Calvin19

who the hell is John Lennon?

The illusion of tolerance is really trendy these days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YhlNoJK7EIg 130~ sq foot acro paraglider. The pilot, Pal is most likely the best glider pilot in the world right now. He is an awesome guy and really fun to hang with. Take a look at the "swoop" at the end. And that one is pretty weak.

Doesn't work like that. The simple explanation is Drag. Parasite drag increases at an exponential rate, and any ram air canopy is a DOG. Induced drag decreases exponentially with speed. The balance of the two is the goal for any soaring aircraft design. The smaller the canopy, or more accurately the smaller the effective span, the less efficient it will be at soaring. Take a look at modern racing paragliders. The BEST gliders are loaded to

I have soared a 260'^2 (.7/1) BASE canopy, as well as a 70'^2 Speed glider (loaded at 2.3/1). Depends on the lift, and how comfortable you are in that kind of air. Parachutes for the most part top out in glide ratio around 5/1, at a very high descent rate, (I think about 700'/min, not sure though never did the math, but when maneuvering that descent rate could get well above 6000'/min. I have seen over 100mph vertical speed under canopy) Modern paragliders get 8-11/1 glide at around 200ft/min sink, with the more important ability to maneuver in tight conditions at that sink rate. -SPACE-

The factors are endless, but in less than technical terms the big things are: Paragliders have: -higher aspect ratio (thinner) (parachute 2-3/1, paraglider 4-13/1 -more surface area (generally) (Parachute 39-300'^2, Paraglider ~170-320'^2) -shallower trim -MUCH better airfoil shape integrity These things and many others make them as efficient in soaring flight as they are. The fabric used on a paraglider is not "less robust", just different. It is a essentially zero stretch sail material, where a parachute uses a semi-flexible material to increase strength on openings. Other differences are harness drag, etc. I could go on. -SPACE-

I wonder why now that any kid at home has more computing power than the whole NASA at that time, nobody is capable of giong back up there Amen! What gives man! I think we just chickend out! What a shame! I know this has been discussed before on dorkzone, but the reason is very simple. Money Science(cool science like going to space) gets a lot less money than military spending. Because ICBMs were a big thing back then, the planets aligned and the dollars went to the cool stuff for a little while. Now we have global annihilation covered a hundred times over, so according to the money, there is no need to go to the moon or anywhere past 60,000'. Not even a tiny bit.

Sad thing. Both are great books. All his books are pretty good. -SPACE-

Skydive gear, from an airplane, ~900' BASE gear, from an airplane,

Awesome find! The LM remains the coolest single object ever made.

Thanks! that was from my first digital camera in 2005. Heather is the red streak in the sky from her NAV lights, she died a year after this was taken in my Citabria with another friend Dave in the mountains. I am on the far left, masked by the bright light. Alex is the next over in front, He died because some idiot white collar/lawyer "pilot" was playing video games in his brand new fail-safe invincible CAPS parachute equipped Cirrus. Not looking where he was going, and flew his engine through the cockpit of my best friend. Luckily the Cirrus pilot (and sadly his passenger) burned alive on the parachute (CAPS) ride down. Alex was in pieces. took them two days to find all of him. Glad the Cirrus pilot is dead, cause i'd have killed him otherwise. I have lost six friends to plane crashes, two to parachute crashes. Only truly cried about Alex because I grew up with him, we learned everything together. That's what happens though. We fall out of the sky sometimes. To do anything that we do without accepting and grasping that in it's entirety is ignorant and dangerous. People go in, and sure, it is a sad thing. A life has been lost. But what did you expect to happen when you started exploring ways to truly live?

A full on, badass, ultimate speed and distance machine. Nick is freaking amazing on that thing. I hope I can fly one one day.

doing it under the radar, never climbing to more than 3000 AGL (sometimes less than 300') doing two ways out of single place airplanes, using whatever gear we wanted. I luckily had friends that came from money, and liked to do fun things. It killed three of them in the last few years, flying airplanes. Only one was pilot error. But while it lasted, (And I will get it back) I had the keys and effectively unlimited fuel. to a skydive ship, an acro plane, two backcountry planes, and we could take the heli whenever as long as we reserved. Sorry for going on, but I have the best two years any person can have, and I miss it. Fly free Heather, Dave, Alex, Nadia. Bottom line, night jumps are so awesome because they remind you where you are more so than a day jump. They let you see the stars and the airplane disappear into blackness, (we used strobes and nav lights ALL the time. pinky promise). Closest call we ever had was my friend with about 15 jumps almost landing inside jail fences. that could have been an issue, but he figured it out and landed on the runway. We jumped into parties, into stadiums, into anywhere that we could land on or in. Warm, Full moon nights were great. pulling low, doing stuff that a bunch of noob, semi-skilled Skydiving and BASE jumping teenagers do when they have a million dollars worth of flying machines at their fingertips.

You ever get over being scared and start opening your eyes on them day jumps? Myself and 4 friends were all skydivers and commercial pilots in training, we had a Helicopter, 2 luscombs, a C206, a cherokee, a pawnee, 2 supercubs, a twin commanche, and a Citabria. The only ones that we rented were the Helicopter and the Cherokee. The airport we all learned at did not allow parachute ops, so we jumped at night, several times, every night for almost 2 years -SPACE-

Nice. Up until last year I had more night jumps than day jumps. (250-300) (yes, skydives from aircraft). -SPACE-

That or worse! I walk on glass in my own house

So you almost did a Shah? Smart man smart man! Sometimes a man needs to just enjoy the show. But now you know the shit I get here. I think the important bit to take away from it is that I -Didn't- pull a "Shah"

My girlfriend and sister (yeah, they both live with me) were going on about some "false perception/expectation of beauty" in women while they were watching that show. I wasn't really listening because I never really listen to bullshit sexist/feminist crap unless I want to start a fight. -and- I figured they were being a bunch of ignorant hypocrites BECAUSE THEY WERE WATCHING THAT SHOW.

Sure there also no difference in landing if you start from 1/4 breaks, right?? yeah yeah yeah. Speed is good, but control is better. Rather be near stall and pound in than out of control and hauling ass. I guess we are just splitting hairs now. I imagine that the majority of experienced canopy pilots deal with turbulence just fine. Target audience here is people less familiar with flying stuff. Don't turn too low and flare. It's all the same.

Yes, kinda. "ram air" pressure at the leading edge openings is what "inflates" the wing. BUT... what keeps you FLYING is lift, from angle of attack. anywhere above stall the wing should have plenty of internal pressure. Line tension from lift is what holds your canopy above you, this is controlled by the angle of attack of the wing. NOT the internal pressure. 1/4 brake idea comes from paragliding, where we use adequate pressure on the brake lines so we can "give and take" as we fly through rough air. I doubt the difference between full flight with brake line tension and 1/4 brakes on a parachute matters very much if at all. So, yeah, full flight with brake line "tension" to feel and be ready to control the wing would be just fine. -SPACE-

Agreed, that was where my 1/4 brakes penetration method came from. Slower penetration equals less violent turbulence. Wrong. More speed, more pressurization and keep your lines under tension. Do not give up your speed... what does speed do for you? unless you are flying something with a very high wing loading, flight speed is easily recoverable. Some guy a few posts up compared aircraft "penetration" speeds to canopy collapse. While not directly transferable, he did have a point that high speed penetration=more "violent" turbulent effect on an airfoil. There is no "save all" flying through turbulence technique, but I strongly believe the best thing to do is just fly the parachute, have tension on the brake lines to be able to feel the wing and what it wants to do. keep even pressure on the toggles and weight shift. as for your "don't give up your speed" comment. Compare turbulent air to turbulent water you are water-skiing on. If the waves are really big, you cannot go fast enough to just skip over them, you have to (sometimes) slow down, bend your knees, and absorb the waves. If you are going too fast and your skis lose contact with the water for a long enough period of time, they no longer can be used for control and the skier crashes(or parachute collapses). Of course you cannot go too slow, because the ski/wing will stop working (sink/stall). you need to find that balance and fly(control/balance) through it. on the same page: Paragliders are FAR more susceptible to collapse than any parachute, and Paraglider pilots fly through more drastic turbulence than skydivers on a regular basis. We control our wings by this"active flying" technique I have described in other posts.. It also should be noted that paragliders are "designed" to partially collapse in some situations to absorb certain turbulence, and yield to pilot error in active flying. The BIGGEST issue when testing a paraglider is its ability to maintain a heading through a collapse.

You are correct, even for the (unbelievably) low empty weight of this alleged aircraft it has very small surface area. Further, it is a "box wing" design. That uses a significant amount of the aft wing area for stability, making it less useful as a lifting surface. If they ever get a motor in it, I would love to test fly it for them. (It will need 2x the engine power they say they will put in it, IMO) The way their press released testing videos look they really have little idea what they are doing. -SPACE-

Agreed, that was where my 1/4 brakes penetration method came from. Slower penetration equals less violent turbulence. -SPACE-

That will not work. I have designed a few flying machines, and that one is too much daydreaming not enough thinking. If they get it off the ground, it will take a pretty skilled pilot to fly. For sure not the average weekend warrior idiot they are marketing it to. -SPACE-

You have never done that? Pussy.