heavydude

Did the mayor of Chicago come up with this stuff ? Reminds me of bulldozing Meigs Field in the middle of the night ! We all know terrorists prefer C172s as weapons. Seriously common sense is dwindling in America. Hopefully they havnt figured out how to regulate seaplanes up north yet, Lord.

Good Stuff by Joe Jennings....I watched that to death, wife and kids will strangle me if I play it again. Parabatix is also approaching cult status in my living room also.

I found Airtec Cypress website fairly good, you fill out form online, submit and send form w/ your unit. You can check online when its recieved, and ETA for delivery. Mine had 8yr + new batt. The 12 year period does seem short however, like the mod says I am sure that its a function of liability. But ultimately its the builders job to determine service life of a product. Would be cool to see if anyone could gather data on activation of old units, test of course.

Perris has decent rental rigs at sq, 1 by the way, All the way up to Triathlon 260 canopy. Nice thing about Perris is they are always running loads providing good weather. All the instructors there are real super nice, plus wind tunnel is cool. I guess Eloy has same stuff but I havnt been there. Speaking of girls, lots of Skydiver women at times....not that I would eever look.....

Never was up there in Nor-Cal, just had a funny thought about all the ranges near Brown Field in San Diego, mostly pistol for Police, Border Ptl etc. At least the bad guys arent shootin at us yet.

I am not an instructor, just a low time jumper..so im real familiar w/ currency reqs. Perris I know has a min 60 day interval for currency so you are way out of that. Most drop zones these days pretty much follow the book due to legal issues, if you dont have a A license you will probably only be able to jump w/ instructors. I am sure a instructor will post details but I bet they will make you do a full AFF course. They do refreshers but usually only for out of currency A holders. Technically also on jumps they have to be signed off by another licensed skydiver to count in the logbook. Yeah lots of rules for a crazy sport.

Darn noisy skeer-diveers, I say we replace them varmits with a nice Blackwater rifle range cross them streets. yee-haw - no mer cloth flappin, just rifle shootin.

OK I am a catholic expert since I went to Catholic school throught high school. I now follow the Jimmy Buffet sect of catholism; feel guilty about lots of stuff looking at hot chicks, drinking too much red wine.... Seriously though I believe that most of these hardcore religions dont have many followers that obey 99% of the teachings. I feel that Cath. Religion just gives you some structure of morality to follow. I would say 75% are Sunday Catholics, part-time followers. In general the religion makes people feal better about themselves. The biggest downer of the Catholic religion lately has been the scandals with Priests, that has disillusioned many.

Ditto to the other comments; this sport lends itself well to a loner, non-couple activity in that if your wife has no interest in jumping she is better off not with you at the DZ. My wife would rather do other stuff. The DZ is incredibly boring to non-jumpers, my wife went once when we took the kids to wind tunnel. (kids liked that) I do see couples and some older married ones that jump together from time to time.

Most of the DZs here in CA are pretty respectable, Perris seems failrly serious all the times I have been there also. Most of the Boozing and strange stuff in my opinion seems to be from the yahoo tandem crowd... Of course it could also be that I havnt been to the real rowdy parties yet ? Skydiving in my opinion is farly upscale, on the outside it has a radical look but its more aviation-mainstream when you look inside the sport. The Aviation group is fairly mellow in a Jimmy Buffet sort of way...that is compared to some skateparks I have taken my son to ! My wife is making me go to church this weekend..however the weather is supposed to be bad, oh well.

I am with you there, I went to Catholic school forever when I was young.....I think thats the reason I hate to waste a Sunday indoors. Like somebody posted previosly the argument against was of unneccessary risk. But idealogically life is all about risk anyway..it all ends the same whether your careful or not. Realized that several years back when I realized how little control you have in life. I do know one thing if I ever have a malfunction....I"ll sure be prayin while pulling the handles ! All this reminds me also of an obituary several months back in Skydiving, an older Skydiver was terminal with cancer was quoted something to the effect of "I shouldve taken more chances" That statement kind of has stuck in my mind, might as well have fun while you can.

N/A

I was doing a search the other day for Skydiving forums..just out of curiosity to see what exists besides this site. Stumbled upon a hilarious discussion by Christians debating whether Skydiving was considered a SIN..... First Booze, Surfing, now Skydiving...

BASE jumping has a coolness factor that appeals to all Skydivers I believe...even if they never intend to do it. It has the whole radical outcast appeal going for it. Like Surfing before it was all mainstream and corporate. You gotta love those BASE movies on Skydiving movies.com, after all whats the most popular movie ? Jeb Cs flick. Ive been telling my wife that im taking up BASE jumping but I am really kidding. Its also cool to tell Whuffos your a BASE jumper.

I like my Aviator from Square1, its not as rugged as other brands but works OK and I like the internal audible pockets. Its a open face, ebay may have some rejects also. They chip easy so I stuck lots of radical skydive stickers on it. I also bought used a Oxygen which is real comfy, up north there you may want to use a Full-face eventually-there warmer eh ? Used helmets can be a good deal also on DZ.com. Reviews are good on DZ com also should you need a referance.

Im bummed, have been getting the mag last two years..fun to read at work to get mind off work and into skydiving fun. Thanks for the motivation Florida dudes !

I have fairly low jump numbers but have already bought two suits; first was a Off the shelf Square 1 freefly suit. Felt like my fall rate was high with it so went out and bought a Bodysport polycotton w/ grippers, booties, etc. The real RW suits really help . plus booties help knee turns; once the tunnel instructor showed me that trick I have never stopped using them. Suits are fairly cheap compared to other gear, I dont see a problem with buying a new one once my flying style advances. In researching RW suits I found that with options they are all about the same price, I went with crater suit from bodysport based on reviews on DZ.com, worked OK so far. It came w/ swoop cords but you dont have to use em, just tuck the ends in your sleeves. Oh by the way I bought the protrack first so I could compare/record fall rates. You also figure out methods/techniques that work reducing fall rate after a while. Funny thing is that here in Socal at Perris just about everybody wears jumpsuits, however at San Diego nobody does.. they all jump regular clothes most times. I aint tryin that until Im sure I wont cause a sonic boom.....

Perris always seems busy to me, w/ all the international teams and stuff, even when I call in sick during the week to jump (dont feel like working that day) loads are always going. San Diego is nice on weekends also.... The general lack of appeal of Skydiving is its specialized training, gear, etc required. Much like general avaiation you dont just decide to become a pilot that weekend.....it takes lots of cash-o-la and time to get your ticket by wings or chute. Makes it kind of a special club but definitely keeps new recruits down. How many of your buddies take up Skydiving, get their Private Pilot rating or fly gliders ? Aviation in general costs too much. There are lots cheaper sports out there....I wish I liked surfing as much as I used to, but Skydivings too dam adictive. In regards to shabbiness Perris is way better than some of the CA GA airports.....like SDM, you wonder where those fed dollars go ?

Cold is when girls at Perris stop wearing Bikini tops. (outdoors)

Sounds like a super idea to me ! Most of the past commercial Skydiving Movies have such strange unrealisitic storylines as you say. Skydiving is somewhat paralell to Surfing....it has all the hot scenery, action and even women. But like surfing Hollywood never quite gets it right....however surfing has done real well with films like "Step into Liquid". Of course I still own Drop Zone, Cutaway, Terminal Velocity, etc DVDs. but also the real Skydiver movies like all Norman Kent & Joe Jennings stuff. Hopefully if the Dan BC movie gets done they will film at the real DZ Locations also ! I volunteer to be first extra hired at Perris, I"ll even work for jump tickets.

I vote for tunnel time as being very valuable for beginning skydivers. Staying centered in the tunnel and developing fall rate, turn skills resulted in way better "real" skydives for me. The intensity of doing 15 minutes(2 min runs) is a great learning tool providing you have a AFF instuctor in the tunnel as coach. You can do the same with more jumps but realistically as a student it is not 20-25 bucks a jump but AFF level prices at 200 per jump....makes tunnel look really attractive.

The canopy stuff during AFF jump is not that bad, you pull on toggles to go R&L and then listen to instructor over radio for a good flair. The landing was easiest part of AFF jump 1. Now for the first 4 exits..shit that was tough, all that stuff about arching is real important... I never did any tadems at all, did my first jump w/o ever being in a jump plane before....did watch all the skydiving movies like Drop Zone, Terminal Velocity, etc...in the end Skydiving was harder to learn that it seemed in the movies. 70 jumps later...Im watching the cooler movies like Parabatix ..... Also what really helps I beleive besides being tossed out of planes is spending allot of time watching good skydivers land...not swoop because you dont want to try that shit for awhile..Windtunnel stuff is cool also if you have one close..they are killer for gettin the moves down without stressin the big drop. I was about the same age when I started, could have kicked myself in the butt for not doing this 10 yrs ago !

You gotta keep jumpin, plus its a good way to keep the pounds off ! Skydiving has probably kept me from getting any bigger.....gotta get a smaller container. The whole skydiving scene can be intimidating at first, its mostly seems full of 20yr old, 150 Lb people. Then the longer you are around some of the larger drop zones you run across all sorts of people. The deciding factor for me was when I ran across several people quite larger than my 235 Lbs who had been jumping for years....sort of convinced during AFF to stick it out. Now I have about 70 jumps and having more fun than ever As a bigger dude you will need big chutes like a Nav 280 or so. Also a custom jumpsuit does wonders, get one with all the grips and stuff for extra drag. Check around also with the DZs, some seem friendlier towards the Anvil Brothers than others..I dont know much about TX since I jump mainly Socal. Good Luck, also you may want to do a search for "Anvil Brothers" on this site, I am not an official member but their posts have been very informative.

Was this in SD ? I remember seeing an identical incident yesterday. Quote

Got a easy solution for you: have it Lazer etched ! I have seen demos on these machines and they can etch a logo on anything, cell phones, knife blades etc. Some stuff like Scuba Gear I work on has SNs and other graphics etched on by Lazer. If you are around any manufacturing trade shows someone always has a demo machine there. (they cost about 20K so you cant really buy one) Finding one to do a batch probably wouldnt be hard, check the net. Etch per pin would take about 10 sec.