MagicGuy

THAT, is awesome.

Why am I not seeing the smallness of Danielson? It looks quite adequate to me! Maybe because I've only seen one picture.. but it looked at least the size of CPI!

Wildcard451's mom must be a magician, every time I see her she makes my penis disappear, reappear, disappear, reappear, disappear......

I'm quiet in person when I'm around unfamiliar faces. Get me drunk and that changes. I'm Mr. Social when I get all sauced up. I'm down to earth, go with the flow kind of dude. And I can do some cool shit with a deck of cards. Oh and I have a potty mouth. But anyone that's reads my posts knows that!

LisaH, so I can give her a hug and thank her for the 1977 bottle of Seagram's VO she's sending me LGreen, who doesn't post but is a fellow magician. Not many skydiving magicians out there, so that would be cool. Skinnyshrek, who offered me his trailer for a week when I was first getting into this sport so I could come to the Farm and do my AFF. All of the people who gave me good advice so I can thank them in person, and all of the people who gave me bad advice so I can give them a swift kick to the balls.

For the price of a new main flap, it's worth it to just get it replaced. No sense in risking damaging the container or canopies for a quarter size scuff. Thanks for all the help guys. Edit: I called Wings today and the price of a new midflap, including labor, is only $85. Not a bad deal!

I've never seen anything but enthusiasm for new jumpers on this site. Yes, sometimes you will get flamed if it seems like you are making mistakes or getting bad advice. But in reality, people are looking out for new jumpers on here. At least that's what I've found. Push the limits, huh? Isn't jumping from planes pushing the limits? Why make things more complicated and risky by choosing to jump a canopy loaded at 1.66 with 74 jumps. I don't know what your canopy skills are, maybe they are above average for your jump numbers. But to put this whole 1.66 into perspective, if I jumped a canopy loaded at 1.66, I'd be on, oh, a 99 sq. ft canopy. I can't even begin to think about being on something that small at this point in my skydiving career. Calling yourself ambitious is far from the truth. Dictionary.com defines ambitious as 1.) having ambition; eagerly desirous of achieving or obtaining success, power, wealth, a specific goal, etc.: ambitious students. There's nothing wrong with being ambitious, but putting yourself and possibly others at risk by flying a small canopy that's above your skills is not ambitious, it's stupid.

Yes.

If you're buying it from someone at the DZ than you have the luxury of having your rigger look at it. If that's the case, why not take advantage of having the rigger right there. In other cases, as in buying off of the classifieds section of this site, you may not have that option. Usually, if someone is serious about making the sale, they won't have a problem with having your rigger look at the canopy before making the purchase. The most important thing, in my opinion, is to talk to your instructors before you even consider buying the canopy to be sure that it is within your limits. You don't want to buy a canopy that's too small and not be able to jump it. Good luck!

Do you know the name of the product he used, and the store where he got it?

Nice Doug, sticking to the Purple and Green roots. Nothing wrong with that.. I like the wind tunnel idea, so I'm gonna steal it. i'd buy my own wind tunnel.

Emailed the guy multiple times about various containers on his site. Never got a response. I didn't think that was very good customer service, so I didn't even bother trying again. Shame, he has some nice stuff on there.

Geez two rigs with 10 jumps. But yeah bro, I would talk to your instructors before buying anything else. It sucks having a rig and not being able to jump it because the canopies are too small. Looking at it is only cool for the first week or so

Sorry to be the devil's advocate, but does it really matter if you have an on-heading open with a skydiving canopy? I can see why it is important for BASE, but when you're under canopy at around 3,000 ft, you have plenty of time to steer yourself where you need to go.

Glad you (finally) got that PC, Doug It does seem to make more sense to have a brightly colored D-Bag. I don't know if a rigger could alter the bag, though. I don't know if riggers can make alterations to the components of the container. I wonder why they aren't made in bright colors? I've seen bright pilot chutes, but the bags are always dark.

Jess, the more you are around me, the more you'll notice how critical I am about my performance in the air and under canopy. I notice everything, both about myself and other people, especially when it comes to canopy control. I tend to be very observant, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. While some people would do what I did and not see a thing wrong with it, I see many things wrong with it and like to do what's possible to make sure it doesn't happen again. Thanks everyone for the tips on making my glide more efficient. I will give them a try! I'm also going to be jumping a Sabre2 150 for a few jumps, which should have a bit more glide than my Triathlon

A loosened chest strap along with bringing my knees up towards my chest to try to get small and, in theory, get more penetration. I did talk to some people who suggested the rear riser input and using a bit of brakes to increase my glide. There's an experienced landing area and then the 'student' landing area. Generally, the pattern is strict, of course, in the experienced area and for good reason. When I did the right hand pattern I landed in the student area. It wasn't frowned upon, but I just hate doing that. It was more of the fact that I confused other jumpers by doing a right hand pattern when the general rule of thumb is to do a left hand pattern.

I thought about a patch as well, but if coloring in the scuff with a Sharpie is a no-no, I doubt sewing a patch onto the flap would be any more acceptable. I'm really not all that concerned about it. Like I said, besides the scuff the container is mint, and sitting in a Cessna with the rig against the back of the plane is bound to put it's wear and tear on the container. But I do what I can to minimize that shit and considering I'm not the one that put it on there, I wanted to try to disguise it as much as possible.

So something has been bothering me a bit lately. There have been a couple instances where, because of a long/bad spot, I've had to do an opposite landing pattern (i.e. a right hand pattern where left is what is used). Just this past weekend this happened. The spot set me up in kind of a crosswind situation. I had no wind behind me to get me to where I needed to be to set up my pattern. As soon as I was under canopy (between 2500-3000ft.) I immediately started heading towards where I needed to be to set up my pattern. Before I knew it, I was at 700 feet and there was no way I was getting to where I needed to be. Instead of risking really low/sketchy turns to do a left hand pattern, I did a right hand pattern. In this situation it was OK because one, it was a Cessna load and one guy was already down, and two, the two other canopies were high enough to realize what I was doing and act accordingly. But, that still doesn't make me happy about what I did. I know that what I did was the right thing to do, but I want to prevent this kind of thing from happening, PERIOD. I realize that doing an opposite pattern can confuse people and therefore can put people in more risk than they are already in. I also know that my canopy plays a big role. I'm jumping a Triathlon 160 and I'm 140 out the door. This particular day I was wearing my weight belt putting me at 150 pounds. Still, the Tri doesn't exactly have the greatest glide out there and I feel that this is my biggest problem. And I know some people will probably disagree, or think that I'm trying to downsize too quickly, but this has happened to me at least 3 or 4 times and I don't want it to happen again. Anyways, I'm curious to hear what some of the more experienced guys out there have to say about this. What would you have done in this situation? Do you think I made the right decision, or what would you have done differently?

Black and yellow Micron with all of the features. Sabre2 135 (matching the container) and a (second) PD143, brand new Cypres 2. Would be friggin' sweet.. some day I will have all of that stuff, except by the time I have enough money for it all, the canopies will probably be slightly smaller

Fish, the Talon is fine, but I bought a Wings container with reserve from the Classifieds. I have another canopy that needed a home and the Wings (besides the fucking scuff) fit the bill quite well. I didn't know that the flap could be replaced. That puts my mind at ease a bit. I'll wait until it sees some more use and if it gets worse or I just can't take looking at it I'll give Sunrise Mfg. a call.

Yeah, I figured this was going to be the case. I wonder how much Wings charges to replace a main flap..

Eh, you have 27 jumps. I thought I'd want to stay on my canopy for a while. But when you can't make it into your pattern on a long spot, and aren't getting the forward movement that you'd like, your opinions may change.

I just bought a new-to-me container that is perfect in every way, except a quarter sized scuff on the main closing flap. I am very nit-picky about my gear and as ridiculous as it sounds almost didn't buy the container because of said scuff. Anyways, was wondering if it would hurt the container to fill in the scuff with a Sharpie. The cordura is black so I'm guessing it will blend in fairly well. Any advice on this, other than not to be so anal about a scuff mark? Any other tips are also welcome!

Pretty cool. Where is it being sold? How much?