Tonto

Out. I broke my femur really badly - pretty much smashed it to bits between the two heads. I had a plate and 14 screws. Looked a bit like a rake in my leg on x ray. It made airport security really tricky too. A rebreak would REALLY have compromised me with a full recovery never expected and amputation a possibility. So I had it taken out. That was 17 years ago. As an aside, if you do have it taken out - think about any other surgery you may need at the same time. May as well get a full overhall while you're out... t It's the year of the Pig.

I do leg straps 1st, then chest strap. Reasons? 1. You may survive a dive without a chest strap. The same is not true when the order is reversed. 2. When wearing a wingsuit, the legstraps are inside the suit by the time you're getting to your chest strap, so again, leg straps first. As for AFF at JSC, prior to getting gear, the student is given a jumpsuit to put them at a projected speed of 115 - 125 MPH, goggles (round neck) helmet that fits. Checked for hooks on shoes, jewelry etc, then given gear, and asked to check canopy size, AAD and ripcord equipped. All JSC gear is checked by the DI prior to removal from the store, and out of date reserves are prevented from leaving store. My students walk out with all straps threaded through, and all straps loose (It's a 400 yd walk). I beleive students should be as relaxed and comfortable as possible. Goggles round neck, alti on. I usually carry helmet for the walk so that their arms are free to practice drills. Once at boarding point, tighten up and tuck away. Once the student is satisfied their gear is OK, they come to me to be checked out. Check is 1. Helmet present, 2. goggles (Still around neck) 3. 3 rings (R) 4. RSL attached, 5. 3 rings (L) 6. Chest strap correctly routed, tight, loose end tucked away. 7. Cutaway handle clear and secure 8. Reserve handle in place, swage on cable 9. Leg straps tight, loose ends tucked away 10. Ripcord (Yes, we still use them..) clear and secure 11. (Round the back now..) Cypres on 12. RSL correctly routed 13. Reserve pin in place 14. Reserve closure loop good 15. Seal in place 16. Free movement on reserve cable 17. Close reserve flap 18. Main ripcord OK 19. Main closure loop good 20. Close main flap 21. (Over Left shoulder to get correct POV) Alti zero 22. Plane on final, put on and fasten helmet. At 1000ft, equipment check, Helmet, (Remove) 3 rings x 2, Chest strap, handles, leg straps, main deployment device. 5000ft - Alti check - "In the zone" (Minimal variance) 2000 ft prior to exit, goggles on, helmet on and fastened. 3 rings x 2, chest strap, handles, leg straps, main deployment device, cypres on, pins in place, flaps closed, Instructors pick up grips. Regardless what you do, having a system is a good thing. No system introduces the possibility of variables, and variables are usually a bad thing when what you've been doing so far has kept you (and your students) alive. t It's the year of the Pig.

Hi Sam, Taya was playing with Rob at the Boom yesterday. She was in the mid 35's on her GTI, as her S3-S is off at the riggers getting extra stuff done to it. I think Rob's on a 78? Loading is around 3.0. They were nowhere near a dock, but she was ghosting him round the outside of a turn he induced to increase the decent rate. (and so help her out.) I think she can go slower than 35 in the S3-S... but then there's too much forward speed... Ah, Life's little problems! t It's the year of the Pig.

Crack Monkey! If you're good I'll let you jump my S3-S again on Sunday! t It's the year of the Pig.

I'm always surprised when I read this. In South Africa ALL students have been trained on ZP canopies for AT LEAST the last 10 years. Admittedly these are (almost without exception) 290 and 230 Skymasters, so they still have dacron lines. t It's the year of the Pig.

That seems prudent, although the truth is, if you survive your 1st jump, you will beleive that you will survive the next. That is not always the case. If someone loaned you a Ferrari for the weekend, would you really be happy going back to you hatchback on Monday morning? The only reason to downsize is to go faster. Going faster reduces your margin for error. And you will make a mistake. We all do. Only one in ten of my landings are exactly the way I want them, so by definition 9 out of 10 are a failure. Sure, I'm picky, and the mistakes are small, but I want perfection. That's why I keep practicing. A 99.9% success rate will send you to hospital once every 1000 skydives. You need to be much, much better than 99.9% good. t It's the year of the Pig.

Hi There, You're breaking a couple of cardinal rules here, and if people seem abrupt, it's because we have seen 100's of people argue how good they are, and how they know their limitations - and be wrong. Truth is, most of them don't die, but many spend at least a year out of the sport, if they bother coming back at all. So. 1. You're downsizing and changing to a more aggressive planform at the same time. 2. You're pushing the limits of your experience loading any canopy at nearly 1.4 at 200 dives - and the Stilleto is not a toy. 3. Add ANY variable here - an out landing, traffic, turbulence - and you have a complete events cascade, with you being the event. According to the PD website: CANOPY (SQ. FT.) Stiletto-135 Varies with Landing Conditions MIN.(Lbs.) STUDENT (Lbs.)N/R NOVICE (Lbs.)N/R INT (Lbs.) N/R ADV (Lbs.) 162 EXP (Lbs.) 189 MAX.(Lbs.) 229.5 SPAN (FT.) 19.02 CHORD (Root/Tip) (FT.) 7.61/5.32 ASPECT RATIO 2.68:1 I've attached the Stilleto flight charecteristics document for your records. Doubtless after reading it you will be certain this is the canopy for you. I do not. The Stilleto has a MAXIMUM wing loading placarded as 1.3 Lbs per square foot. You will exceed that on your first jump. t It's the year of the Pig.

Are you sure about the dimensions? Wouldn't it be bit of a tight squeeze trying to get a penis into something designed to take 2 D cell batteries? t It's the year of the Pig.

There ARE some people out there who have been in the sport a long time, and who don't like the new disiplines, and think that new, safer gear takes the Darwin out of the sport. There were people who were very experienced when I started that I wouldn't even speak to these days because their attitude has remained the same - and so has their skillset - which by todays standards is pretty shocking. There's nothing wrong with missing "The good old days," but when I hear some of my peers lamenting the days when we did 15 loads out of a 206, and complaining that people do "Too many jumps" these days, I do worry that it may happen to me one day. I may have taught you to read an alti, and to pull when it was time, but you need to take the credit for sticking with it, for leaving the small pool and seeing how the world works, for pushing you limits, finding them and limping back into the sport. This really is something we choose to do each time we wake up on a jumping day - usually a weekend - and head out on that long drive with the dreams in our head of what the day will bring. Maybe I'm simple, but I just like it, you know? That just makes me want more. t It's the year of the Pig.

980 (DZ.com username) uses a vented PC on his skydiving rig, mainly for Wingsuit dives. F-111 is my prefered material for PC's, and I like them on the bigger side (32 inch) also for use on wingsuit dives. I have far more consistant openings with F-111 PC's than with ZP PC's. I don't mind replacing them every 200 dives or so. For me, risers, 3 rings, PC's, bridals, pins and closure loops are the most critical components of any parachute system. They ensure the rig stays shut till you need it, works when you want it to and allows you to escape when it doesn't work. I don't need much more than that. t It's the year of the Pig.

I only have 60 jumps on a round main, and maybe a little over 100 on a rig equipped with a round reserve. About 10 years back I impressed a bunch of people by landing a round reserve in the pit after chopping from a wrapped diamond. (It was borrowed gear.) But I can spot! t It's the year of the Pig.

This thread turned out WAY better than I expected it to! And the majority of people think it's a lot of dives that make you an old timer. (Next question, of course, is how many is "a lot." I'm lucky I started where and when I did. I'n South Africa, in 1985, student progression was on round canopies. My 1st jump was on a C9, and once I was on freefall, (from 2500ft with no AAD) I was cleared for the "higher performing" C9. My 1st jump course was about 4 hours, and the biggest part of it, at least half, covered PLF's and being dragged. My 1st square jump was on a Viking Superlite - with wooden steering toggles, and I dreamed of one day having a Paraflite main - I took a lot of flack from my teachers for moving to a square reserve at 100 dives, a Swift, due to me "having more experience on rounds" and so bought a Swift main so I'd be comfortable with my reserve. My GF never had to stand tension for me again, and tunnel checks were a thing of the past. Break-tie disapeared from my vocabulary until now. I have nearly 3000 of my dives out of Cessnas. 172's, 182's, 185's, 206's, 207's and 210's, most of which had no in flight door. I did my water training with a jump into the sea, in a little place called Hermanus, now world famous for whale watching. I remember adverts for 170 sq ft mains with tag lines like "Dare you jump it?" with recomendations of min 1000 dives. My 1st CRW was unplanned, being top docked at 1500ft by the guy I'd just done a jump from altitude with - and altitude was 8500ft. I recall ZP, and crossbracing - long before microline, and chest mounted altimeters, and Motorcycle "Jet" helmets. And learning to spot. And learning to spot. and Kroops goggles. And jumpsuits that were ALL spandex, and made people look like seals about to be clubbed. And then came "Day-Glo" and everyone wore pink. And it faded SO fast. I remember some of the 4 way blocks that stayed in for only a year, like Icepick to horseshoe, and those I felt would never leave, like snowflake to box. I remember camera flyers who had the whole VCR on their chests, and still managed to swoop, and camera's that weighed... fucking lots! And subscribing to Skydiving Magazine and it dawning on me that there were other people who skydived, maybe even a few 100 of them - in other places, far far away. I remember BASE, when it was banned here and the penalty was lifetime grounding, and secretly reading "The fixed object journal" to glean the information needed to survive my 1st Bridge. I had no problems on the dive - but took 5 hours trying to figure out how to climb out of the 700 ft gorge! I recall being told about "Jerry Bird and the All Stars" (I think) and wanting to meet him. By the time I made it to Quincy in 1992, I was on better dives than the ones he was organising, but I sat in on his evening seminars anyway - and still learned loads. I got to jump with him 2 years later at the "Post Equinox" boogie in Australia - and loved the dives he organised. These days, when I hook my Skyflier 3 - Special up to my Mirage G4, I'm amazed how far the equipment has come, and how little the people have changed. Sure, there's a constant set of new people who come and go, all thinking the sport has given them all it has to offer before moving on, but there are those people I looked up to 20 years ago who still have things to teach, and there are those I've taught who I've learned more from than they ever learned from me. It really is quite a ride, and I'm still enjoying every day. t It's the year of the Pig.

So... on your calculations.. someone who started at 18 would be an old timer around... 43 years old? Calling me an old timer? t It's the year of the Pig.

All the threads about buzzing canopies with wingsuits made me think of this one... t It's the year of the Pig.

When I read things like that, I think of Patrick De Gayardon, Rob Harris, Tom Piras, Roger Nelson etc. They were Kings - World Champions - Icons. (No, not the container..) They had talent, were hugely current, had incredible skills... And yet the ground offered them no consession for their level of skill or experience. The risk of living your life on the point of the sword is that it is the 1st to be blunted on the armour of reality. The risk of being part of the blade is far, far less, and yet we are still part of the weapon that slays the dragons of bordom that threaten our lives. Thinking back over the past 20 years, I've done some stupid, stupid things, and survived through luck, good fortune and perhaps the skills I gained along the way. I hope others will be as lucky as I have been thus far, but the incidents mill shows me that is not the case. t It's the year of the Pig.

Sorry, but that is without a doubt one of the stupidest comments I have ever read on dropzone.com. With you there. I'm on all sides of this coin, having done 700+ Tandems, 1800+ AFF jumps, competed and got gold and being a wingsuit pilot with a BMI and PFI rating. I feel that buzzing, with planning and consent, is OK. When some random noob that thinks they have the skillset to save me when it's their judgement that placed me at risk in the 1st place - I worry. This sport is filled with incidents in the early days of Tandem when people collided with the TI, sometimes incapacitating them and resulting in the death of the Tandem pair, and this happened both in freefall and under canopy. The "Tandems go last" rule was designed to defeat those who's ego's were larger than their skillset, but it seems that wingsuiting has given them another chance. I'd hope that "attitudes like yours that make the rest of us dislike wingsuit flyers." could be altered to say "Your attitude...dislike people like you." at some point in the future. We're not all like that. t It's the year of the Pig.

For General - Stilleto 107 loaded to 1.80. For wingsuits Safire 109 loaded to 1.77, with 3m bridle, shrivel flap and 32 inch PC. t It's the year of the Pig.

Ahh. The Jonathan.. I got mine, a 120, in May 1992, and jumped it until February 2003 when I retired it. I did 2200 dives in that time, of which about 1300 were on the Jonathan, the remainder being on Tandem and CRW canopies. It would be fair to say I loved the canopy and was very reluctant to stop jumping it. My reasons were simple. I was a toggle spanking swooper, and aspired to learning riser turns, and my Jonathan (They were all different as someone mentioned earlier) simply detested front riser input. I replaced it with a 2nd hand Stilleto 107, which is still my primary canopy today, some 1500 dives (and 1000 riser swoops) later. I'm not a quick learner, so I like to do a bunch of dives on the same canopy to narrow the variables. Most canopies are good for far more dives than their owners imagine. Jonathans can be difficult to maintain. Since they were all different, and few (if any) records were kept, something as simple as checking line trim can be a task which is impossible to do with any certainty. They were quite a machine in their day though. t It's the year of the Pig.

I have both, both custom. I got the G4 first, a MT, in January 2004. It now has 500 dives on it and looks new. I got the G3 next, also an MT, in January 2005. It now has 100 dives on it and looks new. I also use another older G3 as a back to backer when busy. The G4 is my work rig, used mainly for AFF. The G3 is my fun rig, used mainly for wingsuit dives. I'm incredibly satisfied with Mirage. t It's the year of the Pig.

As for the radio question, the answer is no. Radio has been used sporadically in the past, but due to maintenance issues, and perhaps the fact that there are 11 official languages in South Africa, they have never really suceeded. I'm not a Static Line instructor, and so I cannot answer your AAD question with any authority. I'm not a member of National Safety and Training (NSTO) and so can't speak on why the rules are what they are, but personally I think that all rental and student gear should be AAD equipped. t It's the year of the Pig.

Yup.

He's running a course at JSC this weekend. t It's the year of the Pig.

You got it in one! (You must have training in this stuff!) I much prefer the S3-S system to both the PHI's and the origional Birdman cutaway design. t It's the year of the Pig.

I've had the same issue on the demo I have, which has all the features mentioned above. Try turning your toes out and really muscleing the leg wing open. I've found that to be tiring, but does limit the flap. I'll have the demo at the AFFC for anyone wanting to give it a try. Sized to fit 5'10 170 lbs, with room for maybe 2 more inches height and 20lb more. t It's the year of the Pig.

Well... I'll be there! But I'm a long way from home - so I hope you'll recognise me from last year.. Looking forward to it. T and I have your pm re a lift and are sending it out to the lists, and will let you know what comes back, OK? t It's the year of the Pig.