riggerrob

Most manuals state a "washer to tip length" for Cypres loops. A few manuals state "pack tray to end of loop" (aka "installed") length. A good manual will make it clear which measuring method they are using.

Hi Bill, What type of seat-belts were installed in your Lake Amphibian during its last flight?

Agreed Bill. If you thought FAA Supplementary Type Certificate processes were complicated, try Transport Canada! I got an insight into TC's STC process when I wrote technical manuals for MBB Helicopter of Canada (now part of Eurocopter) 25 years ago. One of MBB's biggest hassles was the difference between FAA and TC STCs. Often the red-neck engineers at Keystone Helicopters (in Pennsylvania) would quickly weld up a new mount for a searchlight or rescue hoist, etc. The FAA promptly issued STCs for Keystone's mounts. But try getting an FAA STC past TC? Hah! Hah! TC insisted on a full engineering analysis, by a diplomaed engineer, CAD drawings. Ten or 15 hours of test-flying by a certified test pilot, a pile of paperwork exceeding the weight of the new mount, etc. ... an exhausting process! By the end of TC's STC process, the new Canadian mount did the same job as Keystone's, was 10 percent lighter, 10 percent cheaper to manufacture, but I shudder to think of how many thousand dollars it cost to certify! A huge price to pay for a piece of paper issued by TC. I see this process as a form of bureaucratic cowardess, driven by the legal industry. Bureaucrats are afraid that any mistake on their watch will kill their pension, so they avoid making mistakes. The simplest way to avoid making mistakes is to never do anything. The second way to avoid making mistakes is to create enough different layers - and involve enough different people that the blaim can be spread thin enough that no one person loses their pension. If the aviation industry grinds to a halt, that is a bonus, because when no one flies, no one gets hurt.

Agreed! Canadian newspapers are describing the Ottawa gunman as mentally unstable. He searched for answers in drugs and religion. When his obnoxious behaviour got him kicked out of a mosque near Vancouver, he sought salvation with a gun. The sad thing is that I have delivered hundreds of worshippers to that mosque (just outside of Vancouver). All of my moslem passengers were quiet and polite. That just proves that the vast majority of muslims - who emigrate to western countries are bright enough to flea the violence and corruption of their homelands. Most muslim immigrants are just looking for quiet places to raise their families. Now our biggest threat is Canadian citizens radicalized by the internet. Who could have predicted that DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects) greatest invention: the internet would be turned against NATO armies?????

Thanks for explaining recent changes in FAA bureaucracy. Transport Canada went the same route a few years back. TC would prefer that airplane owners write their own operations manual, then have it audited annually by some independent contractor, DER, etc. Maybe the long-term answer is for DZOs/jump-plane owners to band together under USPA,PIA or Cessna Pilots' Association to agree on a short list of best-business-practices. Then it would be easy for an FAA FSDO to sign-of on "operations in accordance with USPA/PIA/CPA program number 12345."

If you fart too often, they will shove one end of a hose up your butt. The other end of the hose will be attached to the engine, so that ever time you fart the plane will climb 500 feet. Best advice for faster airplanes: have your gear on and ready to jump when you board the airplane. Keep your eyes outside the airplane, so you will know where you are when the door opens.

Hi John, The knee problems started during a plane crash 6 years ago. I have not walked straight since.

Cars have had auto-retract, inertia-reel and self-adjusting seat-belts for 30(?) years. Why can't we install auto-retract seat-belts in airplanes?

Hundreds? Wow, I've only done dozens. Of course, I tell them that if they don't get their feet up I'll get to use them for a pillow. That's usually is a great motivator. ................................................................................ What? Tandem students DON'T want to cuddle with the handsome and talented John Mitchell? I am shocked and outraged! ... or are they afraid of what Lady Val will do to them if she catches them cuddling with her husband????

Inertia reel seat-belts and auto-retract seat-belts have been available in cars for 30(?) years now. Why can't we install auto-retract belts in jump-planes?

Two week sago, a surgeon sawed through the top of my tibia, inserted a wedge of cadaver bone and screwed my leg back together. Took a lot of oxycodene for the first week, then cut back to Tylenol. Neither drug gives me a buzz, they just dull the pain. Swelling abated after a week or so. Now I am hobbling around on crutches. They told me not to put any weight on it until 6 weeks after the operation. then they told me it would be a total of 6 months before I could return to work.

................................................................................... Judaism, Christianity and islam are all based on the same book. Look long enough and hard enough and you will find a passage in the Talmud, Bible or Koran to justify any act of stupidity. I just wish those mad mullahs would lead by example ... instead of the cowardly practice of brain-washing lonely young men to do their dirty work.

From now until November 11, all war memorials, in all towns in Canada will be guarded 24 hours a day by retired Canadian soldiers. This afternoon, I limped (on crutches) down to Victory Park to pay my respects. Victory Park is only a few short blocks from the rough neighborhood one of the lone gunman used to frequent. The War Memorial was guarded by a lone, retired soldier. He wore a Scottish bonnet and a trench coat.

.................................................................... A witness (woman on the sidewalk entrance to Central Block of Parliament) said that it was a "long gun" during a radio interview. She admitted that she did not know enough about guns to distinguish between shotguns or rifles. ............................................................................ Today's newspapers said that the lone gunman carried a Winchester lever-action rifle. Earlier ISIS propaganda photos showed the spineless coward brandishing a lever-action "cowboy gun."

Whoever it was, did an excellent job. Retired RCMP Inspector. I always thought the role was purely ceremonial. Obviously I was mistaken. Embedded in this news article about Mr. Vickers is some stuff about his background: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/10/22/parliament_hill_sergeantatarms_hailed_as_hero_in_ottawa.html ................................................................................ Similarly, the Quebec Sargeant at Arms dis-armed a nut-case a few years ago after that nut-case tried to shoot up the Quebec Provincial Assembly. I refuse to honor these lone, crazy gunmen with any religious title. Ditto. They're nothing more than a fuckstick loser pissed off at big brother because they couldn't do their own thing to be successful. ............................................................................... Vancouver media is reminiscing about the years that (Ottawa one-gunman) Michael Zehaf-Bibeau spent drifting through Vancouver's nastier neighborhoods. For a while he smoked crack in the dreaded Downtown Eastside. Later, he was expelled from a Burnaby mosque for doing too many drugs and other offensive behaviour. At a low point, MZB brandished a pointy stick in a effort to get sent to jail long enough to kick his crack addiction. The B.C. Provincial Court system failed by not enrolling MZB in a recovery program. Sadly, Canadian society has lost another angry young man - the hard way. He has gone to mujahidin heaven where he will quickly loose his virginity, taking it up the butt like thousands of other deluded holy warriors.

"... Of course there is always the tire, if the pilot knows where the brakes are." ............................................................................... Simple in theory, but students instinctively stand on brake hydraulic fittings. Which raises the question of "How many times you can stand on a brake line before it fails?????"

............................................................................... That is the smoothest jump-step we have seen so far. The (inboard end) filler block eliminates a couple of snag points. Wrapping the step down beside the wheel eliminates a couple more snag points. Some might criticism that step for limiting leg strut flex, but I would need to take a close look at how much rubber is in the upper attachment clamp. As for the step limiting leg strut flex ... I have seen many with hinges at the inboard and outboard edges, but most of those hinges include snag points.

Zombies 1 - Canadian Armed Forces 0 According to Vancouver media, Ottawa gunman Michael Zehaf-Bibeau was born in Quebec to immigrant parents. He turned into a troubled youth who sought answers in crack pipes, violence, petty theft, jail and mosques. For a while, hMZB was one of hundreds of zombies stumbling around Vancouver's dreaded Downtown Eastside near the corner of Hastings and Main. I have driven through that intersection hundreds of times. I will cross that intersection again today, on my way to visit the War Memorial a mere 3 blocks west. Bibeau also searched for answers at a nearby Burnaby mosque (that I have driven past a hundred times). Bibeau was expelled from that mosque because of his radical views and irrational behaviour. Calling this troubled young man a "moslem" is a lazy form of racial profiling. He was a troubled young man searching for answers anywhere he could: crack pipe, violence, paranoia, petty theft, jail, mosque, etc.

After a couple of hang-ups, it is time that we share best-business-practices about the after-market jump-steps installed in piston-pounding Cessna 180 and 200 series airplanes that make up the bulk of our lift capacity. Can we start by agreeing that the Cessna factory-standard step is a snag-point waiting to happen? Please post photos of the jump-step on your favorite Cessna jump-plane. DZOs and USPA Group Members please share your wisdom. Links to Supplementary Type Certificates and modification shops would also be helpful. It sounds like the FAA is increasingly reluctant to sing-off on 337 Field Modifications. Now is the time for skydivers to unite in solving a problem before gov't imposes an onerous solution ... like when seat-belts suddenly became fashionable over the winter of 1992-1993.

one is full of hot air the other is a dirigible No silly, they both went down in flames ........................................................................... One is a dangerous, Nazi, gasbag given to random inflammatory outbursts, while the second is a zeppelin.

" ... two f-16s collided near my property .... A lot of the debris people have found appears to be thin carbon fiber in pieces about the size of a sheet of paper. ..." .................................................................................. Those little chunks of carbon fibre can be dangerous. First, they can leave nasty splinters in your fingers or toes. Secondly, they can short-circuit electronic devices. Twenty years ago, an RCAF CF-18 fighter plane crashed in Germany. One of the first thing investigators grabbed was Pledge spray wax, to contain carbon fibre splinters. Also consider that the first wave of Desert Strom included USAF fighter planes dropping carbon ribbons to short out Iraq's electrical grid.

Whoever it was, did an excellent job. Retired RCMP Inspector. I always thought the role was purely ceremonial. Obviously I was mistaken. Embedded in this news article about Mr. Vickers is some stuff about his background: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/10/22/parliament_hill_sergeantatarms_hailed_as_hero_in_ottawa.html ................................................................................ Similarly, the Quebec Sargeant at Arms dis-armed a nut-case a few years ago after that nut-case tried to shoot up the Quebec Provincial Assembly. I refuse to honor these lone, crazy gunmen with any religious title.

I agree with you completely. We need to do some serious racial profiling to shove these fanatics off to the margins of society. Maybe we could divert them to some sort of Moslem Boot-camp - led by moderate Moslems - that would run them to physical exhaustion and force them to seriously question their radical beliefs.

Bhuddists tell us that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. If we refuse to hide from religious fanatics/gang enforcers/school-yard bullies, we pull their teeth. Religion has always been a lame excuse for violence.

Wow! That is way neater than my first line set! Keep up the good work.