RiggerLee

How does the pack volume compare to a C-9? Nice smooth opening in the vid by the way. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Those are the 360 Fly cameras. It's a fish eye lens over 180 deg. https://www.360fly.com/shop/cameras Sorry I forgot. I should have listed them as well. They have been working with us as well. We have two of their cameras on board. They just barely stick out on each side of the airframe in the payload section. It's like two wide eyes on the vehicle. We can turn them on remotely just by powering the cameras. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Finally got permission to post some video from the latest flight. It was only moderately successful. Loss of GPS was the reason the flight terminated early. So it was an early abort and only made it to like, 92,000 ft. We still had quite a bit of fuel on board so we were a bit fast on opening. With the new slider it was still under 5 G's. The body was less stable under the drogue then before because with the new cutter arrangement we are not locked into the center of the body as we were before. It's a trade off for redundancy with the two cutters. Interestingly the rocket body tended to oscillate under canopy. My best guess is that it was from the changes to the angle of the risers. For lack of a better term it changed the spring stiffness and I guess the drag on the fins just fit right in with the natural frequency. You can use the hand in the video to move the view around. Up and down to look at the body of the rocket. It's a 20 inches in diameter. 34 ft long. Liquid fuel, Alcohol/LOX. Gimbaled engine. Cold gas ACS thrusters in four quadrants, high rate/low rate at the top and bottom. You will see the launch. It is flying with just the gimbled motor. You will see it pick up some rotation. It reaches a high enough RPM that the computer decides to turn on the ACS and stop the roll. We try not to do that unless necessary to conserve He for tank pressurization. The roll stops. Eventually after 20 sec with out GPS the computer shuts down the engine and aborts the flight. During that 20 sec it was flying on the INU. Now the ACS comes on to maintain the stability of the rocket. Because it was such a low flight with the early abort the nose cone fires at appagy. and the ballute comes out. Then the Main opens. The AGU unstows the breaks by pulling in on the control lines and then lets out to full flight. It makes some turns flying back to the landing area. For some reason the AGU was chasing that oscillation under canopy. You can hear it. There is no gyro in the unit. The only explanation I have is that the GPS must have been far enough off center for it to pick up. Wamore can filter that out. On the down wind leg it burned out it's motors and was not able to turn base and final. It landed down wind with no flare in a skidding slide. Although we had some small payloads on board it was mostly a test of the new control software. It produced some very good data for them to tune the control loops. The ACS worked well but was over active. They need to turn it down, change the setting between high and low rate, expand the dead band, etc. All in all we are calling it a successful test even though it was an early abort and did not make altitude. We got good control data and had an acceptable recovery with no significant damage to the rocket. Thanks to all the usual charterers. The canopy is a Strong Enterprises C-1200. They have been very supportive over the years and have provided us with all of our parachutes. The AGU was built for us by Wamore. Mark has been a big supporter and has gone over and above traveling out to most of our launches to help us on sight. If you don't know them, they are the builder of the control units for all the military precision guided parachutes. Thanks to Aerodyne. We have gone to cutters for the drogue release but their oval shaped rings are still used in the three ring releases for the break lines and have in the past flown to over 300,000 ft. Those are the people you might know. Z+ https://youtu.be/mXiNKGViTt4 Z- https://youtu.be/JHJxgW5uAys Their should be a more polished edited video out soon but I prefer the raw. Enjoy. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I DIDN'T DO IT! That is not my red white and blue lightening. I can prove it. Mine is white in the center. I hate fucking demos. This is why I hate demos. It's always like that. There is always shit like that trying to kill you. Every demo I have ever been on has been like that. That is just how demos are. And that is why I stear clear of them. Technically did he do any thing wrong? Other then being stupid I mean, but he's doing a demo so that's already a given. If the plane had sufficient cloud clearance on jump run, which is possible, and the winds on the ground had not kicked in yet, they don't seem to have. then where is the faul? Note that the landing is shot from a good distance away in the stand. I can't tell exactly how far away that was. Looks scary but I wasn't there. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

It will be a total failure unless you can get custom Free Fly colors and custom embroidery. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

What else was stolen? You say they didn't take the student harnesses? That implies a Wufo but the fact that they took the time to steal extra heavy looking back pack thingies implies that they had some knowledge of their value. Maybe some one that targeted the drop zone and tried to do a little research on what to steal before hand. Maybe some one that had been out to the dropzone in the last couple of months? Maybe you could pull the wavers from the last month or two and give copies to the police? In your briefing do you happen to mention the value of the rigs, "This is a $10,000 dollar system and the most advanced equipment in the world..." Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Curved closing pin on a sky hook? Have I missed some thing while I was off playing with rockets? Just checked the on line manual and the pictures still show it straight as an arrow. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I give. Was Vector the first or was their some one else? The Swift and the briefcase were two pins. I'm trying to think of what else came out right there in that time frame. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

I doubt there is even a copy right much less a patent. Have any of them actually filed any thing? Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

That's a cool project. I may have to revise my opinions of the training in the modern rigging schools. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

It depends on the complexity of the project. Having some thing to copy certainly helps. Coping peaces... you almost have to make pattern sets from them. Get the markings right. Order of construction. And then on the next one you're almost starting over from scratch. It's doubtful that they actually have any peaces in common. But yah, you could do it. You'd have to source all the materials and get good thread, etc. You could do it. But at that point I think some one could argue that the rigger is actually in business illegally coping other peoples suits. I really prefer the open source idea and the kit plane materials concept. You can buy plans for an ultra light. You can buy the materials kit for an experimental air plane. You can buy the parts kit. You can even buy the "quick build" kit. Lone Star could live again. Being here in the US is one thing. But lets say you lived in some back woods country or one with tariffs. Look at Quag and his canopy project. No canopy manufacturers in the UK and it's kind of pricey to buy one from out side of the country over seas. I'm surprised their are not more home grown builders popping up in some of these countries. Theirs another guy in south america. He's working on a pilot rig. It's hard to get them down their. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

If you were to build something noncommercialy for your self, I think you would be fine. Copy rites and things protect the commercial exploration of a design. Or at least that is my understanding. I don't think any thing can prevent you from building things for your self. I think it could be argued that the rigger is stealing the design and selling it commercially if he accepts money to build it for you. Having said that. I could do some thing like this. I can do it because I have twelve different types of sewing machines lined up behind me and pallet racks of fabric to the left of me. So when I get board, yah, I do fucked up shit like that. But if even I set down and counted up the hours I had in one of these projects it wouldn't make since to do it. It's only practical if I'm idol and really board. Prices are getting out of hand. I think you will start to see more of this. Like the guys building their own canopies. Mostly for fun at first but once the idea gets around, who knows. I could see some open source drawings getting out and it turning into a little kit plane kind of thing. Then they will start selling quick build kits, here are the pre cut ribs and panels... Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Their is absolutely nothing wrong with an honest question. Every one here will be happy to help you. Your questions tell us a lot about your experience level. Don't be embarrassed by that. We all start some where and the most important thing is that you are asking these questions. When we give you advice, like that you should spend some time with your local rigger learning about this or any gear that you are considering it's in that spirit of trying to help you. You need to sit down with him as he inspects it, takes it apart, see how it works, and how it's built. And their are limits to what you can learn on the internet. We will help you, There are good resources here but it's no replacement to working with it with your own hands. Your best resources are always the ones right in front of you. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Frankly if you know that little about it you should really get it sent to a local rigger to make sure it's the right rig for you. Their's more to this then just picking some thing out of an add column. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

One pin if it's an infinity. 2001 implies that. There was an older Northern light that was a two pin. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

What kind of system? For example the strong drogue stays fully inflated and with only 25 0r 30 lb under it would come down very slow. Sorry don't have any kind of number. Vector on the other hand partially collapses on drogue release and wouldn't drift as far. Call the company, they might have a number on decent rate. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Their are some local riggers that sew as well if not better then the manufacturer, and you don't have to ship it back and forth. But I'll tell you this, I wouldn't do it for $150 and I'm about as cheep as they come. $150 is a smoking deal and I don't know why you wouldn't take advantage of it. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

The better it fits you the more you will like it. The two of you are going to be together for a long time. I've seen rigs out live marages. You would like for the hip junction or ring to be at the point of rotation of your leg. If it's two far forwards of that point the main lift web shift upwards and will loosen when you lift your legs, like in a sit. The rig will lift off your shoulders in a sit and that slack will allow the rig to hinge up off your back. This can range from annoying to dangerous. In the worst case you could in theory roll out the back. That has happened with a couple of badly fitting student rigs but it can happen with sport rigs if the lateral is too long or particularly if there is a lot of stagger and a small rig fits high on their back. There are people that can bend over and slide their rig off their shoulders over their head. Incut lats help with this. They do not loosen as much when the main deploys. So the measurement stays consistent. Got to go to work. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

On a Javelin the lateral crosses the back, loops around the webbing and goes back under the back pad. To make that loop shorter you have too pull the harness, zig zag, and where the back pad is sewn down on the side too shorten it. Easiest thing to do is peal up the bottom of the tray so you can get to every thing and just replace that whole strap. You're basically taking out all the stitching through it. Why sew through the same peace of webbing? It's by far the easiest way. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

They will be peeling lose the bottom of the main tray, replacing that piece of webbing, resewing two junctions... It's a great deal. You wont beat that price. It's worth the price of disassembly, shipping, etc. Insure the shipment. UPS loses shit. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

It's hard to make small changes by tieing a knot. You can finger trap peaces of line into the suspension line to shrink it. It's an easy way to fine tune things. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

It sounds like it's built into the fabric. This can happen. They go to great lengths to inspect the fabric and avoid biased rolls, and they flip panels, and other things to try and avoid this but some times the tolerances stack up and you get a canopy with a turn. Their are no good ways to fix it but there are some half assed ways. First try pulling the slider down and letting your chest strap out. It's a small thing but the more curved the canopy is, the closer the risers are together, the more twitchy they tend to be. It just exaggerates the problem. Letting it expand may make it less noticeable. Some thing else you can do, you can't fix the canopy but you can induce a turn the other way. You can do this by intentionally fucking with the symmetry of the line set by changing the trim of one side vs the other. But if you don't to get that adventurous the easiest thing you can do is to extend the full line set on one side. Sounds strange, but we all know that if your harness is asymmetric, one side slips, that it will cause a turn. If for example you add a second set of links to one side of the canopy, both front and back, you have now built a permanent asymmetry into your rig. So you have a permanent 1.25 inch harness turn built into your canopy. In this day in age, you might just have some one build you a pair of longer slinks for one side. It will look goofy. It will freak some people out. If it works you could even shorten the lines on the other side to make it less noticeable but this is the easiest way to half ass fix it. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Impressive. They must really be on top of their maintenance. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

Did she ever pay up? Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com

A low placed RSL ring through the bottom loop only helps if the bottom of the riser stays with the rig. People keep talking about risers breaking at the grommet hole but oddly the majority that I have seem break snapped at the tape of the third ring. I mean that tape broke. This means that the whole riser released. This is 3 out of the 5 I've seen break. One did break at the grommet and one broke at the front riser. Snaps, magnets, or just rubber banding the center of the slider up to one of the attachment points certainly helps to avoid the occasional brisk opening. I don't think this is a bad thing at all. I don't think it's a solution to the explosively hard openings that break things and kill people. We're not talking about some thing that leaves you sore. These are like an order of magnitude higher. I don't think they are a product of the riser creeping down. I think they are the result of a much grosser failure of the staging of the canopy. Like Dennis. I figure he got one riser caught under the corner of his tray on that sit fly deployment. This difference in length means that one side of the risers and there fore the slider was pulled down about 4 feet lower then the other. One side could almost fully open unhindered and then the riser pops lose and the canopy is fully open. It was a specter if your curious, not that it matters with some thing like this. I suspect sever out of sequence openings, bag dumps played a part in some others as well. That's why I'm comfortable talking about a weaker riser or other fail point. The magnitude of the peak forces are way beyond the change due to wear. Lee Lee lee@velocitysportswear.com www.velocitysportswear.com