hackish

Sometimes used up student canopies and nearly EOL tandem canopies or drogues are taped here. Using tape on both sides I've never seen one that came off. I prefer a proper patch but sometimes it's hard to justify if you know the canopy will be retired in 2 months. -Michael

Last year I setup a program to improve safety and move to a more proactive maintenance schedule. Every packjob the packers do some level of inspection. Every jump the person doing the dressing does a level of inspection on the pax harness. Every 25 jumps a rigger does a more extensive inspection of the rig, pax harness and main. Here is what I found. The drogue kill lines really do need to be adjusted every 25-50 jumps. Doing this has significantly reduced the number of TM complaints about bad openings. Small things do continuously need work and our systems have on average 500-1000 jumps. Stitches do pop on the pax harnesses and they need sewing every 100-200 jumps. Most frequently it is webbing ends and where the webbing is sewed together on the shoulders. Hardware also needs some adjustments to ensure they are opening/closing smoothly. Another point is replacing the elastic keepers. We probably replaced 1 for every 10 tandems done. Less of a safety issue but if a $0.75 keeper is in bad shape it's a magnet for passenger's eyes. "I had a great jump but man the equipment was sketchy" is not the feedback you want. Although the manufacturer errs a bit on the side of caution their recommendations are not that far off. -Michael

We have put a 340 in a standard sigma bag before. I don't recall there being any issue. -Michael

I think it's an awesome idea the day the manufacturer of the tandem system says it's OK. Until then, no! From a rigging perspective there is always some chance that something sticking out from the student's helmet could snag. We never hear about these things when a jump goes well. What would happen if there is a bridle entanglement on that thing? Of course in a perfect world no TM has ever had an unstable drogue deployment and every jump goes perfect... Just sayin. -Michael

The red canopy was purchased at a 70% off sale!

Something to think about is not a design problem with a reserve, it's a design goal. You wouldn't put a F14 shaped wing on a cessna! For a reserve it's the same idea, design goals. Why did the micro-ravens stall when heavily overloaded? They were not designed to be used that way! Similarly, when PD says 200lbs is max, it means that that's the upper envelope of their design. If a bridge says maximum 10t, would you drive your 14t truck over it? Would it hold? Probably. Who would your next of kin blame? Will your optimum 143 work OK with 254lbs MSW? Probably. You decide on the rest or get a bigger reserve. -Michael

A small minority of scientists have been caught falsifying data but that's rare. For anyone who has ever tried to have a scientific paper published they can attest to how critical and picky academic peers (reviewers) can be. It's not at all easy to cover all the "what if's" and most studies are the product or months or years of work. It took an entire year for my wife to get her PhD studies published in a journal and I helped edit the revisions. Most people don't say "hey I want to do a bad job at work today". People generally try to do a good job and with a doctorate degree, academia doesn't pay that well! With a system as complex as the world don't expect everything figured out to milimeter precision but we are starting to see the effects of climate change. What I worry about is how far the train will roll even if we put all the brakes on right now. -Michael

I can get about 100'. Makes searching much easier but doesn't exactly give you a homing beacon anywhere in the world. With a special antenna I get about 400-500'. The biggest thing for me was a $20 price tag and a battery that will last all season. It only has to save 1 canopy to pay for the cost of putting them in 20 rigs. -Michael

Hey baby, I got my lap rating. Want to try it out? Ok, more seriously, are there even any lap parachutes out there? I've never even seen one before and I've looked at a number of the old stuff Vintage Wings flies from WWI and WWII -Michael

All good ideas for discussion. Like others I like to open up the reserve very carefully and see how it was packed. In my experience the only thing pulling their reserve does is disturb how the bridle and PC material was stowed. Although I've seen a few innovative ways to stow bridles I've always found what I consider to be "mistakes" further into the job. Just like every jumper should be popping the reserve, every rigger should be looking at how they or another rigger's packjob ended up. You can't improve unless your eyes and mind are open. -Michael

The reason I haven't yet is that I've got a design for the pocket made and I want approval from the manufacturers. I'm going to be taking the prototype to our symposium in a few weeks to solicit comments then. -Michael

One big thing I have noticed is canopies that have been packed their whole life from a messy rigger, even after a few neat pack cycles "looks" a lot worse than ones that have been packed their whole life by a neat packer. I have been considering making my own permability tester out of automotive parts since I already have a flow bench that can give calibrated airflows and I can control the speed to achieve a specific amount of pressure. I think it would simply require a 1 sq foot fixture. -Michael

I should have known this was going to stir a hornets next. I've said many times before that we can use AC105 on how to interpret the regs. If you got hauled into court and you explained that you interpreted the regs in a certain way consistent with AC105 which is also the FAA's position I think you are on solid ground. I don't necessarily agree with the amount of latitude it gives the Sr. Rigger in the liberal and AC105 interpretation but until the FAA clarifies it in a different way it's all we have. Back on the topic of adding a tracker to the rig, the OP should take into consideration the legal complexities of adding such a thing to a rig before asking for someone to help doing it. Hey, I want to add a rocket to my wingsuit. First you must determine if it's going to be allowed on the airplane, otherwise there is no point in trying to figure out the stitching for it. -Michael

Is a main deployment bag part of the TSO? -Michael

Define degree in engineering? Maybe you could get them to agree to a "diploma". In Canada the term "Engineer" is a protected title so it can't be thrown about but in the USA everyone is an engineer, even without a degree or membership. Some trade schools offer diplomas in engineering with as little as 1 year of courses. Another thing to think about is why do you need the blessing of the BPA? As long as you're not using their name you could be selling parachute shaped bedsheets. Finally, if they have decreed that no parachute in the UK may be jumped unless it was designed by an engineer then I think you could get that ruling cancelled pretty darn fast as soon as you compile an extensive list of commercially available canopies that were not. If they wanted to put you through the ringer make a rigger inspect it, otherwise this thing stinks. -EDIT- I think Lee typed out what I was thinking better. I've found some of the big guys to be very helpful in taking time to talk about ideas. Next trip you plan to America you should go to Deland and see if you can arrange a show and tell with PD. I think you'll find them to be very encouraging and helpful toward your project. -Michael

An open discussion here would probably be most helpful. Don't worry, your idea probably isn't anything new and nobody is going to steal it and get rich. We're planning to install bluetooth trackers in all of our rigs this spring so it's going to be one of many. Also, there is a thread about putting a GPS dog tracker in a rig as well. Depending on the size and weight of your idea the deployment bag is probably the best place for it. -Michael

Must be different in different areas. Since we're flying turbines now they all have GPS onboard but the older 182s we used to lease were all mechanical and it wasn't that uncommon for ATC to give vectors especially when commercial traffic on approach to the international airport 5mi to our south was being routed around weather. It's class C to 125. I still think it's a bad idea to have a helmet full of strong magnets for no good reason. At minimum it's worth making the pilot aware. -Michael

I think it's really the wrong tool for the job. The 5d series is more suited toward action type photography whereas the 1D series is more for studio work. I don't think I'd put my 5DS on my helmet because of the sheer weight. Last year I shot with a 70D and even that is porky compared to the rebel series. In my opinion the major gain you have is just in the low-light performance. The 70D was much better than the rebel and the 5D is much better than the 70D. -Michael

That could be possible. The spring was broken among many other things when I got the machine so I just installed a new one and played with it a bit to make sure it didn't skip any stitches. I feel like whomever the previous owners were got rid of the machine because it was worn out and acting up on them. I'll see what the mechanic says/does but I don't have a lot of confidence because I don't know that he's even worked on a tacker before. -Michael

Thanks. Good ideas. I did have the bobbin flipped and this seemed to improve the tension slightly. I only use brand name Brother parts because of bad experience with chinese clones. Since all the rest of the machine seemed to be worn out and beat up maybe the bobbin tension plate should be replaced. It feels consistent when I pull it out but the tension inconsistencies do seem to change when I move sewing speed up. Do you think I should buy a tension gauge to set it up exactly to the factory specs? -Michael

I bought a Brother 430D. Decided on this over the Juki only because it's the machine PD uses. Every time I've bought a used machine it needed major repairs first. Wish I had bought new. Anyway, after replacing all the cutter and nipper components as well as repairing the burned out stepper motor driver on the controller board and removing a golf ball size pile of lint it's mechanically and electrically sound. I'm having some issues with stitching. PD was kind enough to provide me with their center start tack pattern so I know it's not the file. Top Side Bottom Side I loaded red in the bottom and sewed 2 layers of ty4 just to illustrate the problem. Tension seems inconsistent and I've even tried slowing to 1800 stitches per minute. I have replaced the thread takeup spring as well since it was broken. Any ideas on what I should be doing here other than paying the local sewing machine mechanic to learn how to set it up? -Michael

Is a working compass in the POH as required? How do you normally set the directional indicator? I think the point here is that giant magnets in a camera on your head are probably something to bring up with the pilot. -Michael

I'll give you my experience since I did both of the courses. The CSPA one had a lot more material, history and theory. I found it focused more heavily on the theory and technical end. The FAA course (The one mentioned above) focused more heavily on the practical. I feel that the idea of getting a riggers ticket because one is concerned about the costs of paying a rigger is quite wrong. $1500 for a course, hundreds of dollars in rigging equipment and hundreds of hours to actually learn and get good at the craft is a big investment to save $150 each year. -Michael

I just packed a 176 optimum in a 348 with a 170 sabre 2. It was definitely a firm fitting main. I think the owner will have problems as he has only 30 jumps. I'm expecting he will go to a 150 by the end of the season so it will be comfortable then. I knew at the outset that it was going to be tight so I made sure the reserve was short and square at the bottom. Forget about a 190. It's a bad idea. -Michael

I think I was not descriptive enough. What I was trying to express is that doing all 20 of your supervised packs using a round is not a good idea. It was common a while ago for people to just do a chest rating to get their ticket just to have it. -Michael