AndyMan

I had a demo jump into a residential neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago on Saturday. I had a Pilot-chute in tow, and landed a Swift Plus, which was loaded about 1.2ish. It was the first time I'd ever landed that canopy. I made the primary landing area which was very tight. It landed just fine, and the crowd loved the show. I don't quiet know what we mean when we talk about "overloading" a reserve. I think most of you would think I was overloading that old Swift Plus, but it opened, flew, and landed great. Obviously being aware of the TSO limitations is one thing, but the idea that these reserves must be lightly loaded is false. My whole point here, is that short of the disasters that were the old Ravens - I don't know that we need to be so hard on these 7-cell reserves. My (limited) experience on Tempos, PDR's, and now the Swift Plus's is that they all seem to open, fly, and land relatively well at higher wing-loadings. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Hi Cari, At this point in your skydiving career buying simple things like an Altimeter, Goggles, and a Helmet are a great start. There's some really smart people telling you to take advice from your instructors. Listen to them! Fortunately, I happen to be one of your instructors, I am both an AFF an Tandem instructor at CSC. For goggles, CSC requires that all students wear clear goggles. That means no sunglasses, which some experienced jumpers like. There are vareity of inexpensive goggles that you can buy for $10-15, CSC has them all available at the same price you'd get anywhere else. Buy the one that you like and fits your budget. I always loose goggles, so I buy cheap ones. For an Altimeter, the standard issue Altimeter is the Altimaster Galaxy, which the DZ sells for $150. That's a comparable price to what you'd get anywhere else. The advantage of this altimeter is that it doesn't require batteries, so it'll never die in the middle of a jump. You can also spend more money and get an electronic one, that'll add a bunch of bells & whistles like automatic jump logging and audible altitude warnings, but they come with the risk that the battery could fail at any time. They also cost a lot more. Most jumpers eventually buy two different ones, an Analog one for their wrist and then an electronic audible one to mount in their helmet. Start with the analog one. A helmet is also a good purchase. I'm particular to Bonehead helmets, they've served me better than some of the other manufacturers. A good open face helmet from Bonehead or Cookie will serve you well throughout your skydiving career. A full-face helmet has a plastic shield that will cover your face may also be a good choice, but will cost more money. A full-face helmet is pretty much required if you want to get into 4-way competition. However, as a student we'll ask that you wear an open faced helmet. Jumpsuits really do have to be purchased through the DZ because they're custom measured. While you can have a friend measure you, it's best for someone who knows about jumpsuits to do the measuring. Jumpsuits are also very particular for the different kind of skydiving you'll want to do - so you may want to wait a few jumps before ordering. I wouldn't rush out and buy all this right this week. I'd get a good pair of goggles first, then the altimeter, then a helmet and jumpsuit once you have a better idea about what kind of skydiving you'll want to do. Take care, _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I don't know what it's like in the rest of Wisconsin, but in the Chicago area the big DZ's are charging exactly that - high 20's for a jump ticket. I don't know the details of your aircraft arrangement, but you're flying the single most efficient jump-plane ever built. I have trouble imagining that you can't turn a profit on fun jumps. I suspect the club culture is such that you choose not to. We can argue this over beer next time you're down. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Pick the big city of your choice. I'm partial to Chicago, since I live there. It's very easy to get to because of O'Hare. I jump at Chicagoland Skydiving Center (proskydiving.com) and teach there, I'm sure you'd have a good time. I would avoid anywhere in Florida, Arizona, Southern California, and the rest of the south at this time of year. The weather is hot and or humid, but generally completely uncivilized. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I think the idea that base jumpers always deploy stable is a good example of hubris. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Pretty much, yup. A reserve packjob is a great example of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. You simply can not observe the state of a packjob without disturbing the packjob. Most jumpers aren't willing (or qualified) to open up a rig to judge that quality of the work. Picking a variety of riggers who've been trained and certified makes no more, or no less sense than picking one and sticking with him. An truism of the stock market is that Past Performance does not equate to future performance. I think that applies equally here, too. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Packing a parachute isn't rocket science. I'll let virtually any properly rated rigger pack my rig once. Whether or not they get repeat business depends on customer service. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I load a lighting 190 at about 1.4 and I can say categorically, that it does not land "well". Yes, I can land it, and I stand it up and make it look easy, but I do not have the confidence in it that I do in virtually any other modern canopy, including my Triathlon. I do a lot of CRW demo jumps, and I just don't ever see us using a lightning because the Triathlon is just so much more reliable. I imagine the Storm is similar. A canopy that requires a high wingloading or induced speed is by definition - not good at landing. To the original poster - I've done some Lightning/Triathlon CRW and found they generally fly well together. Give it a shot and let us know how it goes. Don't put on links until you've done a few jumps first. I bet you don't need them. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Thanks so much for organizing this Razz, you and April did a great job pulling this all together. Thanks also to those at Sky Knights who supported us. I had a really good time, learned a ton and got to do some very cool jumps. I'd love to get some photos. I think someone was going to put together a CD? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Thanks. That's exactly what I was looking for. Very cool. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

TV has recently had some really neat effects where they take a still photo and pull the foreground up off the background, and then "move' the camera to create a sense of depth and 3D against the background of the photo. Can you do this affect with any of our standard tools? Photoshop, Premiere, etc? It's very cool. __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

??? That's odd. You have to zero almost every altimeter on the market, except for some of the new fancy electronic ones. Skydivers have managed to survive decades with having to manually zero their altimeter at the start of each day. Why do you have to zero it on every jump? I certainly don't. I"m very happy with mine, it has lasted a long time and functioned well. I don't recomend them for newer jumpers, but they're perfectly adequate equipment. __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Because I hadn't had my coffee when I typed the post. You are correct, and the notes I teach from say the same thing. Thanks for the correction. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I teach landing priorities in the fjc. These are: 1: open area 2: wings level 3: flare to at least #2 position. I note the absence of "into the wind". I stress that into the wind is a "nice to have", but is not on the list. I teach a pattern with standard altitude reference points of 1000, 500, and 300. I draw such a pattern on an aerial photo using a whiteboard marker. Fitting into the pattern is a tough thing to teach in the early in the student progression, since there rarely are other canopies in the air when AFF students are landing. All the fun jumpers are long on the ground, and tandems have usually landed too. There really isn't a "pattern" to fit into, if all the other canopies are on the ground. The tandems make it even more confusing since many TM's seem to dislike flying a normal pattern, and often make their turns (comparatively) very low. On every jump in the pre-jump briefing, I talk through the intended pattern, and remind the student of the importance of landing the same direction as other jumpers they may be near. Ultimately, I agree. Any instructor that is not teaching landing priorities and standard patterns is not doing their job. I suspect that most instructors ARE doing this - but the message simply isn't being preserved once the student gets their 'a' license. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

There's a lot of companies in skydiving that don't seem to understand the importance of good customer service. Aerodyne seems to be one of them. I have a lot of Aerodyne gear, some old, some less old - I've had quite a few interactions with them over the years. I've never had a really great experience with them. I've always gotten what I wanted at a fair price, but getting stuff done was like pulling teeth. I've personally chosen to move on to other manufacturers. It's just not worth the hassle. Skydiving gear is highly competitive, and there are plenty of companies that will give you a good product for a fair price without all the fuss. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

While true, and something to be aware of - I just don't see this as all that different from characteristic of a (student) Cypres were it will fire in a descending plane. Both are scenarios where the unit will fire in an undesirable manner. Both are scenarios where the unit should be turned off. Both are scenarios where the jumper and pilots need to be well briefed beforehand. Both devices have scenarios where they will misread atmospheric changes commonly found in aircrafts. The only difference is that it's impractical to turn off a vigil before climbing. It's unbalanced for people pillage the Vigil while giving carte blanche to the Cypres. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I'm curious how effectively you'd be able to go after an instructors standard homeowners policy. Would it be a hindrance to you if the policy was in a spouses name? Would a typical homeowners policy cover this kind of liability? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

While true, the same is also true of the Cypres. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

That's a big part of it. Electronic devices are capable of reliable self tests. Deep testing during scheduled maintenance is a reasonable alternative to bricking. Occam's razor being what it is, the only likely motive is profit. Ultimately, rarely will it be the case that the original purchases keeps the unit 12 years. Instead, they'll likely keep it just a few years before they move out of the sport. With the Vigil, they don't have a prescribed accelerated depreciation. With a Vigil, they'll be able to sell the unit for more cash as it will likely have a longer lifespan. Not only is the Vigil cheaper to buy, and cheaper to maintain, but it will likely have a higher resale. It's already proven itself just as good as the Cypres. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I have a perfectly good Cypres that is on the verge of becoming a paper weight because Airtec restricts its usage to 12 years. I will never buy another product from Airtec, nor will I recomend them to anyone. Both are reliable, but I can only recomend the Vigil. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I too am one of the bozo AFFI's. You are correct though, the recommendation is not in the SIM. It's in the IRM. When was the last time you jumped a typical student main, like a large lightly loaded Navigator? I did recently, and I was really amazed at how they performed. Burying a toggle and doing a complete 360 rotation netted a total altitude loss of only 300 feet. Don't take my word for it, go borrow some DZ student gear, take a digital altimeter and measure for yourself. Interestingly, while doing a 180 toggle whip at 500 feet on my highly loaded elliptical is definitely not recommended, it's also pretty safe. 500 feet will plane out pretty high. 300 feet, not so much. The question posed in this thread is simple: How low is too dangerous to turn? Such a simple question deserves a simple answer. Any question that only says "it depends" does a disservice to the student since it doesn't give them any guidelines. The question "how low is too dangerous' I infer to mean: How low can I turn in an emergency and still get away with it? The altitudes and degree turns I posted answer that question adequately. Of course we teach to fly a proper pattern, we teach proper pattern entry points, and we drill into the students that they need to be ahead of their turns so that they don't have to turn low. We also show video (from Aerohio) that shows a low turn done badly. We do go over a flat turns, but I don't expect anyone to remember that part. Ultimately, I'm not really sure what your point is. The altitudes and degrees I posted are safe under a lightly loaded Navigator, and under a highly loaded elliptical. Your advice to define exactly what I mean by "small corrections" is good - that's why I specifically mentioned "no more than 10 degrees". __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Interesting. I've done close to a hundred demo jumps since I got my rating 3 years ago and I never seen a need to throw a WDI. I think the only time I've ever seen one, is watching the Knights do their performance. I've always suspected they throw it for show - their accuracy with the WDI is impressive. I have two canopies I jump regularly for demos. One is at a very high wingloading, one is much more moderate. With either canopy I can fly to virtually any target from any reasonable spot. With modern canopies I just don't see the need for a WDI. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

You didn't mention where you jump. There may be other DZ's in the neighborhood that have better gear for big jumpers. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

I jump at Chicagoland Skydiving Center (CSC). I bring my dog when my wife comes out to with me. That way, we can share supervision. CSC allows well behaved dogs to stay. Poorly behaved dogs are asked to leave, but this happens infrequently. My dog is extremely well behaved, so much that we often allow him off-leash at the DZ. He never goes far, will not go through a gate without me, nor will he enter a building (packing area) without me. He often hangs out right in front of the packing hanger, but does not enter it. He seems to have a very well defined understanding of boundaries. He is closely supervised at all times. My wife and I are the only dog owners that regularly allows the dog off leash. The other owners do not trust their dog like we do. I don't blame them, I don't trust their dogs, either. We accept any financial risk caused by our dog. So far so good. _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

Do you really depend on them for the spot, or is it just part of the show? _Am __ You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.