TimDave

The mains are 370s. I am not sure of the rigs. They look like a cross between the racer and a vector. Maybe something from TPS. I know a guy who was in the the airborne. He said they were doing a jump at night and he thought that nobody would see him do a back loop. He did and who do you think was right there when he finished? An instructor. Needles to say, he got an earfull and so did the whole group. They don't concentrate on RW or FS. They are there to mess up somebody's world and I guess turning points does not fit into that equation.

Hey you could take my route. Travel your butt off, work tons of overtime, get pissed off just before WFFC and get fired. Now you got tons of time to jump

The impression I got was that they planned on doing something intentinal. I could imagine things like a group of non-licensed and not current jumpers doing something together. I saw that once and a cypress fire, 2 out happened. When you are at a C 182 DZ that can get overlooked with small groups of people there during the off season.

Solos are groovy baby! I try new stuff, blow off steam, chill out, whatever. You don't have any pressure, that's fun at times. Hop n pops, low and high are all good. When are you going you going to start giving out cocheese numbers j?

I was hoping the sarcasm would have come through (sorry).

This is obviously a HYPOTHETICAL question So here is my personal non-hypothetical answer. A few things to note. The USPA is a self policing organization. And the BSRs are that organizations "rules". By being self policing, the responsibility to enforce rules are up to its members. So that means that essentially you have to take matters into your own hands. But as a rating holder you agreed to get your rating by those rules and are more responsible to enforce them. There are dilemmas involved by ratting out friends. This is hard but remember your responsibility. If you did not notice, that is not your fault and you may or may not be accountable for that oversight. If it was your job to make sure that did or did not happen then maybe you should be accountable. If you should have seen it and did not that also implies a bit of accountability. But if you looked the other way and claimed to not see it, that is another story. The punchline is: If it is wrong and you can intervene, you should. If you missed something you should have seen because you are a rating holder, you may feel embarrassed or guilty and that is good. This is because you care. That is also good. If you were negligent and missed something, that is bad. Always take the high road, you can't go wrong. You may get people mad but you may save their life, prevent and injury, or even prevent someone (like a pilot) from losing their rating. I had intervened late last year by forcing them to ride down on a load that ended up going on jump run after dark when they were not qualified to jump in that condition. I rode down with them to show that it was the right thing to do even though I had 7 or so night jumps and was qualified to make it. It sounds like you are struggling with a decision (hypothetically). It feels good to be praised for doing the right thing much more than it hurts to get scolded for it by yahoos that don't care about the rules when it means they can't do some bling bling thing. I have been called a tight ass by some but I also have not been hurt in this sport more seriously than a bruised ego after a bad landing.

Happy to help.

I wish I could think that straight all the time.

What you are doing is not unsafe to control your openings. It will work at any wingloading. It is just a matter of how aggressive it is. For me it was too aggressive and my 90 left became 90 rights sometimes after over correcting with risers. I put my hands near my risers to take action in case of a possible caopy collision. If it works for you keep doing it. Most openings on canopies like yours and mine can be greatly affected for the good and bad by altering your body position in the harness. Just remember that you have 4 primary control inputs for your canopy, front risers, rear risers, harness and toggles (no particular order here). Learn how to use all of them and you will increase your ability to save your life and have more fun also.

It looks like STP means Student Training Program. I guess when you do the math it all adds up to about $2000 no matter which way you slice it up. $249 for AFF FJC, 2 jumps at $169, 3 jumps at $139, 12 jumps at $50 = ~$1800 at our DZ, their course ~$2000. You would think being an engineer that math would be my strong area

First 18 jumps are $130 each? That sounds high. I would expect jump 8 - 10 to drop to $50 or so since you should only need a coach at that point. Maybe I am missing something like video but I still can't see that price for that many jumps.

To each his own

When you get to higher wing loadings on HP canopies they become very sensitive to riser input. This is magnified many times during opening since the canopy may only be 1/3 of it's inflated area. This makes them more sensitive. I learned that on my xfire2 109 (1.7:1) that the risers are too aggressive. I can deal with almost any off heading openings with harness shift. I was only not able to control 1 after the first 40 (learning). The one I could not, I chopped it after 6 360s in about 3-4 seconds.

I agree. Since I am going to take my test next week for my Senior rating this stuff starts to jump out at me more. When I get that lazy I should quit rigging. To lift the bag out and replace it would not add more than a couple of minutes. I know time is money, but is a couple of minutes worth the potential consequences?

If it works that's fine but it does not seem too professional to me.

My thoughts would be to look for a new rigger if there was one available. It may seem petty like "Anybody can make a mistake" but what else may that rigger have missed. Chances are it would have worked. But here is a scenario. Unconcious, cypres fire while a bit head down. The line may be trapped by the elastic for long enough to prevent the reserve from fully inflating before it is too late. Glad you found it on the ground!

I agree with the harness thing to a point. The Stiletto should be more sensative than the Sabre2 (my experience) from harness input. It can't rule it out though. Have a rigger check the trim. Along with that, have the rings attached to something solid like a packing hook on a wall and pull firmly on the 2 equal length lines on the center cell and work your way out. This will set the lines and correct or show off any line trim problems you may have.

The PD-143R should fit into the TJNK fine. Your rigger may grumble but it will fit. My 126 flew very well loaded at 1.5 (I was concious though Your post here seems to tell me that you already know the right answer. Don't order the sexy small little container if you are not comfortable with what's inside. You are probably in luck since the 143 should be fine.

If you jumping a canopy and pull down on the left toggle 12" for 5 seconds will produce a 180 degree turn and it will lose 200 feet in the process that is expected. But now I have a new canopy, should I expect that it behaves in the same way? I can't say that I would. That, now, is not intuitive.

That is not a blanket true statement. There will exist a "canopy terminal velocity" where no matter what you do (keeping your wing flying properly) you will not go any faster than this. It is a matter of physics. At some point the drag will become equal to the ability of your canopy-pilot system to increase in speed. I have seen tests of this done with a GPS that indicated vertical speed and the GPS did not indicate higher descent rates than xx. This was regardless of how many degrees past a certain point you got.

You are correct that some people can and some people can't. I never said that there is nodody is capable of it. I was just speaking in generalities. In general most people are not ready. As for my canopy choice. I made it after taking the evolution canopy flight school, attending many seminars by Brian Germain, and spending days doing canopy coach jumps with Brian and preparing to fly my new wing that way. I also read every thing that I could get my hands on (articles by John LeBlanc, Brian Germain, Brian Burke, and other aerodynamic texts). I felt that I did my homework and only when those experienced people said that I was ready did I downsize. Also I never made any reference to my experience like I was just trying to make people aware of what they say may give the wrong impression. If you look at my profile you should be able to figure out my exit weight. I put about 250 jumps per year on my crossfire at my current pace. I am sorry if I came off like I wsa attacking you. I did not mean to do that. I just got very angry that the subtle message I got from your post was "Hey I did it, you might be able to also" I am not attacking you, I just am trying to prevent unnecessary encouragement. There is plenty of that out there.

You have the attitude that is going to make you an OLD skydiver (that can still walk). I wish people like you were in the majority in our sport. I have taken the time to learn as much as I can by going to canopy control seminars, courses, etc. I encourage you to do the same. By doing that, you will become more comfortable and nonchalant about doing something under canopy. Talk to Scott Miller, Brian Germain, John LeBlanc everytime you get the chance. Pay for coaching under canopy. That will save your life, not being able to Spock somebody or do 20+ points in 4-way. Keep it up you are on the right track.

Nobody is saying that it can't be done. They are saying that it is not a good idea. I can catch an arrow shot from a bow, does that mean it is a good idea? Comments like yours will just encourage more people to do things that they think they are ready for. When the not-so-perfect situation arises everyblody will just pray they survive it unstead of starting another thread just like this one. You are right, it can be done. I am just tired of seeing and reading of people that have low jump number and wing loadings that are not appropriate for that person to SAFELY learn.

See, I knew there was somebody more smarter than I are That was what I was thinking! How much help is provided by cross ports? If there is inadequate pressurization would the cross braces be ineffective also?

The basic idea with the trim like that is to have as much of the lifting force vector perpendicular to the weight of gravity (pointing up when in straight level flight). This would give the canopy a more powerful flare. Also the dropped end cells prevent wingtip vorticies and channel more of the air over the airfoil instead of having it spill off the sides. This improves the performance as well. I am not a canopy designer but just someone that has a small grasp of aerodynamics. If I am wrong hopefully someone could gracefully point that out to me