dorbie

Awesome, and well done to the gear makers for sponsoring you.

There are degrees of testing, and it does not need a setup like a US army helmet test lab to produce some numbers for helmets. I'd be happy with a simple single standard constrained drop test, perhaps concussion level in the danger zone and see what the accelerometer says, forehead, sides and back. I don't think a standard should be set, but numbers would lead to informed choices. It doesn't need an expert to publish what the peak g-force impact load was on the head. Reality can be more complex but big deal, I'd be happy if we got this. Of course there are labs who'll do that for you today and give you a report, I am neither interested in a career change nor do I manufacture & sell head impact mitigation equipment but why would anyone be so foolish as to go into competition with numerous labs to service a tiny proposed market (the helmet makers) that simply does not seem to be interested for the most part. The labs are out there: http://www.bhsi.org/testlabs.htm

Umm..yeah ok if you want to believe that. There might be something to this d30 foam. The testing methods are a bit over the top but it seems to work. http://dvice.com/archives/2007/10/d30-foam-allows-helmet-wearers.php Sparky Still, some protecs are certified to certain standards while not a single skydiving helmet can claim any certification at all (to my knowledge). Which makes the protec safer in my book. On the other hand I don't wear one as I perfer the cool theme of skydiving helmets I tend to agree with this, and it's why Oregon Aero can be taken seriously, they provide some impact numbers.

Umm..yeah ok if you want to believe that. There might be something to this d30 foam. The testing methods are a bit over the top but it seems to work. http://dvice.com/archives/2007/10/d30-foam-allows-helmet-wearers.php Sparky Any skydiving helmet could pass the shovel whack test. The d30 is interesting because it is flexible until impact but that is solving a different problem from the one skydiving helmets suffer from. i.e. getting 'cool' fashion victims to wear a helmet that's comfortable and looks/behaves like a garment. It may be a good solution for a helmet shell liner offering comfort and blunt impact resistance, but that's not clear. Where are the numbers? These online video demos are just hype and marketing.

Research covers many definitions. Poney up the money?....A calibrated accelerometer with a serial connection to a PC, swing arm pivoting under gravity, surrogate head weight, impact plate and logging software. Not necessarily expensive but there appears to be no interest, but even if you don't do impact testing you can still tell that some crappy piece of thin comfort cloth is going to be of minimal benefit. People who can't figure this out have no business making protective headgear, but it's a free country and they do stick disclaimers on there saying "[our headgear sucks at protecting heads]".

It doesn't matter what helmet you mention, someone in skydiving will always say a protec is better, it's a mantra because helmets have historically offered limited protection in our sport. However, thickness counts for a lot and material is only part of the story. I had an aerosports certified helmet with significant protection on the DZ and someone still offered the 'helpful' advice that it's not as good as a protec without a clue about the helmet. It's not bad advice normally, but hopefully not automatically correct with companies like cookie at least trying to improve the situation. Maybe one day you'll be able to buy a skydiving helmet that doesn't have a disclaimer on it that says [this helmet is crap for protecting against impacts], to paraphrase. Oregon Aero offer a visco-elastic liner upgrade for the Pro-Tec and other products: http://www.oregonaero.com/p77-2001.html#styrene I won't be convinced about d30 until I see comparative impact G forces in a lined helmet shell vs normal pads of equivalent thickness. Getting more rigid under high loading may be a bad idea for your brain at certain impact loads. Even then a thin liner no matter what it's made of can't do better than thick foam of the right consistency but at least they're trying to address the problem.

We don't share definitions of working fine. Your unit has failed get it fixed.

I was folding my pilot chute the Germain way the other week and it seemed that having the pilot folded with the hackey near the bridle increased the potential for the hackey having some unwelcome involvement with the bridle, however slight the chance. I was probably overthinking it though. You can dream up all sorts of crap and never really know the odds of it happening.

There's at least one incident where worn softlinks put someone in a wheelchair. On the other hand there's another one where reserve Rapide's were not done up by the rigger.... Trust but verify.

Looking at the failure modes of the new system while ignoring known flaws with the old system seems to intentionally miss the point, but it's always easier to resist change and stick with the status quo than to lead. Pretending there is no risk associated with not adopting a change is a safe and popular fallacy.

If attributing incidents to some particular piece of equipment, it is only rational to attribute saves and successes too. Even in the early days these innovations save lives and it is a jumpers conscious choice to select the gear he jumps based on potential outcomes. Bill can be proud of his record of saves, and I'm sure even the skyhook's ballance sheet is positive. But talk is cheap, back it up by jumping a rig without any of Bill's innovations. I know of at least one person who had a hard reserve pull due to following her training which told her to punch out at 90 degrees with her handle, I was given the same training but understood immediately what had happened to her. If you don't really understand the mechanics (and many people don't) you can give yourself a very hard reserve pull and scare the crap out of yourself as this woman. It's one of those factors you can never fully account for in the statistics of no-pulls or low pulls.

Exactly, this is why I called the case against kiting as an argument against this technique a straw man although I wasn't aware this was being taught by Germain (although I have since seen some military jumpers in training use the technique). It makes some of the reactions to this suggestion look quite foolish. I'm not averse to kiting personally but it depends on the circumstances, LZ etc. A lot of it has to do with perception and what people are used to/comfortable with.

There is competion, you can get a custom Dolphin container for $1225 all the way up to a custom Javelin Odyssey for more than an extra grand above that, and everything in between. The wait is half a year on the Odyssey and 1 week on the Dolphin, so it does not appear that jumpers are beating a path to the cheaper product. Of course you need a few more items to complete your rig. Since you're such a big fan of competition and are so price conscious let us know if you get the Dolphn and if not please post to this thread why not.

Thanks for trying it instead of just offering an opinion.

Good, someone else agrees...I'm glad it's not just me! That's a strawman. This is not about kiting your canopy in the landing area, it's about using kiting skills to get your canopy down quickly and safely. You can practice anywhere.

Yes and I've tried these techniques on both and shown it and I have to say that this is quite a bogus analogy. There are underlying principles at play here that translate between both types of canopy.

The wide angle lens can do strange things. This uses a .3x multiplier and you can still see a large hole even on exit at full altitude that should tell you that it was truly immense. The load spotted for that gap, the uppers were ripping and you can see us drift towards it we missed it. Skydivers cloud bust, it happens, it's reality.

It is specific to the canopy design, trim & loading.

This might have been something to mention at the outset. When the advice comes from a highly experienced expert, people can easily understand that what works for you, may not be the correct course of action for them. As it was, you did not mention that, instead you made it sound like a valid course of action for most people. You even defended it as such when I suggested that there was a simpler and more reliable procedure that others should follow. The truth is, I don't really care which way you personally do anything. However it does bother me when you offer up bad advise for all to see. At this point the public at large has heard both sides and will do what ever makes sense to them. In the first line of the first post someone forked to this thread I said that you need practice to develop the skills to implement this. These skills are not unique to paragliding. Any kiting experience is advantageous to a skydiver regardless of the method used. I would not call myself an expert, I never claimed to be but I did not give bad advice, although I have seen plenty of it posted on this topic.

well. shit... I thought we werent allowed to jump thru clouds...maybe I should come to your DZ, cause they wont even put the load up without a hole big enough to see the entire area around the dz. I've seen entire loads get out with more cloud cover at other DZs.

As a Paraglider pilot I've done a lot of kiting in high winds and much larger wings than the canopies we skydive with. When I was a student it was a lot of work, but kiting is not a lot of physical exertion once you master it, so you need more practice if you find it so. The key is to stay under the wing, keep it loaded instead of pulling it into the wind and induce the minimum of drag with control input in high wind (rear riser steering instead of toggles if necessary). Nothing wrong with stepping back under control and I've already addressed the point I was holding some toggle after landing that I should not have been. The best way to make killing a canopy using toggles safer is to step back (towards the canopy)as you do it. Some of your observations are simply not correct like the nose, it was just the random dynamics and unnecessary. The canopy was completely limp and tail into the wind at that point.

As I said in the other thread, I held too much toggle after landing, you can see it on the video, live & learn, however I did not get dragged. I took two or three steps back and the canopy was under control at all times. If you kill it with the toggles in a high wind situation like this you will induce a lot more drag and horizontal lift in whatever direction and you'll be moving back a lot more than I was. Even if you're flying it into the ground. So I thoroughly disagree, unless you have arms like an orangutang or are jumping a pocket rocket. No argument on cutting away, but it is completely unnecessary unless you simply cannot penetrate to maintain zero ground speed.

That's the shittiest advice of all. Once you land, and your toggles are down, letting them up will do the same thing it does if you made those moves while flying your canopy; the canopy will dump all the lift, and surge forward and (try to) dive. Rubbish, this is abject nonsense. Your toggles are not down after a high wind landing, that's the surest way to start moving backward before you are even standing.

The best way to collapse a canopy quickly without getting dragged is to get on the rear risers. 4:45 on my video.

Nonsense. You can control your canopy and get it down very quickly on the rear risers much safer and with no chance of getting dragged. Your toggles WILL NOT be down in a high wind after landing, because you do not need to complete your flare, your ground speed will be zero long before your hands are down. As I posted in the other thread watch this from 4:05 and at 4:45 wou will see how instantly the canopy is under control. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWNnxqukz9Y I'm not saying do this without the skill but practicing your kiting and building up to this is the way to ensure you keep it under control in high wind.