VTmotoMike08

I have seen some CRW dogs who added padding to their leg straps. Obviously, it can help a lot when you are under canopy for an extended time. Maybe post this on their forum here or better, look for people doing CRW at your DZ and ask them what works.

Do you mean like a spinning (corkscrew) force moving you so fast a contact pops out of your eye? I'm sure that would be impossible, or you would black out from G forces before it became an issue http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal

Volleyball kneepads work well. They are padded fabric, and I used to wear them under my jumpsuit in the wind tunnel. If you are handy with a sewing machine, it should be simple to sew them in. Any sports store has them.

Well I don't know about measuring points but I read something valuable on here a few weeks ago and actually wrote it down to remember it. Your MLW length is measured by taking your height (in inches) minus your inseam minus 20. Its a rough measurement, but that should get you close. I'll try to find the original post...

No shit, I once had a whuffo ask me if my parachute came out of the grippers on my jumpsuit. And this was while I was wearing a rig

No. I propose a free pass only on NONWRECKLESS minor violations. Doing a 270 thru the pattern would certainly be considered a wreckless act. I dont think there is any nonwreckless minor violations in swooping like there is in driving.

Agreed that some more thought might need to be put into that. I cant think of any area that I have ever driven where the limit should be decreased tho. But if you do get in an accident, those things will do a lot to help you walk away from it. Because then you could lose you immunity to minor violations for 5 years and have an insurance claim. Its not removing liability for accidents, just making sure good drivers don't get a punishment that is way more than the crime for minor offenses. No. He is at fault for failing to yield. And anyway, I am proposing that you would owe him an equivalent POS 1983 car. Say it would cost him $1000 to buy a new junker but the insurance co only gives him $500. You would have to pony up another $500. This is more applicable to when someone totals your 1-5 year old car that loses a lot of its value fast. So you have a right to go 5 mph in a 45 zone and hold a huge line of traffic behind you?

Because I want to be able to drive faster without getting a ticket and I think that increased safety systems justify the added risk. Note that I said non-wreckless violations only. I think DWI/ DUI falls under wreckless in most states. Anyway, it is much higher risk than minor violations, so I would answer NO.

If I was king of the world, here are the traffic laws that I think should be implemented. Feel free to hate me, flame me, or accuse me of increasing traffic fatalities, this is more of a rant against my daily commute than anything else. Lets also hear some of your proposed laws. 1) Speed limits would be universally raised by 10 mph. Vehicles have more safety systems than ever before and its time that we acknowledge that most of our speed limits are significantly lower than they need to be. As safety systems increases, speeds can also increase and we can have the same acceptable margin of error. 2) Judges would be required to dismiss all non-wreckless traffic violations (including less than 20 over in most states) for drivers that have not had an at-fault accident in the last five years. If you can push the limits a little and still not cause an accident, you should not have to pay for minor offenses (like slight speeding, rolling stops, etc) that only serve to pad the state’s budget while increasing your insurance rates. 3) If you cause an accident that totals someone else’s car, you (or your insurance company), must pay the replacement cost for a similar vehicle, not the depreciated market value of the current one. I don’t think I should lose a dime or have to put up with a lesser car due to someone else’s mistake. 4) Bicycles would not have the same rights to road use as cars. I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said “Same road, same rules, same rights” with a picture of a bike and I laughed. Until they can go the same speed so that they don’t hold up traffic, they do not deserve the same rights. And they don’t have the same rules either because they are not required to have turn signals, headlights, etc. And no, I did not recently get a speeding ticket to prompt this, its just the way I think it should be. Lets hear some of your ideas for better traffic laws. Edited for spelling

Old don't mean junk I have many rigs ready to jump made long before you were even a twinkel in your daddys eye and they are more then safe and airworthy. It's people like you that talk all kinds bullshit about older rigs to people @ the dz and on line that has noobs thinking anything older then 5 yrs is junk and unsafe, when it's not true, there is a lot of really good older rigs around that can be picked up cheap, you don't need to spend 2 to 5k to get a rig. I have no issue with older rigs. My current Javelin is 17 years old and my previous vector was even older than that. I agree that there is nothing wrong with older rigs but if someone had pointed out the differences in comfort to me when I was buying my first one with 40 jumps under my belt, I might have made a different decision and been happier with it for longer. And I don't give advice to students (noobs) at all, I leave that to the instructors. And I am very well aware that you don't need to spend 5k to get a rig, but I do think that you generally get what you pay for.

Agreed that many of the classifieds ads on this site are very poorly written. Most of the time when you do reply to one of those, they are not much more helpful than the original ad. However, usually when the add is for a more expensive or newer item it tends to be better written. Most of the poorly written ads are for old crap gear that would be very hard to get rid of anyway. From what I have seen, its not even worth replying to if the description is not very good in the first place. My personal pet peeve is !!!Great Beginner Rig!! Usually these are for rigs that are older than the person who is buying them

Hey now, I am coming back to Virginia in 3 weeks, so I will be fairly close to this place!

Well, since the links on the website do not seem to be working, I thought I would ask this here. Is there any word yet on advance pricing for buying block time before it opens? Anyone want to accidentally leak any info? $500/ hr would be nice

I am not an AFF-I, but I like the one at Chambersburg Skydiving Center. It's an arch trainer that looks like it was professionally built. It has bars and fabric and it is wide at the feet and gets more narrow towards the chest. IFRC, it actually supports the feet unlike the home built ones. The best part is that it forces the student into a very nice hip arch, while some students that I have seen on a traditional "creeper on a pole" setup have a tendency to arch from the chest. It also rotates about the center point and rolls around. But like I said, not an AFF-I, just my observations

Maybe point out that you did not put any wear and tear on the rig because you did not jump and perhaps they can cut you a discount at least on that portion of the cost. Mention that you have a potential for a lot of return business... unless they refuse to reasonably work with you on this cost. In a polite way of course.

While on the topic of changing the lense of the factory diver, I would add that you should pry the velcro off with the dull edge of a knife because if you pull it off by hand the velcro is stronger than the glue holding it to the helmet and it can peel off, leading to a very inconvenient velcro repair. Someone spared me from learning that the hard way so I thought I would pass it on

On a semi-related note, here is a pic of a room that me and some friends completely filled with newspaper a few years ago in college. Thats why you never leave the dorm room unlocked and leave for the weekend And yes, we did have wayyy to much time on our hands

The exact same thing happened with flags in my neighborhood, all the way in Colorado. You would think these realtors are conspiring or something IMHO, realtors are way overpaid for how little work they do. When we sold our house, the realtor did maybe 6 hours of work between a meager advertising effort and selling paperwork, and walked off with thousands in commission. Not that I'm saying it was unfair, he played by the rules but I dont think they ever deserve as much as they make. But that being said... I would definitely be a realtor if I didnt like being an engineer so much. I wont bitch about it anymore, maybe I should just get on the other side if I am unhappy about how overpaid they are

Got another link? The airspeed ones do not work but everything else seems to play properly. I want to see a 26 pt average

As the chart says, a J2 will take a 150 just fine. That 170 is probably a tight fit. It doesn't mention harness sizes but a C-20 is one of the longest harnesses out there, obviously for a tall person. I am 6'2'' and my javelin J3 is a C-18 but it is snug. I'm sure someone else will say this but you can always call/ email Sunpath with the serial number of the rig and ask how tall of a jumper it was originally made for.

Well... I told myslef I would try to do 100 jumps this year and I made #51 of the year today so I guess I'm on track

Does anyone have a link to a video (youtube?) of this commercial for those of us who have not seen it?

Thanks everyone, the last few posts have really put into words what I was trying to understand the whole time. I now realize how silly it sounds to try to get off the hill early

Thanks, I think that answers most of my questions. But I am still not sure about one thing- why is there a popular perception that you should put your heaviest jumper in the tail position? I have heard the phrase "pull the formation down" from several different skydivers. Perhaps this is referring to likeliness in preventing a funnel? But they could all be wrong. I certainly don't mind flying tail tho. I have a bad feeling that all my posts sound like a confused idiot but I need to get a few things sorted out in my head

I have a few questions regarding the launch of a 4-way (or base of something larger) that I wanted to ask. First, in a good 4-way otter exit, is one of the goals to minimize the time spent on the hill? I can see how this would be helpful, to get your formation pointing straight to the ground ASAP, but if you can turn points on the hill right out the door, why rush getting off of it? Is it even possible to change the amount of time spent on the hill? Secondly, assuming the answer to the first question is yes, what is the best way to do this? Is it better to have the person flying tail weigh it down from the back or to have the point block as much of the wind as possible so that it never goes steep? Maybe a combination of both? The reason I ask is that I was flying point for the first (ya... beer) time this weekend and it actually worked out very well, I could feel the formation spent less time than ever on the hill and was going straight down after what felt like just a second or two. I am a bigger jumper (6'2", 225 OTD) and I have usually been told to go to the tail slot because I could "weigh" the formation down and level it out sooner. But if I can get out and catch a lot of prop blast from the point position and level it out that way, would this be better? Assume that, for the sake of discussion, all other factors (team mates body positions) are neutral. I hope my question makes sense, any thoughts are appreciated.