RiggerLee

How many line groups did the fire fly have? I seem to recall it having only A, B, and C lines, no D's. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I was never actually sworn to secrecy and it's old news, contracts a done deal. They were developing a radar proximity fuse for a retarded submonition. I wasn't involved with any of the "secret" stuff but it had to meet a firing accuracy of better then .5 m, the altitude to be programmable from 1 to 50 m in 1 meter increments at the fall rate of 300 ft/sec. There was a lot of other stuff but the point is that they had actual radar data of the firing altitude of the cypress. The parachute was just to keep them from breaking their antenna every time they did a drop test. They had to gather a lot of data and the antenna on the nose was expensive. They wanted to open it as close to the ground as possible and the cypress just would not fire consistently on time. They were annoyed and they asked me to find out what was up with it. So I call SSK. Got the germen guy on the line and started to explain to him what these guys were doing and the problems they were having. And this guy starts to go in to this whole song and dance. It's been years I don't think I can quote him any more. I used to be able to do his whole routine with the accent and every thing. I've never heard a bigger pile of bull shit before in my life. It was this whole speech about how skydivers fall so different from what was essentially a bomb. All about the airflow as they tumbled through the air and how they would have to build me a special cypress that be able to under stand how a bomb falls... I tried to explain to him that we had a perfectly stable finned drop platform with perfect symmetric static ports... it was the easiest simplest case that you could possible have with the smoothest most consistent pressure data you could ever ask for. All variables null out or go to zero. Why wont the damn thing fire on time. And he goes back into his dance and I'm just holding the phone staring at the receiver. I suppose he had no idea of my back ground. For the record I never finished my degree. I'm a worthless collage drop out. But I was an aerospace engineering major. I was top heavy with math. I'm not an idiot. But the shit he was spouting was such bullshit I don't think even an AFF student would fall for it. I mean he wasn't even putting in a decent effort with his lying. It was when I said the words "Government Contract" and "Defense Contractor" that was when his voice changed. I could almost hear him doing the happy dance on the other end of the line. Finely I just told him that I would have my boss call him and hung up. I was polite but it was obvious that I wasn't going to be able to get any thing out of him. And I'll admit that I was a little annoyed that he didn't have enough respect for me to even try to come up with a plausible lie to try to feed me. So the next time I met with the head guy I reported my utter failure to get any viable information about the cypress unit. I even did my whole germen guy impression, his full speech and explained that they were not going to give answers to some one at my level. He laughed but he was clearly a little annoyed with my failure and told me that he would call him self and take care of it. So a week goes by before I could speak to him again. The moment he saw me he started cracking up and told me how he had called SSK and spoken to the same guy. He had identified him self and gone over what we were doing and had gotten the same lame line of bull shit back in return. I think germen was even more excited talking to him. He could barely get a word in and finely ended up staring at the receiver, just like me, as the germen guy rambles on with this completely incoherent crap. Finely he had excused him self and hung up just like I did. Now trying to bull shit me is one thing. I'm a nobody. I don't have any letters after my name unless you want to count my seal symbol. This guy worked for Raytheon. In case any of you don't know. If you've ever wondered where those guided missiles or tracking radars or the fucking spy satellites that reed the newspaper over you shoulder while you set on your toilet taking a dump through your roof... yah, that would be Raytheon. This guy was a project leader in the antenna division of Raytheon. He finished his degrees. They quit adding letters after his name when they used up the alphabet. And Cliff and the Germen guy had both tried to bullshit him with the same load of crap they were trying to feed me. He even quoted the same speech back to me. So after that the basic consciences was fuck airtec. They just built their own firing circuit. Not exactly challenging for these guys. It's really a shame but when they heard the words government contract they just couldn't see any thing past the dollar signs flashing in front of their eyes. And if any one ever has need of an AAD for some weird project I can tell you that Vigil is way easy to work with. They will talk to you and never once did they try to bullshit us, ever. So fuck Airtec. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Stable, I would guess a tandem pair should fall around 180 mph. I'm not sure what they would do head low on their back. There might be more then one reason why the opening altitude on the tandem unit is higher. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Just for reference. The package we were dropping fell around 300 ft/sec. The cypresses were expired if that counts for any thing. The first batteries we used were old but new ones did not solve the problem. It was a small compartment just slightly bigger then the cypress so there was not a volume issue. We thought it might be an issue with the size or number of the static ports. They redrilled them and added a couple more and we do not believe there was an issue there. It was just firing late at inconsistent altitudes. Our conclusion was that 300 ft/sec exceeded the limits of the unit. I repeat that should not be an issue for a skydiver under any normal circumstances. I don't see an issue with AAD's firing at decent rates above the rated speed of the reserve. At least not at the lower hard deck. Some systems designed for bailout from air craft have move complex logic with mutable firing altitudes and time delays. But the bottom line is if you are burning through firing altitude with that high of a decent rate what other option do you have? Better broken lines on a reserve then a creator. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

This was my understanding. That everything was based upon or extrapolated from the barometric data. My question, and based on the data you've gathered I think you might be able to answer it, is how well the accelerometer data can be correlated to the pressure. Your study of the tumbling incident represents an extreme and difficult case. Keeping it more simple. How much change do you see between belly to earth and back flying? The Accelerometer located in the standard location in the tray is fairly close to the CG. How much "noise" do you see from normal movements, center point turns, tracking, spins, rolls, vertical transitions, etc.? Can it tell you which way is down? How well does that correlate to the burble? Can you predict and correct the error in the pressure to any degree from the accelerometer? Oh, look, I'm on my belly. Let's take 10% off the height. I'm on my back now. I'm 5% higher then it says. So what I'm asking is can you filter the accelerometer enough to correlate it to the burble in any way? Is this some thing that could be done real time or just in retrospect. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I think you are way into the "just a few of us" category. The typical jumper can not hook up a three ring. Hell a lot of them can not pack their own main. But every single one of them could benefit from what you might learn from this. And the just a few of us that want to know... we really want to see that data. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

They're trying to do it with just a static pressure sensor. Depending on how smart you tried to make it you could try to do some interesting things. When you tumble or change position you basically get discontinuities in the graph. With enough brains you could try to peace that togather to extrapolate where you actually are at. The people at cypress have at times implied that they are doing some thing like that. I can also see it getting fooled like when you set up on opening under a snivelly canopy. Every body know that it will fire high that way. What I've always wondered about is why they don't have a three axis accelerometer in there. They've gotten pretty cheep and it's not like you need a fancy super accurate one. Even just the real simple questions like are you on your belly or on your back would allow you to correct a lot of your burble error. I'd really like to see how much correlation you could get out of the data. It's fixed pretty well to the rig and your back. How would it relate as you did transitions? And you could actually look at the total acceleration relative to the rate of change in pressure. It might let you distinguish between a sudden roll and a sudden deceleration. It could show you the difference between the pressure increase from setting up under canopy and the increase from a continued fast fall rate. Basically I think you could peace the discontinuities in the pressure curve together with the acceleration data. First with a burble correction to the data it self from the angle. Second with a correction at the points of discontinuity based on the total acceleration. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Well the first thing she needs is a tight jump suit. Another secret is small grippers. The big huge competition grippers add a lot of drag. You can get by with less. Weights suck. Doing CRW I some times wore up to 40 lbs of weight. In free fall even a small amount can help a lot. And she doesn't need as much as some people would put on her. It sounds like she had a bad experience with an uncomfortable weight belt. They may have tried to put too much weight on her. Or the belt may have been bad. When I started building belts it was from a problem just like this. Little tiny girl, very short. All the weight belts were too tall. When they are that small if the belt is taller the the space between the top of the hip and the bottom of the rib it gets very uncomfortable around the sides. We built her a belt with a wide thin pleated section across the lower back. It tapered to a narrow section that was short enough to go around her sides bellow her ribs. The pocket in front are built short and the weights small and divided to try to keep it as low profile as possible. It became the proto type for our weight belt. She's probable going to need some thing like that. You can build it or have her send me a message. Another option is to look at putting weight pockets on the back pad of her rig. Depending on how it fits her that can be a good option. The nice thing about it is that you don't feel it on opening or under canopy. The rig supports that weight. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I'm impressed that there even are reports. I've seen the whole range of responses over the years. Some drop zones have no interest in gathering any meaningful data and at times actually oppose it. The thought is that if there is no information then there is nothing for a lawyer to spin. So good reports are some times hard to find even within the industry. The quality of the information released to the larger public tends to be even lower unless some one opens their mouth and starts blabbing. I actually fall into that category. You can call me nieve or idealistic but I believe in openness, honesty, the free exchange of information... the truth. I believe that there is a Truth and that we ultimately can not hide from and should not fear it. It's a very unpopular attitude these days and pretty much categorizes me as a fool. But the point is that because there is no out side party investigating these accidents there isn't a lot of good information on some of them and there is no real motivation to change that. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

That actually sound really reasonable and a lot of us took that approach for many years till that Javelin harness blew up. Then we started looking more carefully at how the strength degraded and we started to realize how critical the edges of the webbing were... Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Just for the record, that's their normal construction on their multi ring harness. I think it's stupid. No one else does it that way. On the other hand it's never failed so theirs that. But I was also astonished when I first saw that design. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

There are right now combinations of equipment which do not meet, or at least have failed to meet, TSO standards. It's on video. Right there. Watch the reserve PC tow. Tows like a fucking bitch. Every bodies seen it. Oh look theirs another one, watch it tow too. There it is... big steaming pile of horse shit. The thing is nobody really wants to clean it up. It's messy. It's smelly. Yeeu, nasty. Did I mention expensive? And what if their has already been deaths? If you put out a change now isn't that like admitting guilt? I would think that they would be more invested in fixing problems or potential problems but some times functionality seems to take a back seat. I fear that some day some one will get their ass in a sling in a real law suit. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

This is speculation but it seems to fit with problems I've seen in the past. Tried to use cypresses for some drop test. They would never fire on time. It had a higher fall rate then a normal jumper. This is straight out of my ass, I can't prove how it works, but our theory was that it made it's decision to fire at about 1,200 ft. It then charged up a capacitor and fired the cutter at 750. But with our higher fall rate it didn't have the time to charge up the cap and could not fire on time. The guys at Airtech were impossible to work with so these guys just built their own firing circuit. I'm not saying that they don't function as designed under normal circumstances. However with a higher fall rate you can exceeded their limitations and when you do you get these late firings. Vigil has made the software available so that any one can down load the data from their units and the data is excellent. Cypress has always kept it a secret. Every time there is a fatality they send the unit in and airtech goes over it. Almost with out exception they come back with a reply that the unit fired on time but I've never seen any of the raw data. You could look at some of their action over the last few years such as campaigning for higher opening requirements in the BSR's and make out that they were covering up for failings and inadequacies in their system but I'm not convinced. I still think that the issues lie in the container design and the PC launch in most of these cases. And depending on which ones you want to count, there are way more then three. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

The paint could be challenging to say the least. In silk screening T-shirts we use a PVC. It's actually a plastic that gets into the fibers and hardens under heat. That's why it stays. You basically can't do that with nylon. It will melt and it doesn't stick well. There is also a dye sublimation that works very well on nylon and other synthetics. But it can't do light on dark. You could actually print the blue but I can't imagine doing some thing that big. To silk screen on synthetics or smooth surfaces like the cheep corrugated plastic signs you can use an epoxy paint. It's much harder to work with then the PVC. There is a working time and clean of the screens is a bitch but it's not like you're going to be doing this all day. It's just fifty stars. I'd try a good course screen about 100 count or less. You want the epoxy paint they use to print white numbers on jerseys for foot ball. Put a thin spacer. 1/8 or 1/4 inch wood around the base of the screen to give you the stand off. Swipe with a squeegee. Done. You have a star. The more I think about this the better it sounds. And the white is WHITE. It's good and opaic. I'll bet I could print one side in about two hours. Come back and do the other side the next day. Try to get LoPo or HiPo fabric or some actual flag fabric rather then F-111. I think you'll have better luck with a more porrus non slick surface. I think this is the way to go. All you need is to order one screen, the paint, and a squeegee. You can get it all from any silk screen supply shop. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Now you are confusing me. I see where you could make the feed dog go backwards that way but how does the presser foot on a 7-33 work backward? I mean the center foot just goes up and down. The outer cycles with it pressing down lifting the center foot. At that time the feed dog rises and shifts the work back but as I recall the outer foot is just spring loaded riding backwards with the feed dog. I think it comes up hard against a stop when it comes back forwards. How do you get it to swing forwards in revers? Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Did it actually have a reverse? There is a technique where you kind of loosen the presser foot or you can even remove the feed dog so the machine is not walking. It's like a darning machine. And you just sew with it. You pull the material back and forth or at any angle at your whim. It is a VERY fast way to sew. It takes some practice to get the hang of it but if you get it down or if your not too picky about the quality of your sewing then you can turn out shit like you wouldn't believe. Try it some time on an old machine. Take the feed dog out of a drop feed. It's best if you have a smooth throat plate or put a peace of smooth tape over it. Start slow and slide the thing in between stitches. That's basically how a darning machine works. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

It was a company here in Texas. I think it was called Lone Star. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

This argument has been around forever. I might point out that there are some presidents for sub contractors. As I recall Aerodyne used to have some of the sewing on their main canopies, original triathlons, AR-7, AR-11, done in south Africa. My understanding is that they had the envelope cut and sewn by PISA and completed the assembly of the canopy, building line sets, etc. here in the states. It was an Aerodyne canopy. Bill Hazlet and Aerodyne were the manufacturer not PISA. There are a number of manufacturers that subcontract components like risers. At times container manufacturers have subcontracted reserve pilot chutes. And that's TSO'd. Same with handles. I think Paraflite also did some subcontracting in south Africa again on their reserves. Again Paraflite was considered the manufacturer. Vertigo subcontracted PD, then Strong and later Precision to part of the work on their canopies and then "finished" the construction, ie. they sewed on logos and tail pockets and vertigo was considered the manufacturer not PD or strong or precision. How about the guy that sold kits so you could build your own nine cell canopy by taking your seven cell and using it as a base to sew two more cells onto. So since there there is no certification, approval or authorization to build a main canopy What stops some one from building their own main and calling them selves the manufacturer? For that matter what stops some one from taking a subassembly like an envelope and building their own line set and "manufacturing" a main just like aerodyne did. But it's not a sabre any more it's a "Bob Special". And then their is the argument that there are no airworthiness standards for mains. A major repair is some thing that could affect the airworthiness but since their is no standard there is no such thing as a major repair on a main. And if there were a standard then 80% of the mains are absolutely unairworthy. How many meet the requirements for decent rate and total speed. You want to talk about some of the malfunctions on mains? How about opening times? Structural? I saw a canopy open hard and blow half the HMA lines off the bottom of it. In the end all of this is neither here nor there. It may have been a "miss print" as they say but it was really a better standard when the "Rules" were interpreted as saying that the FAA was keeping it's hands off the mains. To do other wise cripples the development of the sport. And what business do they have in it? How bout this. My "main" is a part 103 unpowered ultralite vehicle. It meets all the requirements. And I can launch it any way I choose. I can ground launch it off a hill. I can aero tow it. And I say that I can fall out of an airplane and deploy it. You know by that logic we should be able to cut the labels off our tso'd gear and fly all of it under part 103. And there are presidents for things like that. As an example a hot air balloon is a certified aircraft. But you can decertify it and fly it tethered. They legally drop base jumpers that way. FAA has signed off on it. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I counted three back ups and I'll bet they were still very glad to be landing in the water. And in all fairness, he couldn't have G-loaded it harder if he tried. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

You can side pack, and I mean side pack not on the floor pro pack, and put it into a molar bag. There are actually a couple of ways to do it. You can actually split the ears dragging three cells out of the folds to each side. It wont be as neat and it's more bulky. It also limits how you can fold the canopy and distribute the bulk. There is actually an even older school way to pack it where you do not split the ears. You take the top of the canopy and go to one side of the loop and turn it 90 deg. across the top of the bag to fill the top of the bag. Don't even think about trying this with one of the modern bricks. Oh, for days gone by, when rigs were wide and soft and fluffy. Where did we ever go wrong? Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

You're not ready to down size till you stop calling it a "chute". Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

What kind of ring was used on the first of the vertical two pin internal mirage? I want to say that they had the heavy RW-2 on them. At least I think that's were I heard the bending story. But I'm not sure if he was referring to that rig or to the story of that peace of hard in general. Who built or tried to build rigs with thin RW-2's? Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Aerostar or Starlight? Also if I recall the original Mini ring system also used a round ring equivalent to a RW-2. They stretched. You had to replace them with a heavy gauge ring also round. I used to have one around some where. I think it was on an early Mirage, two pin vertical internal, that I saw the replacement rings but it might have been a swift. Looked like it had been milled rather then forged. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Number zero roll rim sper tooth stainless. see loyd and hodges. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Heads aren't that expensive. Just get a second head and swap them out on the table to change gauges. $150 problem. A good attachment like a binder can cost more then a head. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com