SkymonkeyONE

Ultimately, it's entirely dependant on the TSO'd maximum suspended weight of the reserve parachute and harness/container system. That, and the availability at your local dropzones of such "big-guy" rigs. There are several people who frequent these forums who did their AFF at exit weights above 300 pounds. You need only find the dropzones with the capability to accomodate you. What is your body type and weight, by the way? Chuck Blue AFF-I (among other things)

No more than the wing that any camera flyer jumps. The way the wing tensions upward in flight that hole basically disappears. It's positively not been an issue on any of Tony's and Jeff's designs to this point whether front or backflying. I think Jeff spends more time flying on his back than anyone I know other than SLOmar. Chuck

You techies amaze me. I wish I had enough brain power left in my beat-up 43 year-old body to begin to understand that shit. Seriously. That's cool shit. Chuck

PF has really been killing it with quick deliveries lately, but there was a time when Robi was positively swamped with orders after new product releases. That happens with all the manufacturers and will never change. Ultimately, it's all about how long you are willing to wait to fly exactly what you want. Hell, you never know, you might find that you really like one of the Tony Z-wings or a J-bird. Those guys can have you a suit sewn in like three days if that's what you like. Thankfully, there are enough suits of every manufacture out there now that you can almost always demo before buying. It's a great time to be a wingsuit guy! Chuck BMCI-4 Z-flock LOCAL

They just replayed the first episode. It might end up being a decent show. I thought the first episode was OK.

I positively loathe SC. I find it completely without merit on this skydiving site. You know what though? I don't own the site and I don't make the rules. It's a horrible forum in my opinion. Chuck

Why not get it directly from RWS? They do make the rigs, you know. You can also get your Racer rating straight from JumpShack. Both are walking distance from the DZ and situated right next door to each other.

When I had just got my original Vector tandem rating I made the mistake of visiting my dad's DZ in Alabama. I ,on two consecutive jumps out of one of the C-182's, got the following: -a 6'7" 265 pound college kid -a 6'8" 275 pound construction company owner I am 5'7 and weighed around 150 at the time. No problem whatsoever with guys like that. The worst part was getting them out the damn door past the pilot. I dove both exits to the rear. Since then (nearly ten years ago), I would have a hard time figuring out how many big guys I have taken. Many, many 240 pounders, that's for sure. It's the 100 pound girls that will take you for the worst rides. I will take the big guys anytime, so long as they are in shape. Chuck

That's a fantastic video, bro. You were killing it!

They did the actual on-screen completion of the stunt in a coupe. The convertible was never seen, if it did in fact ever arrive. The on-screen completion was pretty cool in that JC had to grab Luis's leg and drag him into the car, less he get dragged out backwards by his main. Chuck

I have an S3, and S6, and a V1. I have access to a V2 that fits, but have yet to put a jump on it so I can't say anything about it yet. Perhaps Perry might chime in here as I know for a fact that he has jumped all three suits. Anyway, I can at least compare the S6 and V1 for you. I fly wingsuits almost exclusively. I have just over 1,100 flights now I have around 30 jumps on my S6 so far and 20 on the V1, switching back and forth regularly just for shits and grins and to see which one really goes better for me. Both suits have wider legwings than the S3 and both suits are faster. The S6 legwing is nearly three inches wider than the S3 and the V1 is two inches wider than my S6. The S6 inflates faster out the door than the V1. The S6 arm wings are much harder to shut down at pull time and the V1 leg wing is much harder to shut down at pull time. I have the same forward speed no matter which of the two suits I jump. I get the same flight time in both suits, but the V1 is much harder on my arms toward the end of the flight. The S6 is a much more suitable suit if you are going to take docks or give hand and arm signals as the wingtips do not flip up if you release the grippers. Both suits are fantastic in my opinion if you are wanting to fly long and hard. Both suits have plenty of range when you are flying in dirty flocks, too. Neither suit exhibits any tail flappage in flocks. Hope that helps.

I will definitely not be bringing our golf cart back to Palatka for the Hog Flop. Katie and I will be there, but not our cart.

I don't know, Scott. I think it probably takes Katie about the same time to rig into her Lady Flyer as it does her Classic II. Either way you look at it, neither system takes but a minute or two to rig up. I would not count "time to rig" as a real reason to chose one suit over any other. And yes, I totally agree that it's silly to de-rig a suit!

It was boring last night, so I turned off the TV and went to sleep.

I can promise you that neither myself nor Tonto have any "hostility" toward JVX's. I personally think it's a nice, task-specific canopy. I won't be spending three grand on one anytime soon (I am very happy with my current canopies), but if that's what you like then go for it. The people with their panties in a wad are the ones who DO go out of their way to say "this is the best and you are jumping old, outdated stuff". That's simply childish. I don't think that any of the guys who are capable of skillfully piloting competition mains in their intended manner are suffering from "gear envy" over this. How about letting everyone make their own, informed decision on what they want to jump instead of having people force it down everyones' throat? Chuck PS: I am going to bring parts of the old Team Extreme thread back today. It will be split into two parts: the inevitable "JVX rules" part, and the "Stu is with PD now" part.

Just a quick note to say that we did four flights yesterday (monday) here at the hills. Everyone on the flocks (up to six way) lives here on the DZ. We got Randy Lopez (Towerrat on here) up on his first two flights. He nailed both flights, but I will let him post about the outcome of his second one....Caw! Caw! Katie was backflying and barrel rolling like a champ on the last one, too. It was a pleasant day. On three: one, THREE! Chuck

It gets cold where you are, Bob?

Wow. How long into the flight was that, James?

We had a good event. It was a manageable crowd (average flock size was 12) and perfect weather. There were a total of 22 wingsuit loads; I did 17 of them. We had two reserve rides (Mark and Scotty's new girlfriend), but no injuries. Everyone landed on airport too. We built some very clever formations: -plenty of "BFV's" -double chevrons -stacked V's -"the double flying vagina with video penetration" -"the vertical true vagina with triple penetration" -a tall stack -a tall vertial V -wedge -"the true Z" -a muff brothers initiation wingsuit dive (five new muff brothers) Some of the dives were a real hoot! Ultimately, we all had a great time and made a ton of fun, fairly technical skydives. People had the opportunity to jump pretty much any suit they wanted and every single skydive had suits from nearly every manufacturer. Here's what was all flying together: -at least six different variants of Tony Z-wings and J-birds -one S6 -four S3's -one Firebird -at least six Vampires (mostly V1's, but there were two V2's that did not get flown) -one back-vented Phantom -one Matter 3 The evening meals that Janine cooked were excellent, as usual. The only thing that sucked at all about the event was all the love bugs flying around and getting onto and into stuff. It was very disturbing and I can't wait till they are gone. One thing I can say for sure is this: there is not a single dropzone in the entire United States that has as many full-time wingsuiters than Z-hills. We positively kill it here. Hey, it's 10:30 am on Monday morning and I have to go outside and get on an Otter. Peace, fools! Chuck

3:17:0 Lots and lots of wingsuit jumps! Flock and Dock 2.5 was a fun event.

I jump my Sabre2 97 a lot more than I get to jump my Velo these days. It's my primary wingsuit main. I load it at 1.85 and it fucking screams. No, I don't get Velo distance out of it, but who cares; I do have one of those as well for other jumps. Chuck

I cannot believe that Matt has not posted pics from yesterday and Friday. I am going to stick his head in a toilet first thing this morning. Oh, by the way, I have a massive hangover!

Other people have piped in and said the same, but I, as a guy that used to manage an "ISP school" will tell you that "AFF" is not dead. What is dead are the schools that think that they can get away with just doing seven levels and signing a guy off as "experienced". No matter what discipline you learn in, you are still not a qualified skydiver until you have that "A" stamp on your card. I got into a philosphical debate at the bar here in Z-hills when I got here about this. You see, the person who was arguing in favor of the "seven levels and you are done" stuff" was all bent out of shape that we, at Raeford, were making people do what is in essence nine levels to get past cat E. They were all like "why charge a guy more money if they are able to complete the TLO's in seven" I told them that we never forced a person to do all nine jumps. If a person could complete the TLO's for multiple jumps on one skydive, then that's great! It was rare that a good student could not complete all the "AFF" stuff (cats A thru E) in six or seven jumps. Where the difference comes into play though is here: some dropzones pretty much mandate that you get "training video" on each of your AFF levels. That's outside video for those of you not paying attention. Outside video takes another slot and costs the student a ton of money. At Raeford, an "ISP" dropzone, we never pushed outside video for AFF. The great majority of instructors all jumped their camera helmets on those jumps though, with .3 lenses, and thus got the exact same debriefing benefit for doing this "inside" video (which we did not charge for). Ultimately, the end cost for the student is about exactly the same. Seven levels here (z-hills school, but this applies to all such schools) with "forced" video or nine levels up at Raeford (and elsewhere) with no incurred video cost. The student would not see a difference at all in cost if they were to do all "nine" levels of ISP-based AFF at my old DZ. The only people that have a gripe are the "outside" AFF video guys who are losing out on their ramen money. In my opinion that is simply not a valid complaint. In the end, it does not matter what method you chose; I teach them all and will teach my freelance students any combination of ways. The only thing that matters is that you check every single block on the A-license proficiency card without having to "crawl under a poncho" and perpetrate a fraud by signing off on shit that your student has not actually completed. I hope that makes sense, Chuck Blue D-12501 AFF/SL/TM-I, BMCI-4, PRO, former S&TA and manager of a pretty busy turbine DZ school.

Seven nice flocks Friday; seven nice flocks today (Saturday). If you are not here you are missing some really good times. It's beer-thirty; I gotta run. Gimme TWO, fools! Chuckie

First flock of the day was a 9-way vertical "V" flying. Very nice way to start a Saturday. The weather is perfect here at Z-hills.