jmfreefly

We always called that "El Nino". But boy did it make your suit smell bad afterwards. Totally off topic (like farting in a wingsuit is such a great topic ), but why is it ok to pee on yourself, but if your buddy let loose on your leg, you would punch him repeatedly? Same thing with farts.. Anyway. j

The same that I use for signalling RW breakoff, two handed wave off. I have also seen folks use a 1 handed wave bye-bye, but I think that is not as clear to those not directly in front of the jumper. No matter what you use, I recommend covering that at the same time as reviewing the breakoff altitude. j

Accounting for people is very important, and something that newer jumpers seldom do, especially above. If you can't account for everyone, then backtracking has the same issues as the banana peel does for head down (you can't see if someone is behind you). Another thing that I see very few people do is actually signal breakoff. This can help warn everyone that speeds will start changing and to watch for people tracking. j

No doubt a bullet cam is an easier option. However, the bullet cams that were widely available previously had such poor picture quality, it wasn't worth it to me. I'll have to say, pulling with a footmount is a bitch.

That is nasty. It is like peeing in your wetsuit.

No more hardcore than the BH model in design really, but I am interested in seeing what you have done. The goal of this version was to make it pretty universal, which meant a bit of over engineering. If it was just for me, I could probably get away with some bulk and some of the adjustment points. j

Yes you are! I call beer! j

Ok, here is a series of pictures of my foot mount. As you can see, it is pretty big (especially with no shoes on..

I have made both a belly mount and a footmount (actually 2, but one was a bust of a design). Mine were basically like the BH mounts, but much cheaper and a bit heavier. The two major components of the mounts were fiberglass and a R.A.M. Mount http://www.ram-mount.com/. My first mount was a bust because 1) I made it around an old stuffed shoe, but the shoe was a bit smaller than the one I jump with (doh!) and 2) there was poor support on the bottom of the foot (to counteract the 'lever action' of the video mount on deployment. The second design was made around an oversized shoe that other people could use it too. The extra space is taken up with styrofoam. 3/4inch webbing sewn on the mount, with some friction adapters are used adjust the mount on the foot. The mount uses two 2-ring releases to cut the mount away in emergencies. One around the ankle, and one across the arch. The gotchas of the project are 1) if you overbuild the mount, the footmount is pretty heavy (mine is). 2) if the mount is big, or uses a long arm (mine does), the mount is pretty hard to control. 3) You need to make sure to have a lot of extra slack in the cutaway cable. I almost lost my mount and camera when I extended my leg to full extension under canopy I'll try to dig up pictures of the mount, or take a few new ones. j

Their faces are white because the cold is restricting bloodflow to the capillaries in the skin -- Just like people look a tiny bit translucent / blue when they are really, really cold. The redness occurs on the ground, when bloodflow returns to warm the skin back up. Skin irritation from windburn also takes a while to show up. This can explain why people don't have red faces on video (colder air is restricting bloodflow to the skin), even if they had more blood pooling in their head. I am guessing that you didn't intend to write this statement as you did. (Since gravity applies force to the ball even while it is in your hand.) English can be so ambiguous sometimes. Increased heartrate, I agree with you, also helps combat any blood pooling. j

Fluid/pump dynamics in an accelerating system. j

I don't think that would be an issue for most people. The deployment sequence for a wingsuit is significantly different (starting from a different position, symmetrical arm movements, etc.) that I think it would be less of an issue than your borrowed gear scenario. However, your point is well made. I also think, in general, the folks who are are using the pouch are either BASEing or flying wingsuits for a majority of their jumps. (Side note, I don't have one either of my suits, so I can't comment first hand) j

Finally got around to uploading some pics taken from video at CSS over the Easter Boogie. Some from a flock dive, a few of Chuck, and one of Scott giving a FFC to TheMonkey. Good jumps all around. J

Pulled to be sent to Vigil for replacement, or pulled permanently and replaced with a different AAD?

Or a bit hypoxic, in my case. j

I used to split the last stow on each side of the bag. I gave up doing that as it was just more work to pack. As for the post about 'not having enough stows/bag surface', just get a smaller canopy . I barely make 2 non-locking stows in the middle of the bag.

I'd concur with that also. j

There is really no 'best' combination for anyone. They are all tradeoffs. Riser length is dependent on: how long your arms are if you need to reach your slider, and the brake settings compared with your height. I think generally, the longest riser you can still reach your slider with is the one to get. mini vs. standard depends on: what your rig has on it. If you have small rings on your rig, you can't use large ringed risers. If you are buying rig/risers together, then the mfg will make sure they match. Most often small rings go with type 17, and large on type 8, but I have seen mini rings on type 8, which looked pretty strange to me. Type 8 vs 17 is pretty much weight based (and fashion based for some people). j

Good luck with responses from Birdman. I know Kevin (Kevin922) had some stitching come apart and asked about sending it back to the mfg for repair. Birdman basically said "find someone locally". They referred him to someone up in NY that had dones some alterations, but she was not using e-thread. He ended up taking it to our rigger, and he did a pretty good job (from what I saw). Alterations are a little bit bigger job, but I wouldn't be surprised if he could do it with good quality. PM me and I'll send you his contact info if you wanted to talk with him. I am not sure about the 'quick' part, since he does his rigging part time. j

Exactly. The point is that risers are easy to replace, while harness is not. Has nothing to do with reducing forces on the body. j

Yes, they did. I had one of the small sliders on my nitron and finally got fed up and called Precision and they said "oh yeah, we changed the slider, we will send you a new one". Well, I was thankful for a new slider FOC, but geesh, ya think they might have said something about a revision!! My neck still suffers from a bad opening with 2 cameras on my head. Haven't had much issue with the openings lately, but I definitely pack it to open slower than normal, JIC. j

I did only one flight this weekend on my S3, and it wore me out. Nothing like a go-around for traffic, thin air, a really long flight (132 seconds according to my neptune), and maxed-out, fatigued muscles to whip you. When I deployed, I was a bit dizzy for a few minutes. But it was all worth it, flying from the dz to skirt a cloud, and flying back. Nothing like brushing the edge of clouds to make me grin from ear to ear! Back on the subject, I found that the muscles that gave out first where actually my forearms/hands from gripping the wing edge. The angle at which your wrist has to cant in order to grab the edge is unnatural to me. If I can do it without having my wrist at that angle, I could probably get better flights. I had to drop my wing edges for the last 1000 feet to let my hands relax so I could pull my hackeys/handles. j

What is the source of this information? Vigil stated explicitly that it was a pre-US-release beta unit and that the software version was different. The units offered to US 'beta testers' are exactly equivalent to US production units (indicated by Kim from Vigil to me via email). I don't have any information about the non-US beta units. Are you claiming that the hardware was the same, or that it was exactly the same (and Vigil is misinforming the public)? j

Talking with Beezy (sp?) from HiPer USA, there are other differences (but pretty much negligable) 1) Material (as cited) 2) Stabilizers are attached to the outboard lines differently on Nitron (Precisions Stabilrib config) 3) The nose on the Nitron is one an extension of the topskin. On the Nitro it is a separate piece that is attached slightly differently (with tapes (?)). The german mfg claims a benefit, but not sure that it is conclusive that it is better. 4) The Nitron has (used to have) a larger slider spec. Supposedly all the Nitros (US and non-US) use the larger slider now. 5) Nitro center cell is checkerboard (cosmetic from what I understand) j

Mixing vectran and spectra slinks should raise no concerns. The breaking strength of each material is the breaking strength of the material, irrespective of what it is made out of. The only difference is the wear properties, and slinks don't suffer any real friction (to my knowledge). j