faulknerwn

I zero mine once a day, and then turn it on every jump around ~10k. I don't need it on on the ride to altitude. W

I had my rigger sew a flap on the tail with somewhere to place rubber bands when I bought a Lightning without a tail pocket a few years back. It literally took him less than 10 minutes to do and I've got hundreds of jumps on it now. Check local before you send it to PD. W

18,000 for CRW - long ride down! W

I never charge. Too many people helped me out when I was poor, broke and right off student status that I would never dream of not doing the same thing. My only request to the newbies is to do the same for others when they get experienced enough. W

I definitely prefer Racers. The big difference is that they're long and skinny rather than short and squat. Most of the other rigs don't bend in the middle like Racers, and with my short torso, that means they just dig into my back and I find them quite uncomfortable. W

Sequential is what the majority of people use. Its the flattest trim. Rotation is the steepest trim, and demo's somewhere inbetween. Unless you're jumping team or have some other reason to buy something other than the standard, go sequential. I also thought that this was standard with CRW canopies, but I guess not, I'll definitely have to tell them that. Its sposed to be - but from what we've seen lately they're not so good about it. One friend had his canopy relined and it came back with red end cell lines but not red center cell lines? Strange..... W

I don't have any pictures of my risers, but the 2-1 setup is just like Bob described. W

Yep. PD doesn't seem to do this very well by default. [reply[ You'll also want self-opening toggles so you're not fumbling when reaching for a toggle. Aerotech Products (http://www.aerotechproducts.com/) has both CRW risers and toggles available. I've had various ones over the years. My favorites were made at the Square 1 rigging loft - they have cutaway cable through the toggle so they're in an "always-open" mode. Quote Similarly, some of us have short arms so we get shorter risers in order to be able to grip up near the links or grab individual lines if need by. My risers are 19". /reply] I use 17" ones on my CRW rig. It even allows me to grab individual lines as need be. W

What in particular?

PD makes different line trims for their canopies - is that what you mean? If that's the case I would suggest sequential trim. I'd also get the line lengths in matching with what the guys organizing the current world record suggest - your canopy will match more of the others on the market. Their specs are available at: http://www.cfworldrecord.com/ As far as risers go - different people prefer different types of toggles. Some people like 2-1's, some don't. I like to get blocks put on my rear risers as well as my front (tho I also have 2-1's on my fronts) for easy gripping. Many people prefer the wide risers for gripping - I always get mini-risers because I have small hands and can't grip the wide risers.

Since we use tail-pockets to stow lines and not deployment lines, its a circular piece of fabric with a large grommet on the middle, that slides down the lines after opening and covers the pilot chute. Basically it keeps the pilot chute from being inflated on your topskin. Made a noticable difference in landings for me. I was surprised. W

Actually at Quincy we always landed off. We were supposed to land at the racetrack 5 miles away (and usually we did) and we just hitchhiked back. Met all sorts of great locals - rode back in everything from dump trucks to 18-wheelers to cars. The whole group of us nearly died one time when a guy driving the pickup truck we were in pulled out in front of a dump truck as he turned into the airport. Missed us by 10 feet or less - no shit... Scared the heck out of all of us.

I've landed 18+ miles off on a couple of CRW jumps. Nice practice demos! I remember when they did the CRW record in California in '94, one guy got a ride back to the airport with someone who didn't speak much English. They took him to the closest airport - and it was the wrong one! My favorite though was during the DQ record attempts at Skydive Dallas in '97. About 10,000 feet the airplane pilot looks back and hollers at us, "Does anyone know where we are?" One of the locals looks out the door and hollers back, "That's the Red River - we're in Oklahoma - head south!" Luckily we just needed to find the CRW formation to land miles off - but we did manage to stay in the state of Texas :-)

Don't forget to make it symmetric so that your end cells and center cells stand out for CRW :-) W

It can quite effect a canopy though - you'd be surprised. I voted to not chop it but I'll tell my story :-) I had swapped a Triathalon 99 I had several hundred jumps on into a new rig and the deployment bag had a bigger grommet on it I believe (I'm a tad fuzzy on the details). The first jump I noticed that the bag had slid all the way down to the pilot chute - so even though the pilot chute was collapsed - the bag caused some drag down there. I landed and the canopy stalled at my ears and I crashed backwards. I didn't put 2 and 2 together at that point, scratched my head a bit and jumped it a second time. Second jump the same thing happened. It was at this point I finally got my brain in gear and fixed the problem. I was _quite_ surprised at how that much extra drag affected the stall point. I've noticed recently that my landings on my CRW canopy (a Lightning 113) have improved enormously since I put a pilot chute killer on it. If my Cobalt 75 had a non-collapsed pc - I'd almost certainly land it, but I'd hope for wind and be extremely gentle on the controls.

One of my favorite jumps ever was the last jump I did with a buddy before the army shipped him out of Texas. We did a sunset cross-country, a nice 3-stack, gorgeous clouds and sunset, had a nice refreshing - soda - and then turned it into a dragplane right on top of the dz at the end. It was awesome. W

I had 48 jumps when I got off student status... I put my student logbook online because it was so funny. Its at: http://crw.boxofclue.com/skydive/howcrw.html

Interesting. I did the chamber when I was in Brazil a few years ago. Being of smaller build, and the fact that it was a military chamber, we had trouble finding masks which fit me. It took a long time to fit me at the beginning, and after I had removed the mask and put it back on in the chamber - it wasn't quite sealed right. I stayed somewhat dizzy unless I held it on tightly to my face - by holding it on I was ok, but I still felt pretty weird for a good portion of the day. I wonder if my reaction had to do with not having a good seal on the mask? Interestingly enough - the Brazilian military was going to make us wear oxygen to go to 15k. And not only that - but we would have to pre-breathe oxygen for some amount of time, and the oxygen setup we had to wear was pretty much a full pilot-style hard helmet - with a mask that covered your whole nose and mouth (well in my case my entire face!) We weren't particularly upset when the C130 blew an engine and we had to do only 13k jumps out of a different plane. W

Try also just bumping a toggle - i.e. don't hold it long enough for you to notice the canopy to start to turn, just pull it quickly and immediately return it to prior location. Works like a champ. w

Absolutely track away. I had one cutaway a couple of years ago where I knew there was at least 4 of us who were going to be cutting away - I chopped first I think and tracked like a banchee. A couple of thousand feet later I opened my reserve after a really good wave off and look over my shoulder :-) W

A wrap is where one person's parachute is wrapped around another person's body. The top person usually has a good parachute, which is why its best for the bottom person to cutaway first because the top person quite probably has a landable main. An entanglement might be the result of a head-on collision for example. One person has passed through the other person's lines. Normally neither person has a good parachute in this situation. There are several probable results of this: 1. 1 person is orbiting and 1 person is hanging straight down. The orbiter would here cutaway first because he would get flung free. 2. If both are kinda straight down, the top person cuts away first. Since he's probably the one who passed through the other person's lines, there's a chance his parachute will go back out the way it came and save the other person a cutaway. Also - if the bottom person cuts away first here - his lines and risers are going up and wrapping around the other person. This leaves the other person without a good canopy, and entangled in lines and risers. His future is looking pretty ugly. That's why there's a difference in who cuts away first - it all depends on whether someone has passed through the lines of the other canopy - because that's usually a deciding factor on whether the top person has a good canopy or not. W

If they're actually entangled (not wrapped - big difference) then if the bottom guy cuts away first then he's probably going to assure the other guy's fatality. By cutting away - the other guy is now left without a good main, and your lines and canopy wrapped around him. If you let him chop first, then you both have a much better chance of survival. I'd rather see 0 fatalities than 1.

I think a lot of non-CRWdogs aren't understanding the distinction between a wrap and an entanglement. Normally in a wrap, the top person will still have a good canopy, while the bottom guy's canopy is wrapped around the top guy. This is where the bottom guy cuts away first. An entanglement is where one person has passed through the other person's lines - its a completely different situation as Genn explained above.

Sounds like you're talking about a wrap here - not an entanglement. If its a wrap, the bottom person would cut away first. In an entanglement, one person has passed through the other person's lines. Neither person generally has a landable canopy unlike a wrap, and if the bottom person cuts away first, he's likely to leave the top person without a landable main above him and be wrapped in the bottom guys lines.. If the top guy cuts away first, he may bounce lightly off the bottom guy but he can fall free and its safer for both involved.

In the past Bill Runyon and I have organized CRW at the WFFC, but neither one of us can make it this year. I haven't been contacted by the Convention at all either, so I'm not sure if they have someone else lined up or what's going on. Bill and I can't do it this year however. W