Couloirman

I just drove back to Pgh from CO last week and the long boring drive would have been a whole lot better if I had made some jumps along the way! If you know of any DZ's close off I-70(which I take the ENTIRE way) Id really appreciate letting me know. Ill be heading back to CO again in August, so I hope to see some of you, and maybe make a jump or two with you to make the drive seem like its not as bad as it really is. Thanks.

I sold my spectre 170 a while back and was waiting for my sabre 2 150 to arrive, which it finally did, so I did not have to exchange with my buddy after all. Thanks for all the info though guys, my rigger who I asked later told me it'd be fine, but again, I did not actually do it.

any problems with it? Im doing a balloon jump tomorrow and am borrowing a friends canopy from his mirage. Can I just cut away his chute and attach his mirage risers to my vector container with his mirage dbag and pilot chute, or are there any compatibility issues that I should know about between the two container manufacturers? I don't wanna repack his chute into my vector dbag if I dont have to, id rather just transfer the packed d bag into my container if possible. I cant think of anything that would not work about it, but just wanna ask and need to know before the DZ opens tomorrow and I can ask a rigger, thanks. EDIT: my container is sized for a 170 sabre 2, his is sized for a 150 but has a 170 sabre 2 in it.

This is very reasonable, responsible advice and probably the way to go. Im about the same size as you and think that I have downsized very quickly compared to some so I may be able to relate. Thats a big drop in size, if your DZ has in between rigs there is no reason why you should not go one size at a time. If there aren't in between sized rigs, Id probably wait at least until I was off of AFF and maybe even more jumps to do it. I stood up perfectly every landing in AFF until level 7 where they switched me from a 230 9 cell F-111 to a spectre 230 and I flared too high, ate shit, and felt like I was beat up for a few days after. If I had been under soomething smaller, well... If you arent comfortable in your head, no way you'll be comfortable at 50 ft getting ready to touch down. Its almost as much about state of mind as it is about skill. if you dont think you are ready, you aren't, no matter what the instructor says. Have fun, stay safe, and dont let other people make you feel pressured to downsize if you dont feel ready, its your femur, not theirs. Ill just finish this off with the usual disclaimer that I am no instructor, or anything even close, just a low-time fun jumper. I just thought Id add my $.02 anyway bc the advice I gave will in no way endanger anyone and I am bored and felt like replying to pad my post count. After all, # of posts on dorkzone.com is directly related to your skill in the air right? Well, now Im one post closer to being a skygod

Honestly, the landing area is by far the worst part of the DZ.I have excellent accuracy with my canopy but for not so good pilots, and newbies the area is dangerously small.It is surrounded by a chain link fence that I have seen several people almost hit in my very limited time there.I don't know how there aren't more accidents because of this.The plane is fine, the people are fine but if I were doing my AFF level 1 there I would be quite afraid of the landing areas obstacles.

looked pretty good to me. bonus points for holding onto his handles

of course it CAN be done safely, but there are things out of ones control that are inherently not safe and you can do nothing about. Its not about proving the asshats wrong, and IMO you didn't prove them wrong at all. All you did was showed that one time one person skydived through pregnancy without anything going wrong, and got LUCKY. It could have ended a lot differently. Thats like saying a guy just off AFF who flys a velo a few times and lives is "proving" to everyone that velos are safe for novices. Another thing, the minimum age for skydiving is 18 in the US, so how old is the fetus while jumping? Sounds like a DZ could actually maybe get in legal trouble for allowing a pregnant woman to jump should something terrible happen to the mother or the child. Also for future pregnant moms, if you go to a greedy DZ Id avoid telling them you're pregnant or they'll make you pay for two jump tickets

well, damn, I honestly thought I was onto something here and really considered not posting it so no one would steal my idea... Oh well.

sorry to hijack(sort of) but why cant we use the same container for all canopy sizes but change deployment bags appropriate to the size of canopy and put shims in the main tray to give the bag a good fit? Does it have something to do with reserve and main sizes being too different and them flying badly together when they are both out at once? Is this the main reason or are there other big ones I am too new and ignorant to know? Thanks EDIT: at least on vector they say you can go one size up or down from the recommended canopy size and still have it be a reasonable fit, however jumping in dry or high altitude climates you should not go one size up because the canopies pack bigger at high altitude. At least that was their reasoning as to why I couldn't order a container sized for a 150 and put a 170 in it for a while jumping out here in CO... But i guess it was a good thing, seeing as I cant get my slippery chute into the bag anyways

If any of you actually do decide to actually stow the excess brake line in the pin make sure this doesn't happen... http://www.chutingstar.com/archives/00000131.html

Touche to you both then...

So I bought a disposable Ilford B+W camera and lanyarded it to a hook inside my pocket the other day, to avoid dropping it. The plan was to open high on a 5K hop and pop with no other canopies in the sky and get some cool pics of spiraling under canopy with mountains in the background for a photo class I am in. I took the pics and everything was fine. When I was developing the pics, I could feel some gunk(yes, this is a scientific term) on the film and wondered what the hell it was all about. When I went out into the light I could see that the camera body was covered in battery acid on the inside and the film was irrecoverable. Why did this happen? Condensation from rapid temp and pressure change?(wasnt in freefall for very long, hopped, and popped) If so, what is different about peoples digi cams that makes the batteries not prone to do this? Is it just type of battery ie:cheap disposable camera batt v. nice rechargeable Li ion batt? Thanks for any help in advance. Would like to do this again, but am reluctant to take my point and shoot out for this if it will maybe get ruined.

FKNA hilarious. Thanks for that. He's got a very valid point... But he worked on the Babylon 5 before this, and probably already received a paycheck for his time no? I mean, is he asking to be paid twice? I would liken that(asking to being paid twice) to federal estate tax laws. I already paid the freakin government tax on the money when I earned it from working, now I have to go and give them half again when I die so my kids cant have as much??? WTF?

This sounds very strange considering the most basic license, A, has a requirement that you must know how to pull the cutaway handle, flex your three ring system to prevent them becoming stiff, and reattaching the main. This is essentially the same thing and the newest of newbies "has" to know how to do this just to get their A. Your profile says you have a decent amount more experience than required to do this, so I just dont see the problem.

1) I dont know its a perfectly good airplane until its landed, and Im not willing to take that risk... 2) Have you seen the guy who fixes our airplanes? Im pretty sure hes 12. 3) because all you have to do is not die to impress girls

another thing that helps me in many aspects of my life, that Im quite certain I learned from my dad is this: If Im scared, or even if I just dont wanna do something, I just say to myself "You are doing this no matter what, you know you are going to get out of the plane(or insert any scary activity here), so you might as well enjoy it" Honestly this helps me even through homework. I really dont wanna do it, but I just do it and get it done and then its over with, or in skydiving its just the beginning

isn't it great how skydiving turned sewing from girly to macho? Whats next, a canopy knitted by hand? Maybe Ill cross stitch my name into my ring covers...

I think hed be hard pressed to get a 170/143 R into a micron considering the largest size is made is for a stilletto 120 and a PD 126R.

wait let me get this straight. You were practicing PLF's(parachute landing fall) in freefall and the instructor had to pull? Do you mean your practice touches? I dont see how you could practice PLF's in freefall. If you couldn't move your shoulder, how did you steer your canopy? Good on you for getting down safely though. I tore my rotator cuff playing hockey getting checked into the corner of the penalty box at full speed by my own teammate!! It took a full year before I was back to normal and I still get pains sometimes, but just give it a lot of time to heal properly, rotator cuffs can be REALLY tricky...

are you referring to stowing the excess loop through the trulock pin itself? I dont like that method either and have not been doing it. from what I saw, it leaves a loop that could(relatively easily) finger trap itself with the toggle(upon brake release) leaving a knot on the steering line and not allow the toggle to go up through its guide ring to full flight on one side so unless flown in brakes would be in a constant turn.

fear is good. Its what keeps us safe in the face of great danger. When you stop feeling any fear whatsoever, you start to get complacent, and thats when the real danger comes into play. As long as you keep that fear in check well enough to do your job it will help to keep you safe in this sport. I'm obviously a total newbie to this sport, but have found that in my other high risk activities, fear has helped keep me safe. Just keep jumping and you'll feel better soon.

Now I figured out through trial and error to put the pin in first so it wont happen, but just curious, did your riser weave stay tight after you stopped putting the pin in second?

The trulock toggle system has a pin that slides into a cover in the riser to prevent brake fire on opening. While setting my brakes last weekend I noticed that the stitching of the riser itself had some a little bit loose in one area in the middle and the pin could slide all the way through the riser from front to back. There do not appear to be any broken threads of the riser itself, and when removed it is hardly noticeable. Has anyone else experienced this? Did it get worse? The pin is not very sharp at all, and the riser has stitching around the pin area which appears to be there to prevent this problem. Ill try to get some pics up tonight but Im not sure if I want to put the pin through the hole again and maybe make it worse. EDIT: the rig is only 20ish jumps old so wear anad tear shouldn't have been a problem yet, Im very meticulous about setting my brakes and am not rough on the rig.

a middle ground between the 210 and the 170, hmmm...... wait for it, wait for it......... It comes in a 190, Eureka! Sorry to be so sarcastic, long day...

I have seen two people pass out on their first tandem jump(well, seen the aftermath on the ground) and after that Id have to say go for a tandem first. Some people would never think they'd get overwhelmed, but then they do and thank god they're strapped to someone to land them safely. In AFF, if you pass out, you still have to land that canopy by yourself so you'd better know you can handle the rush...