where they were flight controls. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

How can you know that? I am assuming your video camera points where your eyes do. Which means that the canopy opened behind you, out of your sight. By the time you could see it, opening was already mostly finished. The linetwists alone are no problem. Linetwists + harness shift (uneven risers) are. It was easy to see from the video the risers were offset by what looks like about 3 inches. Even if the bag did spin off your back like you think, and even if modding your gear fixes that, you'll still get linetwists if you load your harness unevenly and cause riser shift like that. Best way to fight that is to lock kneebones and anklebones together after pitching. It's impossible to shift in a harness if your legs are together like that (try it under canopy one day, try making a harness turn with legs together, you can't). BUT... the modern suits that inflate like a rock make it impossible to close your legs... another reason I don't like that characterists. Regardless, the point still stands that staying centered on opening is more important than what bag or container you have (not to say that the latter does not matter). www.WingsuitPhotos.com

I've noticed a trend over time of increasing pressurization (suits of any size, not just the large ones). I am not crazy about this at all, possibly because I started jumping on suits with very low pressure, but I like feeling more fluid and mobile inside the suit. Even my Ghost3 which I like for the most part, has a slightly higher pressure than I'd prefer, which makes it take significant effort (compared to my Phantom) to transition from back to belly. I can't imagine jumping a suit with even more pressure than the Ghost and trying to use it for acro stuff. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Nearly a decade ago I traveled the country with a bag of demo wingsuits and put them on dozens of students with all sorts of different rigs. I never encountered a harness that wouldn't work with the suit that was sized for the student. Since then there have been countless new wingsuit designs that similarly have no problem fitting any harness on the market. If the wingsuit and harness can't work together, then it is a problem with the suit, barring some really strange fucked up harness that intentionally changes everything we know about how harnesses work. But the Vector3 (that Donohue jumps) is if anything one of the most "normal" harnesses on the market. It is the wingsuit's job to fit all normal rigs. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Not a joke, it's a deep metaphor about the futility of existence. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Yeah, those are what I mentioned having on my first rig. I think I might even have a spare set somewhere. I thought they were so stiff though that they totally prevented pull past. Good to know that's not the case. Thanks Brian. That would definitely be preferable to swapping my entire risers out. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Thanks everyone for the responses. Sounds like I have a few different solutions to investigate. Never thought I'd be replacing risers/toggles instead of just using what came with a rig, but thinking hard about it now. Yeah, I had about that many on mine too. I definitely don't think it's a huge problem or something that's likely to occur. I can't even prove it is the riser's fault in the chop described in OP. But I can certainly prove it's possible, and I'd like to remove or minimize that possibility. Sounds about right, see my other response above. Thanks for the suggestion Spot.

My rig is an Icon Sport with a Pilot main and some sort of soft links, I guess it's Aerodyne's version of a slink? With this rig I've always put the slider behind my neck after deployment, both for the "swoops" I do and also to get it out of the way of my big camera helmet. I had a chop last weekend that I believe to be due to a toggle release on opening. I couldn't see since my head was pinned to my chest with linetwists, but when I recovered the main canopy later there was indeed one brake released, and it corresponded with the direction I was spinning (still, it could have released at some point after the chop). This has naturally got me thinking about my riser/slider combo and how to prevent this from happening again. Perhaps a stupid question coming from someone with my experience, but truth be told I've only owned/jumped one rig other than the one I have now, and it had Slink bumpers, but I don't think they allowed the slider to come down period (I was not in the habit of pulling my slider down with that first rig). So, I am not really sure about what solutions exist on the market for this. Basically I'm faced with what seem at face value like contradictory goals: - slider should NOT come past riser end during deployment - slider should come past riser end when I want it to later What systems are there that allow this? Attached is a picture of my current setup. There is really nothing in place to prevent the slider from coming too far. The top of the riser, with the 4 parallel tack lines, is pretty stiff and generates quite a bit of resistance when pulling the slider down, but obviously I now question that this resistance is enough. Would love to hear recommendations from other people more familiar with gear offerings in the current market. [inline risers.jpg] www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Depends on the wingsuit and your deployment style. Wingsuit openings can be much softer than normal freefall, but they can also feel harder if you let yourself get whipped. But lots of people love Sabre1's for WS because they open quick which in general is more reliable and on heading. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Sorry but the entire idea is nonsense. If you have the ability to control the suit in any way, then fly and deploy as intended. To somebody who is tumbling out of control, I am not sure why your weird upside down streamer position is supposed to somehow be more achievable than normal flight position. Out of control is out of control. If you don't have the ability to control the suit, then pitch before you die (first jump priorities from AFF and all that). And stop jumping suits you don't know how to control. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Yeah my wild ass guess with no stats is that per capita proximity flying has orders of magnitude more fatalities than swooping. Which has nothing to do with what PD names their canopies. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

If there is somebody out there who actually changes their opinion of the risk level of proximity flying, based on the name of a canopy... then I weep for our species. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Post some pics! (It doesn't have to be you). Not sure I've ever seen a shot like that, but you're right it is possible with any suit. As proven by the backfly king in an antique suit. But... this does not negate the fact that some suits are much better designed for it, and will do better in the long run no matter what you learned on.

I know you know this, but just for clarification: it's the high forward speed (not the low verticsal speed) that makes your deployment happen in less vertical distance (leading to the illusion of lower pulls being acceptable). Low deployment speed in my experience makes deployments weirder and definitely not faster. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

7. (that's my answer to everything, there is a unit somewhere which makes it work) www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Those are not beginner exits IMO... You're missing the point, which is that clearly he needs better sleeves. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Nothing about you is normal Chuck. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

No, I'm not in the market for a wingsuit. Thanks for asking though. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Ditto, it's pretty rare that I get twists and even more rare that I get to try to fix them myself. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Haven't tried them all, but very happy with my Pilot. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

That's called "sinking out your deployments" and I did it for my first several hundred WS jumps and recommend it to anybody who wants more stability during opening. At some point I sort of subconsciously stopped doing it, plus it's harder on modern suits with more rigid legwings. www.WingsuitPhotos.com

Lots of cameras: 3.5k -4k A camera: 3k-3.5k No cameras: 2k-3k www.WingsuitPhotos.com