
faulknerwn
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Everything posted by faulknerwn
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I've never jumped the French canopy but I've jumped the Triathalon and the Lightning. The Triathalon is doing a good job at the world meets in rotation competition. I believe the American team is still jumping Lightnings. Triathalons seem trimmed a bit steeper than even rotation Lightnings. I believe many of the competion rots teams are jumping Tri 99's, while the smallest commercially available Lightning is the 113. They don't seem to fly that differently in my book - the trim angle is different and the pilot chute retract is slightly different on the two. But most rots teams change their retract system around to how they like it anyway. If you want to do anything other than competion rots, Lightnings are more common. The Russians are jumping Tri's for competition and they're rocking. W
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Well...Capwells cutaway canopies years ago. Why should anyone have changed their release mechanism to the three-ring release? They both released your main. You wouldn't jump a rig with Capewell's now would you (all people in general)? So why, if we have the technological advancement to do it, would you choose to not install a proven safety device? Well I had a reserve ride on a belly mount round about a year ago so I'm probably not gonna give you the answer you expect on that one :-) But I would have no problem putting a Cypres on 2 of my 4 rigs. But on the other 2 they would increase the danger - the "safety device" would cause me more problems. The 2 rigs I'd put it in are regular rigs. No problem there. The next rig is my rig which is used exclusively for CRW, I won't have an AAD in a CRW rig. Assuming I'm not unconscious on exit, a Cypres working within its design paramaters will never save me. CRWdogs don't normally die because of too little out - we die because of too much out. And a Cypres is designed not to fire in a partial mal. And after Brad's accident, we're all more aware of jumping up on exit. A misfire on a CRW rig (and we use radios in CRW formations and do low downplanes and such) will almost certainly kill me because my reserve will likely be entangled with someone else's main as well as my own. It was only a few weeks ago that a radio triggered a Cypres fire. I can' t risk that in CRW. So that's my third rig. My 4th rig is a tiny little power racer. If I put a Cypres in there, there'd be no way to push the pop top down nearly as far. I do a lot of CRW - the last thing I want is snag points. Even if not doing CRW, it can snag on the door of the Cessna or other places. I think the odds of me having a problem from a poorly seated poptop are far greater than the odds of me needing a Cypres. You can claim that I should sell the rig and that's fine. But I'm a little person and its my favorite rig. I don't see the fact that I can't fit a Cypres in there as a reason to get rid of it. Sandy Wamback thought the same thing and paid the ultimate price. I might too. I just don't think that with the type and style of jumping I do its a problem. I'm much more likely to do CRW with that rig than a 300way. So for 2 of my 4 rigs a Cypres is a safety device. For my other 2 it isn't.
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But I also recognize that we are fallible human beings and that by adding a Cypres to my rig I have added a level of safety that was not there before. A Cypres can't land me. It can't make me flare. But just because it doesn't do EVERYTHING is no excuse to not have one. Don't get me wrong - I don't have a problem with people jumping a Cypres, I'll probably get one in at least one of my 4 rigs before the year is out. But what worries me is that even on the most basic, generic, trivial skydives, people act like not jumping with a Cypres is akin to trying to kill yourself. I know numerous highly experienced jumpers who jumped without them for years and now own them. I have no problem with that. I just worry about the new generation of jumpers who seem to think that jumping without one is as crazy as jumping without a reserve. 99.9999% of skydivers will eventually need to use their reserve. 99.9999% of skydivers will never have a Cypres fire when they're unconscious. All the ones I've witnessed were from low pulls and they all resulted in double deployments. If you read some of the save reports on Airtec's web site - you'll understand why people worry. Numerous people waited for the Cypres, or pulled on something it didn't work so they gave up. One guy died because he exited below Cypres activation altitude and didn't handle the situation right. This kid told his friends that if the Cypres didn't exist he wouldn't be jumping because he didn't think he could handle it. Its that kind of attitude which scares me. The point I try to make to newbies is that if you think you might get knocked out on a skydive, change the frigging skydive. Make it a smaller group, more experienced people and less newbies or whatever. But if you go up on a skydive thinking "it'll be ok, I've got a Cypres" I'll worry like crazy about you. If you plan smart on the ground, the odds of ever needing the thing goes way down. But not enough people do that.
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I won't jump without one *as long as it lowers my probable risk*. Which for me has been 100% of the time, so far. Although I haven't done CRW, my (minimal) understanding leads me to think that having a Cypres active on a CRW jump would have more potential risk than reward. If I were to do CRW, I'd turn it off. You bring up a perfectly valid example of when it isn't suitable. Ok - question for you. You're doing a solo hop and pop. You try really hard and make damn sure you don't hit your head on exit. The only way a Cypres will help you is if a. you have a sudden heart attack in the 2 seconds out the door rendering you unable to pull b. you don't follow emergency procedures correctly. I know people who are 20 years old (pretty dang unlikely to have that suddent incapacitating medical problem) who won't do a hop and pop without one. I can't fathom how a Cypres is lowering their risk (assuming they are careful leaving the airplane) other than saving them if they can't do their emergency procedures. And if I were them, instead of relying on the Cypres to help them with emergency procedures, I'd put myself in a hanging harness and practice those procedures for hours on end until I have confidence. If you can think of some way having a Cypres lowers your risk on a jump like that other than helping you if you brain-lock, please let me know.
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Quote"if you wouldn't make a particular jump without a Cypres, you probably shouldn't be doing it with one." What a crock of macho SH*T ... I wouldn't do a jump without my cypres as a rule but it doesn't make me a bad or unsafe jumper .... Why? If its a freefly jump where you think you're liable to get clobbered, maybe that person should be doing a solo if they don't have the control. If its an 8-way and you think someone might swoop into you, maybe they shouldn't be in that 8 way. I understand a lot of people view it as a backup. But I see a lot of people who do jumps with zoomies and people are out of control because they have a Cypres "just in case." It would be better to make that skydive a 2-way instead of an 8-way where you can watch them and stay out of their way. tThe better plan would be doing a solo or a 2-way freefly jump for example instead of that 4-way if your skill levels aren't there. The part that worries me about some people and Cypreses is that they don't take the steps to ensure their safety in the planning of the dives. That's the most important step to safety. I'm one of the more conservative jumpers when it comes to safety in a lot of ways. But I don't jump with a Cypres (though I have no problem doing freefall with one in the appropriate rig.) I've lost 30+ friends at least now in this sport. Of those people, I can think of 1 whom a Cypres might have helped, and most likely it wouldn't have helped him either other than delivering a better looking corpse. Too many people use a Cypres as a rationale for doing unsafe skydives. Not everyone certainly. But some. Especiallly the ones in the 100-500 jump range it seems who are confident in the sport yet haven't had friends die yet. Those are the ones that I worry about most.
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Really the main people I worry about are those who won't make even one jump without a Cypres. Whether its a solo hop and pop or whatever. If on this jump you concetrate hard on not hitting the airplane on exit, its a solo hop and pop, etc - people are still too scared to do it. That worries me and makes me really wonder if they actually trust themselves to do their emergency procedures properly. I own 4 rigs. I'm a CRWdog. I've had 12 reserve rides. One rig is exclusively for CRW - I'll never ever ever put a Cypres in there (a misfire would kill me - and yes, Brad was a friend of mine. And I'd bet money that if he were still alive, he'd just be more cautious about how he exited and he still wouldn't put a Cypres in his CRW rig.) I've got one Power Racer which if I put a Cypres in it would make the pop-top stick out too much and it would be dangerous for me during CRW or at other times. That leaves me with 2 rigs I could put a Cypres in. Quite likely I will put a Cypres in one of them within the next year. I don't jump either one of them much however so I'm not particularly concerned. A Cypres is similar to a life-insurance policy - but its a matter of degree. I mean, most people wouldn't pay a $1000 a year for a policy against a lightning strike, or maybe one for being run over by a dump truck. I just think its extremely unlikely that I'm ever going to need one. I very well may die skydiving, but I'd make a bet of a large amount of money it'll be from a CRW wrap or a bad landing or a main/reserve entanglement or something else. I've got 3000 jumps and have never even been slightly dizzy or really hit even vaguely hard in freefall. I used to have a Cypres. I sold it back when I got heavily into CRW. What I found out about myself is that afterward I was backing out of loads I previously would have gone on. I was more concerned about safety and zoomies. I'm much more conservative now than I was when I had a Cypres. And I truly was not aware of that fact when I had one. I had no idea I was doing skydives that I wouldn't have done without a Cypres. And it seems to me that if you wouldn't do the skydive without a Cypres, perhaps you should rethink doing the skydive with one. You can be killed by a hard hit in freefall with or without a Cypres. People tend to forget that. Be more conservative and if you wouldn't make a particular jump without a Cypres, you probably shouldn't be doing it with one. W
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Right. You must surf the Lightning - you can't do a traditional full flare on it or you'll bite the dust every time... Its easier to recognize the "surf point" the more speed you come in withj. W
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Right. I always tell people to do a straight-in approach with front risers for extra speed. Its almost impossible to get a decent landing out of the suckers without the front risers. I just come in hard on front risers, about 5 feet above where I'd normally flare I release the risers and then I plane it out. Don't go too deep into the flare because it will stall higher than Spectres. FWIW, I find it easier to land the canopy with links in the rear risers than without them. W
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You guys gotta do more CRW!!! Let's see - I believe it was Quincy '98 where we landed 18 miles off (most people landed at a _different_ airport) after the Casa p[lot gave us a downwind jumprun and we were building a big-way so the pilot held a heading. In small CRW my farthest is probably 7-8 miles off. In an aircraft emergency I landed 10 miles off. DQ '97 had so many bad spots - I remember one jump the formation wasn't building and all I did from 14,000 feet was try to find the airport. I spotted it in the distance when I was about at 1500 feet. I know we landed 15-20 miles away on some of those skydives as well. Flying downwind you can go far :-) I prefer to view CRW as touring the countryside and being an ambassador to the neighbors :-) W
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Come on down to Salado. We're real friendly, just jumping Cessna's but we know how to have fun. Wen
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Its an informal requirement at my drop zone that everyone do CRW with me. I typically get them when they have 20ish jumps and their own gear and take them up. They learn a lot even on their first jump. They get briefed on emergencies, they learn what flying a biplane is about, they do a downplane, the whole works over a jump or two. I know that back before I did CRW, I had read the 2-canopies-out paper and thought I knew what to do if I had a Cypres fire or something. Once I started doing CRW I can look back at how clueless I was. Having done CRW has helped out at least 2 people at my dropzone - one was at a big boogie and had a canopy collision at 800 feet - she remembered the training and knew what to do. Another had a pc-in-tow or something and deployed her reserve and then the main inflated. She flew both canopies down to a safe landing - having done CRW before is a BIG help in those situations - you can't help but have a somewhat better grasp of the situation. W
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I've never tried it on freefall canopies or ellipticals, but CRW jumpers regularly have different length lines on their canopies. I've got 2 Lightning 113's - one with 8 1/2 foot lines and one with 9 foot lines. I like how the one with the longer lines flies better - it seems to pendulum out a bit more in the flare and lands softer. The rotation guys who jump _really_ short lines definitely have to work harder to get good landings. The shorter lined canopy also seems a bit more "twitchy" I guess - it seems to react a touch faster to toggle input. W
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Retractible pilot chutes are hard to retrofit. The biggest thing I'd like to see is dacron lines. Much easier on you in wraps than microlines. Non-cascaded red center A lines make life easy as well. For bigger CRW, CRW-specific canopy is a must. For small CRW at your local dz, canopies like a Spectre and a Triathalon fly really well with Lightnings and work well for smaller CRW. W
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Back when I had between 200-1000 jumps or so, I had a Cypres in my only rig at the time. I ended up selling it when I started doing almost exclusively CRW. What did catch me by surprise however is that after I sold my Cypres, I became much more wary of what jumps I did - I found myself turning down jumps - "I don't have a Cypres." Which worried me because what it made me realize was that I might have been doing jumps which may have been "questionable" with the rationalization (that I didn't even know I was doing) that I had a Cypres. These days I own 4 rigs. One is exclusively for CRW and I'll never have a turned on AAD in it. Most CRW jumpers don't want to use an AAD because a misfire will almost certainly kill you. (Much less chance of that in freefall). And Brad's accident is pretty much the only conceivable way it will help you (a Cypres is designed NOT to fire if you have any canopy out - CRWdogs usually die because they have too much shit out/around em, not too little.) I'll probably put a Cypres in one of my 3 rigs before the summer is out. But probably only 1. 1 rig I rarely jump - it hardly seems worth the expense for maybe 5-10 jumps a year on it. Another rig is like Sandy Wambachs - a Power Racer - you can conceivably squeeze a Cypres in there if you're a great rigger, but it wouldn't go easily. The rig is just too small. And I do enough CRW, I don't want to do anything which would make my pop-top stick out and possibly cause a wrap - I see a wrap on that rig as a higher possibility than being unconscious. Yes its a wager - but I'm wagering I'm less likely to need the Cypres than a tightly packed reserve in that rig. So I expect I'll have a Cypres in 1 of my 4 rigs before the year is out, but I don't plan on making a decision about which rig to jump because of whether or not there is a Cypres in it.
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I'm not sure if this is what happened by any means, but I'm going to take a guess. Many CRW canopies have a retract system which retracts the pilot chute to the center of the canopy so it doesn't trail behind to get tangled. The way most work is that there are 3 rings (sometimes 4), one on the center cell and one on both the next cells over. If the retrack system wasn't checked to make sure it was clear when packing, i.e the line ran cleanly between the 3 rings, sometimes they'll end up knotted. In this case, there isn't enough length of bridle to allow the center cells to fully inflate, as the bridle is keeping them from widening completely out. Lesson: Always check your retract system when packing. W
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If you're using a deployment bag, and you're not doing hard-core competition style exits, I'd bury the nose to the tail and save your back :-) On competition exits, its generally packed like a reserve with the nose exposed and such. But since you're using a bag, I expect you're not doing that. I normally just bury the nose to the tail and roll the tail just enough to keep it in place.
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I assume you're not planning on taking it to terminal eh? Do you have a tailpocket or a bag? I normally will never roll the nose because it will make it open off-heading. When I want a slower opening I will bury the nose straight to the tail but often I don't do that.
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I waited a month after mine. I deliberately did it in January where I expected a lot more bad weather than normal. I definitely wouldn't have done it 4 days later, because your flaps are still healing. W
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My philosophy was always if I can land my main without breaking a bone, I'm not going to chop it. Whether you can land a 2.0 loaded canopy like that however is an individual decision. You should practice up high and figure it out. Loading a more lightly loaded canopy on rear risers is pretty simple. I certainly would recommend it to people over cutting away. I've seen it done quite a few times over the years without issues for the most part. Only 6 months ago I watched a friend have a total (pc stuffed down in the pouch.) He opened, broke a bunch of lines on the reserve, and the reserve started streamering. Luckily he had had a total, as now with his reserve malfunctioning, he dug hard and got the main out which is the reason he walked away. Do I trust my reserve? Yes. I have 12 reserve rides (I do a lot of CRW). But I'm not going to cut away a "mostly good" main. I've landed with broken d lines and a weird knot or too here and there from CRW wraps. Never had a problem. There's just been enough people over the years who've had reserves blow up and stuff, that I'm not about to cutaway a main which I can land without breaking anything (although I may get dirty from a PLF or a slide) to go to something which may not open. I chop when my main isn't in a survivable configuration. W
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Its not so much that we don't like to use the riser flaps, its that nothing fits in them. :-) Typically CRWdogs have a lot more stuff on their risers than freefallers. We'll have large toggles for easy access, we'll have blocks on the risers for easy steering, many of us have 2-1 assists on front risers for holding trim. All of that stuff typically doesn't fit well in a normal rig. Typically if you special-order a rig for CRW you want: 1. Comfortable leg pads - we're in the saddle for a long time 2. Large riser covers - to try and do some amount of containment for stuff 3. Many people like to have a weight pouch in the rig for weights. 4. A well-protected reserve system which minimizes snag-potential during wraps and such. 5. Smaller reserve handles or pillows for less snag potential in wraps. 6. Special risers with all sorts of junk on them. 7. Snaps with lots of places to stow hook knives.
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Hmmm. On my Lightning 113, absolutely land it. On my Diablo 88, absolutely land it. On a no-wind day, I'd _probably_ decide to land my Tri 99 - the reason being is that its rear riser stall-point is much higher than any of my other 3 canopies and I'm more likely to accidently stall it. My Cobalt 85? In 10+mph winds absolutely land it. In lower winds, I'd probably still land it. It flies really well on rear risers. I weigh between 145-150 with gear.
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Sure. I'll answer questions. Probably better to ask this stuff in the CRW forum though. (Or email me.) But yeah, I use warping all of the time. Its basically a matter of really hauling down on one front riser and pulling the opposite toggle down to your shoulder or so. I use it regularly to dog the canopy out. I mainly use it a. When being base for someone having trouble docking on me. I warp my canopy and it makes me a sitting duck and an easier target. b. When I'm docking a wing on a big-way and its a really doggy formation - I'll fly up and docked in a warped configuration because in front risers I have too much forward speed, and in brakes/full-flight I have too much up. Welcome back to CRW!
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Typically most people start at one of the outer ones, route it through the other outer ring, and end in the middle to keep it symmetrical. (I do this.) I know people who swear that you should always start it in the middle so it pulls on the center cell during opening, and I know others who start in the center and end in the center (but you have to be careful with bridle length here - they're trying to make their pc retract through the center ring, but if the bridle isn't long enough, it'll keep the canopy from inflating fully. W
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Not a problem!
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On pretty much every CRW dive I do, I use all of my control inputs. Front risers give you speed and dive you down - very useful for rotations or when you're trying to lose altitude. I dock on rear risers if the formation is fast and floaty, front risers if its fast, toggles if its slow and floaty. I'll use toggles for sashays, I'll do rear-risers stalls to lose altitude, and I'll often fly with one front riser and one brake to "warp" my canopy which basically dogs it out and makes it easier to dock on. All your inputs do very different things, and its good to learn how to use them all.