gus

Straight of student status I bought a Spectre 150, I put about 200 jumps on it then changed it for a Spectre 135 - and I've put about 200 jumps on that too. I'm about 180 pounds out the door so that's wingloadings of 1.2 and 1.3 repectively. Openings: I've flat packed and pro packed and the only difference seemed to be that pro packing gives more on heading openings. I've jumped some dubious pack jobs that have been shoehorned in on a 20 minute call and I've jumped some pack jobs that have been so neat they should have been photographed and saved for prosperity. It doesn't seem to make much difference: openings are soft and on heading the majority of the time. I don't know where Spectres got their reputation for loooong opening from though, perhaps it's my packing but both of mine open pretty consistantly in about 500 feet. In my 400 jumps I've had no more than 2 hard openings and a handful of line twists but those were probably my fault. Flight: In full flight my Spectre feels solid and dependable. Turns from full flight are quick enough to give me a bit of a buzz and get my body nearly level with the canopy. It also feels solid in brakes, even right on the point of stalling. The stall itself is gradual and predictable - it's actually quite difficult to do. Turns in brakes are nice and flat and easy enough to perform close to the ground if necessary. Riser pressure seems quite high, although I don't have much to compare it to. I can pull a front riser down right to my shoulder but I can't hold it there for more than a 360. Snap turns on the front risers don't really build up that much speed - the recovery arc is pretty shallow - but pull off a nice carving 180 and on a nil wind day you can get more surf than you might think with enough energy for small carves and a nice soft landing. Landing: I honestly don't remember the last time I didn't stand up a landing on my Spectre. In strong winds where I'm coming straight down, in nil winds where I'm screaming across the ground (relatively speaking of course!) even landing cross wind and landing out if you remember to flare allllll the way it'll set you down gently. Complaints: My only complaints are with the glide and the forward speed. It's not that the glide is really bad it's just not that great either - but on a long spot you'll always want more glide that you've got! The forward speed is perhaps more a function of the wingloading but when it's windy I don't get much penetration and that's a bit frustrating. Overall: Great canopy, especially for the 'novice' jumper but also for anyone who wants an easy, predictable canopy that's still capable of being fun when you push it. Gus

Forgive my lack of rigging knowledge but what's the difficult thing about building tandem drogues and how would a square drogue address the problem? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Bloody name droppers. Not wishing to correct Hinton's Great Spotter but I was on Al's 500th a few weeks back! I'm also told he's going to be one of Steve Newman's Bullet Freefly School Bitches (ie instructor), presumably over the summer when things pick up. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

So what are the potential advantages of square pilot chutes? Or were you doing it just because you could?! (A perfectly valid reason by the way

I click my heels for wave-off, bring my legs tight together and my knees down, thow out the pc and collapse my arm wings by bringing my wrists and elbows together infront of me. Disclaimer: I only do it like this becasue that's how the guy that trained me up does it. I'd like to experiment with deploying in full flight but I haven't yet because I've only got 15 wingsuit jumps and it's one variable I'm happy to leave alone for the moment. The one downside to deploying like this vs full flight is that I think it makes you more prone to turning during deployment and giving yourself line twists (although I've only done that once). Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Agreed. I read the thread and more than anything I was just a bit dissapointed - I always assumed that the average dz.commer was a bit more civilised and intelligent... Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Dirtdive has them for 115 GBP (175 Euros). Albatros has them for 168 Euros, I don't think you'll find them that much cheaper... Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

What are they actually like about letting you freefly? If I turned up with an FF1 and 300 FF jumps would they just let me get on with it? Paying for a check-out jump seems like a bit of a rip-off..... Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Yikes! Have a look at a live drop from 250 feet on an Irvin-GQ round - pretty scary stuff. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Excuse my ignorance but what it a 'side spin', what causes it and what do you do about it? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Either the joke about Troy MacLeur 'sleeping with the fishes' or the one where they put Bart on ritalin and he comes down to breakfast with organges down his shorts. Genius. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

There are indicator-only systems here and here but they look like they might require an external power source. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Well they're normally good enough for me but when it all goes tits-up can I place the collective blame on dz.com? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Damn you and your crazy Jedei mind (), for the sake of my sanity let's assume the clock's ok. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

It's just a boring work thing (think packets/frames/networks) but it's really bugging me. That's where I'm at.

Ok, I have a good analogy: (1) A guy walks into a room with a clock on the wall, he sits down, pulls out a piece of paper, writes a 0 on it and starts to watch the clock. Every 27 seconds he tears up his bit of paper, adds 1 to the number he's just destroyed and writes it on a new bit of paper. (2) Some time later a second guy walks into the room and sits down. He looks at what's written on the 1st guy's bit of paper, writes it down on another bit of paper, puts it aside and starts watching the clock. Every 125 seconds he repeats this process (creating a pile of paper) - sometimes the 1st guy's counter has gone up by 4, sometimes by 5. (3) You're sat next to the 2nd guy but can't see the 1st guy, his bit of paper or the clock on the wall. If you took out a wedge of paper from the 2nd guy's pile, could you work out how many bits there were there by looking at the top and bottom pieces only? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

I probably do mean milliseconds but it doesn't really matter, it's the 27:125 ratio that's important. I'm not so sure. Each value of the counter represents a chunk of time 27 milliseconds long and if you don't know where in that chunk your frame was created I think the answer to "how many frames have I missed" can be ambiguous. I'm trying to think of an example but it's a problem of the counter and the frames not being in synch. If the counter incremented every 25 milliseconds we'd be laughing... Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

I know we've got some techy bods around here so I thought I'd share this problem with you all and let you show off your intelligence - it's been hurting my head trying to figure it out! EDIT: There's a better explanation a few posts down. (1) I have a counter, which increments every 27 microseconds. (2) I'm receiving frames of data, one every 125 microseconds. (3) Each frame contains the value of the counter at the instant the frame was produced. OK then! If, for some reason, I miss some frames can I work out exactly how many I've missed by comparing the counter value of the current frame with the counter value of the last frame I received??? Ta! Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

You're absolutely right, it must be a subconcious thing to counter the forward drive my arms are giving me. I'm jumping tomorrow (probably just jinxed myself ) so I'll try to concentrate on trying a different position. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

I've seen the same print at a friend's house, it's a nice photo but from the gear it looks quite old. I'm sure it's the same rock formation as Mick's avatar. Can't find any info on ikea.com. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Never mind, I emailed the BPA and got this back within 5 minutes! Gus OutpatientsOnline.com AGM Programme 2003.doc

Is there a list somewhere of what's happening at the AGM? All I could find on the BPA website was this: Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

Hey, nice videos. I counted just under 50 seconds delay, how far horizontally do you think his opening point was from his exit point? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

I emailed Roy yesterday to ask about international orders and he got back to me within a few hours. I also have a few friends who have bought rigs through him whilst holidaying in the States and they've all been really happy with the products and the service. Gus OutpatientsOnline.com

When I'm in sit I tend to fly with my arms really far back (on the right in this picture). I don't often see other people flying like that but when I try to bring my arms forward (like Steve is in the middle of the photo) I find it much more difficult to stay stable. I never have any trouble generating forward movement or generally moving around, should I just stick with what I do or are there good reasons to try and change my flying style? Gus OutpatientsOnline.com