brettski74

What did your instructor say when you asked him/her this question?

What about Alti-Track? If I recall correctly, Pro-Track used a serial interface. Alti-track is USB with a special dongle between the unit and the USB port. You get Jump-Track 3.0 for free with the USB cable and dongle. Some of the features look nice - particularly Linux support for geeks like me. It would be nice if it supported the Alti-Track USB download.

You need to read the post in the context of the entire thread. He's specifically said more than once that he considers the skyhook to be a bad idea, period. So is suggesting that better safety features can only lead to people overestimating their utility and taking risks that ultimately might lead to their death. It could happen, but isn't that a failure in training rather than a shortcoming of the equipment? Hand deploy pilot chutes and 3-ring release systems and depend on additional pressure not to screw up or should we use the better equipment and teach our students and novices a more appropriate attitude to safety? I wasn't advocating a low cutaway. I agree with you. Maybe this was the part that didn't apply to me, because the rest seemed pretty specific... A low cutaway is a bad idea. Whether you have a skyhook or not, your emergency procedures and decision altitude really shouldn't change. I was counterpointing the comment that a skyhook is only useful for doing low cutaways. Quite the contrary. More altitude provides more time under canopy. A higher reserve opening at any altitude means more time to figure out how it flies and where to land it. If I'm going to have any chance of understanding how useful it can be and under what circumstances, then I'm going to have to quantify the effects of the device in some way. How much higher will I be open? How much extra time will that give me? Under what circumstances will that help me and how? It's ridiculous to read numbers on here as absolute or accurate in any way. Most numbers stated on here are approximate at best, and in the hypothetical context of this discussion, estimates or examples, only. As always, your mileage may vary. Perhaps this helps...

You can do it!

That's a hardware logbook.

Who was suggesting that, Bill? If you find yourself spinning at 1500 feet over a heavy machinery shop, the skyhook might give you the extra altitude you need to fly over it and land safely in the open field next door, or the altitude you need to turn and avoid landing downwind in 15 knot winds on a reserve you've never flown before. The argument that we should reject something that allows a wider margin of safety just because someone may misuse it or overestimate the level of improvement is a very weak one. Under typical use, the skyhook RSL mitigates more risk than it creates.

Unless you're landing in an updraft - which is not advisable, as there will probably be turbulence associated with it - your vertical speed will be much the same for a straight-in approach, regardless of conditions. You flare to avoid pounding your legs into the ground. You can do a PLF, a shoulder roll or dance the merengue. You might hurt yourself. You might not. My question is why are you not flaring? Whether you have brakes or not, you still have rear risers. There's no point in pounding your legs into the ground on landing when you are perfectly capable of reducing your rate of descent and making it gentler on your legs.

I think statements like this are where the "cool" factor comments are coming from. I'm sure that the people involved in that incident would have agreed that it was completely avoidable, also, but somehow, it still happened despite both of them having the experience of over 1000 jumps. We're all human. Humans make mistakes. Not true. An extra 200 feet under reserve might mean an extra 12 seconds or more of canopy flight for me to figure out my stall point and locate a suitable landing area. There was an incident on the 100-way camp back in May where a skydiver was under her reserve low over ground with many hazards. While I don't believe that there was an RSL involved in this instance, it does show that there may be situations where an extra 100-200 feet under your reserve may be beneficial in avoiding injury, such as providing more time to find a safe location to land and more altitude to fly there. That's why UPT call it the Skyhook RSL. I don't think anyone at UPT is trying to pretend it's not an RSL. I'd suggest that the only people who would suggest otherwise neither own a skyhook nor know anything about them. My training and experience make me feel safe. That doesn't mean I shouldn't invest in better backup systems. I think I'm a safe driver, too, but that doesn't mean that I reject the idea of anti-lock brakes and airbags as being good ideas. As can a normal RSL. The skyhook reduces the risks of certain failure modes, such as a reserve bridle entanglement during a spinning malfunction. It also adds new failure modes specific to the skyhook, such as what can happen if the AAD fires at the right time during a skyhook deployment. There are modifications to the skyhook RSL system to mitigate this risk, but most out there won't have those modifications at present. I think the skyhook adds value and reduces more risk than it creates. Does it do enough to justify the price. I think it does. So do many others. You disagree. Good for you.

I'm guessing that you're Dan's friend with the strong feelings about the V3. Agreed. I jump a V3 with magnetic riser covers, and while they work well, I don't know that they add much, if anything, when compared with a well designed tuck tab. If I bought another V3, I'd still get them, but the availability of magnetic riser covers on one rig over another would not affect my buying decision. Why are you so anti-skyhook? It's one thing to be pointing out features of the V3 that are done better in other rigs, but this statement seems to be suggesting that the skyhook itself is a bad idea, but you're yet to provide any arguments to support such a statement. Can you explain why several manufacturers are all licensing it and working to get it approved in their rigs, or why yet more manufacturers are working on their own MARD designs?

Are you sure about the Icon? I know that they were working on getting it approved, but I just checked their website and there's still no mention of the skyhook RSL on there, nor could I find mention of the Skyhook RSL as an option for the Icon on the Square1 website. What is the MaRRs? I've not heard of that one.

Yes. I'm not sure why you think this. The Javelin Odyssey is a great rig. It has good pin, riser and bridle protection and the Javelins I've jumped in the past have been very comfortable. It also is available with a skyhook RSL if you want one, which required quite recent redesign of the yoke. Others have said this before in this thread. I think you're worrying about a very rare type of malfunction that could happen on any rig given the right conditions. Search the incidents forum and see how many incidents of this nature you can find. If you're not sure about your packing techniques, then talk to a rigger or instructor. You can also refer to the manuals that will come with your new gear, as they will have packing instructions with them as well. Honestly, if you buy a V3, Infinity, Javelin or any of several other harness/container systems, you'll have some great gear.

So, in your estimation, what rigs do you consider have better pin/riser/bridle protection or comfort than the vector 3? There are many harness/container systems that I would consider having comparable pin/riser/bridle protection to the vector 3 and my vector 3 while stiff when brand new, is now quite comfortable. Given two rigs with comparable pin protection, riser protection, bridle protection and comfort, but one has a MARD and the other does not, which would you choose? Searching the incidents forum, I'm quite sure that I'll find more low collision and low cutaway incidents than I will find main container flap entanglement incidents, so if I'm going to play the percentages... Sure - a MARD such as the Skyhook RSL is a backup system. An AAD is also a backup system, but you jump with one of them. To the OP, note that the V3 is not the only rig with a MARD, so even if you are adamant that you want a MARD, you still have at least two choices, maybe more if you're willing to wait. Sunpath also offer the Skyhook RSL on new Javelins. Several other manufacturers are working on adding MARD systems to their harness/container systems, either by licensing the skyhook or working on competing designs such as Mirage's DRX.

Sure I can. Here's my answer - You don't know. That's the point. Nobody's suggesting that you should live in fear of a malfunction of the 3-ring release or the reserve. Sometimes you run out of options and that's what you have to do. Saying Why risk it when you've got a perfectly good reserve isn't the best attitude, though, since it seems to ignore the fact that there may be other options. Once you've cut away, you've given up those options and there's no going back. On the other hand, if I try to secure the brakes but still have trouble with the main, I can still cut away. If: you're above your decision altitude, you are able to secure the brakes and land on rear risers, you have practised the skills necessary to do so on your current canopy and the conditions on the ground are satisfactory for a braked, rear-riser landing, then why cut away? You know you have something above your head that you can land safely. Your reserve is not guaranteed. Learn to fly your canopy using all inputs and in all modes of flight and you will have more options than just cutaway and rely on your 3-ring release and reserve to fix all your problems. I have cutaway and landed my reserve. I'm not afraid of it, but I still think it's better to have options.

Why not? While he doesn't post often, I find that when he does post, he tends to explain things fairly clearly in language that anyone on this forum should understand.

Not true. In the USA, Canada and possibly other countries, UPT and Strong ratings have meaning because the various organisations who regulate skydiving and/or the issuance of ratings (ie. FAA, Transport Canada, USPA, CSPA) delegate that responsibility to the tandem manufacturer. This is not necessarily true in other countries. Based on a conversation I had with one tandem master last time I was in Australia, the APF conducts it's own training and issues ratings for tandem parachute operations. While I'm sure that this draws on the knowledge and experience from the manufacturers' courses, it's independent of those systems. Since they have no UPT/Strong rating, they are not bound by any requirements set by such a rating. I'm not saying this is a good or a bad thing. I'm just saying that's how it is - at least as far as I know. If you're an Australian tandem master, feel free to correct me.

How do you know you have a perfectly good reserve? Yup good point???? how do you know your steering link is gonna break while driving on the freeway. how do you know if a wire will burn in your home and set your house on fire..yup another good point... What's your point? Perhaps I'm missing it, or perhaps you missed his. Maybe it's easier with the text of the post that he was responding to...

There are other dropzones in Canada outside of Quebec that will take people at 16 or 17 years old with parental consent. I don't think that I could say this about all dropzones, but certainly I've jumped at dropzones in Ontario and Alberta that will do so.

We're thinking along some of the same lines...While you're struggling with your chest strap, you're not watching for traffic, or whether you're headed towards town rather than back to the dropzone. You're also taking away time that you could be learning to fly your canopy. We only get a few minutes of canopy time per jump and a significant part of that we have to spend getting into the pattern and landing. You could be spending those minutes learning about your stall point on both toggles and rear risers, how your canopy responds to riser input with the brakes still stowed, etc. These are things that might help save your life when you have a tricky landing one day. Your chest strap shouldn't be that uncomfortable. You had it that way for the ride to altitude and the freefall. That's got to be at least 15 minutes or maybe 20. I'm sure that those last few minutes under canopy will be just fine, but if it really is that uncomfortable, then perhaps you're overtightening it on the ground. It only needs to to be tight enough to prevent the main lift webs from spreading over your shoulders. If you've got it tightened so much that it's distorting the main lift webs inward, then you're probably overdoing it. Even with your chest strap done up, the main lift webs should be running relatively straight from the laterals up to your shoulder.

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I think it's neither. Firstly, "square" doesn't necessarily refer to a tetragon with equal length sides and right angled corners. It can also refer to a corner being right-angled, as in construction, woodwork, etc. I have a square amongst my woodworking tools. It is triangular in shape. [Crazy] Secondly, as a living language, English is continuously evolving. What square meant 30 years ago may not be the same as what it means today. Thirdly, I think it depends on the context and the person speaking. I've heard discussions referring to square parachutes that includes things such as the katana, the velocity, etc. I've also heard a rigger explain that one of the main differences between the Sabre and Sabre2 is that the former is square whereas the latter is semi-elliptical. Bottom line is that I know very few people who still jump rounds, and even then, it's things like the Para Commander, rather than a "true" round like a T10. As others have alluded, for the majority of active jumpers today, the possibility of jumping out of an aircraft with anything other than a ram-air canopy is at best, a novelty, or at worst never even enters their minds, so to apply a descriptive word like "square" to describe a canopy when their brain is likely to associate "canopy" with nothing more than the set of ram-air canopies available and still jumped today, "square" has got to imply something else specific about the canopy beyond it's being a ram-air canopy, otherwise why not just say canopy. Personally, I prefer the term "ram-air". In terms of semantics versus romantics... No matter which side of this debate you are getting caught up in semantics. If you understand the point a person is trying to make, then who cares what you think "square" should mean?

Yes. The rear risers are generally far more effective and less likely to cause malfunctions when used during opening. Two reasons why rears are better: rear riser turns tend to give greater change in direction for a given amount of input, whereas front riser turns give greater loss of altitude for a given amount of input. try to do a front riser turn with your brakes stowed. On every canopy I've flown thus far, pulling down on a front riser with the brakes stowed does nothing to change my heading. I can't say this is true for every canopy design, but if you haven't tried this to see how you canopy responds to such an input and you're thinking of using it in an emergency situation, maybe you should try it out first and see how it responds.

If the jump numbers in your profile are accurate, a more important question to be asking is why you're trying to loosen your chest strap in flight at all? Two reasons why this is probably of no benefit to you are: With a large wing and low wing loading - which is what I imagine you're currently flying - the difference in wing performance between the risers spreading an few inches will be negligible Unless you have some facility to either remove or stow the slider, the slider will prevent the risers from spreading, anyway, meaning that loosening your chest strap is likely doing nothing positive for your canopy flight. It's unlikely that you would have such features on your current rig due to the negligible performance improvement this would provide for a large, lightly loaded wing. Talk to your instructors about your chest strap. At the very least, they will be able to demonstrate things first hand. Secondly, they can probably explain to you whether there's much point in you doing this at all. Personally, if someone with 30 jumps came to me asking for assistance on how to loosen their chest strap in flight, I'd suggest that they spend more time learning to fly their canopy and less time worrying about the chest strap. There's your answer right there. If it feels unsafe to be messing with your harness under canopy, then perhaps you're not ready to be doing that. [Crazy] Seriously, there are plenty of things for you to be worrying about learning about canopy flight at your experience level. Loosening the chest strap is not one of them. Save that for later when you start getting coaching on enhanced landing techniques.

He was referring to an earlier post by diverdriver about level & cut vs not.

How much is a slot to full altitude at such dropzones? I have heard DZOs comment that operationally, the cost to them for providing a low pass for a large turbine aircraft is no lower than a slot to full altitude, since there are generally always full altitude slots on the plane anyway and the additional pass at the lower altitude can sometimes even mean marginally higher costs in terms of aircraft maintenance and fuel burn. At some dropzones I've jumped at, the price difference for a low exit is less than 20% of the full altitude price. I'm not sure that you can rely on slot prices to reflect the relative cost to the DZO or aircraft owner for providing the lift.

I'm wondering how secure such a temporary stowage of the brake line would be. I'd hate to have it release again at an inopportune time, such as on final or while trying to do my rear riser flare for landing. How do you propose to wrap the released brake line? Maybe something like a half hitch - or not quite just under the guide ring on the riser?