billbooth

Bill Booth - throw out John Sherman - pull out Now you know why the inventor of the throw out doesn't like the pull out How come the pull out gives you an out of sequence deployment? This question is a trap. Don't answer it! ETA: To the OP, ask your dad My patent covers both throw out and pull out deployment systems. I tried both, and came to the conclusion that throw out was the better system. The market seems to agree with me, and the vast majority of people now use throw out. Don't get me wrong, some people go through 1,000's of jumps on pull out systems with no problems, but it takes a special technique and understanding about exactly what you are doing to make a pullout system work correctly. Hand deploys are simply easier for most people.

Shannon; While you're here, don't forget to stop in at United Parachute Technologies, PD, or any of the other 30 or so skydiving businesses in DeLand, and see how your gear is made. I'm sure any of these fine companies will make you feel welcome. Bill Booth

This jump was not a "one-off" It was one of the first steps toward the "World View" Project, which will allow almost anyone to take a balloon ride up to 100 grand, and return to earth under a ram air canopy. The same companies which made Alan's jump possible are collaborating to make this a reality in the next few years. Go to Paragonsdc.com for the full story.

To give a really head high droguefall position, the main was in the upper container, released using a standard Sigma Disc. The drogue was not trailing because it was in a free bag. A device to make the drogue bridle rigid was designed so that Alan couldn't get wrapped up in it before the drought inflated, which took several seconds. The whole system was designed to eliminate the potentially deadly flat spin that has plagued everyone else who has tried a really high altitude jump before. It worked beautifully as Alan reported maintaining control at all times. The main purpose of this endeavor was science, and a lot was learned that will benefit future high altitude exploration. Alan should be congratulated on the tremendous gift of knowledge he has given all of us. After all, he is Vice President of Knowledge at Google.

Good ones. I didn't eat the instrument panel, but the next day I was sore everywhere the seat belt touched my body. Without seat belts, I probably would not have made it. I encourage every jumper to use them on every jump. Just be sure they are tucked out of the way before you jump, especially when exiting small aircraft.

Retractable seat belts for aircraft? Hell, most light aircraft also don't have windshield wipers or headrests or airbags or even "modern" engines. If the FAA were in charge of automobiles, they probable wouldn't have any of these safety devices either. FAA regulations (and lawyers) make everything related to aviation so expensive that I'm surprised we're still flying light aircraft. Although most of the people I know in the FAA are decent and hard working, the system is so complex, that they have to move mountains to get anything done. Remember, it took them over 20 years just to "legalize" tandem. One thing to remember, all safety devices, even seat belts, can kill people in certain circumstances. As long as they save more people than they kill they are still a good thing.

The best thing about this record, in my opinion, is that Alan is one of the nicest, most unassuming people I've ever met. He was truly more interested in the science (and the adventure) than any fame this fantastic achievement might bring him. He is truly one of us, and someone all of us should be proud of.

Here's a post of mine from 2003, when this issue first came up. It is just as true today: "Again, if pillows are so bad, why are they used as cutaway handles on 99% of the rigs out there?" Although I designed the "soft pillow" handle for the 3-ring release in the first place, I won't get into the discussion (too much) about whether it makes a good reserve handle for freeflyers. Most decisions in skydiving are tradeoffs, and this is certainly one of them. However, I do think a pillow makes a better cutaway handle than a reserve handle, simply because, where the pillow is in a cutaway situation, is much different from where it is in a reserve pull situation. Think about it. In almost all situations where a cutaway is needed, you're hanging from your main risers, and your main lift web, where your cutaway pillow sits, is pulled up and away from your body, so your cutaway pillow is literally right in front of your nose. Now think of where your reserve handle is in a total malfunction. It's down below your armpit, tucked tightly against your body, maybe even UNDER the webbing, and more than a little bit hard to see, especially if you're wearing a full face helmet. Now think how much a reserve pillow handle feels like your harness, or a fold in your jumpsuit, especially if you're wearing gloves. Now picture yourself low, out of time, and in desperate need of a reserve handle that you can't see or feel. Aren't you glad you bought that Cypres?

I wish I could remember what I was reacting to. It must have been outrageous...Probably something regarding the female anatomy. Ahh, the good old days. I sometimes wonder if the young jumpers nowadays are having as much fun as we did.

It's a mater of airspeed and the direction of the relative wind. Pin and loop systems simply release too easily with very small pilot chute loads. As I said, the Skyhook lever solves this problem.

It's distressing that I have to write this, but historical accuracy demands it. I have been skydiving for 35 years, and I am as big a fan of Bill Booth as anybody, and in no way do I mean to denigrate him or his contributions to our sport. But he did not invent the skyhook. He may have redesigned it for skydiving rigs, but the first MARD system was invented by Mark Hewitt, on a base rig called the Sorcerer, and Bill knows this. Credit is deserved where credit is due. The inventive idea in the Skyhook is not simply the idea of hooking the cutaway main to the reserve bridle. It is how to do this in such a way that the connection releases and gets out of the way when it is not needed, but stays connected when it is. A little history. If you will look at the beginning of our "Skyhook Promotional Video" (#2 on UPT's website) you will see video evidence that I started working on MARDs in the early 1980's. The reason the skyhook didn't come out until 2003 was that it took me all those years to work out all the problems that need to be solved before such a device would be safe enough for sport jumping. During the 80's and 90's I designed and jumped several primitive MARD's, but none of them worked well enough to satisfy me. The Sorcerer system came out during this time period, but required a hand deployed reserve pilot chute, had no automatic release system, and wouldn't work with spring loaded, ripcord activated reserve systems. As has been noted elsewhere on DZ.com, I included mention of the Sorcerer in my patent application. Some of my first devices involved pins and loops similar to the Sorcerer, but these systems weren't reliable during rapidly spinning malfunctions. You see, the MARD connection pulls on the reserve bridle near the midpoint, which means that it is pulling on both the bag and the pilot chute. If there is a lot of horizontal speed involved (spinning malfunction), then the pilot chute often generates enough force to prematurely release a simple pin/loop system, which will release as soon a the pilot chute loads at all. I needed to work out a system where it took a lot more force from the pilot chute to release the MARD connection in a partial malfunction than in a total malfunction. This is where the Skyhook lever/cam design came in. It is designed to require 5 times more force from the pilot chute than the weight of the packed freebag (25 - 60 lbs.) if you have a partial malfunction, yet release with a force of between 4 and 8 lbs. if you have a total malfunction. And it has to figure this out instantly, with no input from the jumper. The lever idea worked well, but there was one more serious problem to address. Simply - What happens if the RSL side riser releases BEFORE the non-RSL side riser. This is a bad situation even with a "normal" RSL, and has resulted in several deaths due to main/reserve entanglement. But with a MARD, the situation practically GUARANTEES a fatality. I was stumped, so I put the Skyhook on a back burner for nearly 10 years. Then one day I was discussing the problem with a young engineer I had hired straight from Georgia Tech. After thinking about it for a moment he said," Why don't you simply connect the RSL riser to the cutaway cable leading to the other riser? I was stunned. There was the answer I had been looking for dropped right in my lap. The young man's name was Kyle Collins, and that's how the Collins' Lanyard, a necessary component of ANY MARD system was born. We had a working model that day, and you will notice that it is his name, not mine, on the patent. So I put out the Skyhook immediately right. WRONG. I didn't want to put two new reserve related systems at once, so I fitted all of my existing and new tandem rigs with the Collins' Lanyard. I then waited the requisite 5 years to see if the Collins' Lanyard worked as expected. It did. Then, and only then, was I ready to release the Skyhook. The whole process took nearly 20 years from inspiration to implementation, but I think the result was worth it.

I agree with you. It takes about 5 years of actual use to really "prove out" a reserve system. The Skyhook passed that milestone six years ago. It's now been installed on over 30,000 rigs from 4 manufacturers and packed by riggers of all skill levels, all over the world. If we estimate an average of just 350 jumps on these rigs (some have none, many have thousands) then the skyhook has been along on over 10,000,000 jumps. USPA claims its members use their reserves every 565 jumps (3,000,000 jumps and 5,309 reserve uses in 2010). This means that the Skyhook has been "used", (one way or another) over 18,000 times. It is not "perfect" (nothing is), but it has certainly been the most "trouble free" device I have ever invented, including the hand deploy pilot chute and the 3-ring release.

The first side flap you close pulls the top flap off-center in that direction, and the second side flap doesn't pull it back. If you close the side flaps in the numbered order, everything will end up centered.

You would be right.

I can't believe anyone would make the argument that their own life is not worth $300.

Thanks for rekindling fond old memories. I put 350 jumps on my black and gold Delta II (with no malfunctions) before Snyder talked me into a Para Plane. It had a unique feel in flight, like no other canopy I have ever jumped. OSI openings were soft, but two problems I remember: 1. No flare, and 2. If you pulled down a single turn panel too quickly, it would often turn in the opposite direction.

Most skydiving fatalities happen because someone does something stupid, either on the ground before jumping, or during the jump. Very few people "need" any safety device if they always do everything right. However, people, being human, screw up all the time. I doesn't matter if your particular mistake is rare or common...you're just as dead. The main reason why jumpers haven't had a problem with main-reserve entanglements on MARD systems, is that the only MARD system in common use, until now, has had the Collins' Lanyard included. As I said above, it's way to early to have a meaningful debate about other MARD systems. See you in about 5 years.

True, since I reinforced type 17 risers, outright breaks have become more rare, but still happen. And goodness knows if even these risers are strong enough if someone comes out with a really hard opening new canopy in the future. Plus, there are many other ways a single riser can release without breaking: 1. The white loop can fray and break from sharp housing endings. (There's a PSB out about this right now.) 2. The white loop cam break because of "lockdown" or mis-assembly, especially on tandem systems. (This happens dozens of times a year.) 3. The housing ending can come off because of poor swaging. 4. The riser can release because the white loop is not passed through the housing ending when assembling. (We have a video example of this in the Skyhook section of our website.) 5. One riser can release before the other because of incorrect cutaway cable lengths, especially if soft housings are involved. I have personally seen each of these happen, and there are probably more I can't think of right now. But the point here is this. Why put up with a known problem with MARDs, if there is a known and tested solution? Why take the chance? What do you gain?

There is one major difference between the Skyhook and any other MARD system, and that is, only the Skyhook has the Collins' Lanyard. (So what is a Colins' Lanyard, and why is this important?) Let me explain: I didn't market the Skyhook (my third attempt at a MARD system) for 5 years after I developed it, because it had a major flaw. If the RSL riser released before the non-RSL riser, the Skyhook (or any MARD system) would pull the reserve bag right into the lines of the still attached riser. The scenario almost guarantees a main-reserve entanglement, so putting out the Skyhook before this problem was solved, was out of the question. The Collins' Lanyard solved this problem by making it theoretically impossible for the RSL riser to release without the non-RSL riser also being released. I introduced the Collins' Lanyard first, and gave it 5 years in the marketplace, to be sure it worked we'll enough so that the Skyhook would be a successful device, as tens of thousands of installations over the past 12 years have proven it to be. (This is a very brief explanation of the Collins' Lanyard. If you wish to understand is design and function more fully, please go to uptvector.com and click on the Skyhook tab.) As to another point brought up in this string: At first, I designed the Skyhook with a release force (in the event of a total malfunction) of under 2 pounds. Trouble was, we experienced a very high number of premature releases from backward spinning main malfunctions (a rather common event). Since increasing this release force to about 10 lbs. (when applied quickly, as it happens in a real malfunction) the number of premature releases has dropped drastically. It generally takes many years of field experience to determine how well any component of a reserve deployment system will work out in the real world, so any meaningful discussion as to which MARD system is "best" will have to wait for a very long time. I give you the above facts, not to discredit any other MARD system, but to explain why I designed the Skyhook as I did. It is up to you to determine if my reasoning was sound.

Mike: Terri and I have been out of internet range for nearly a week and just heard the terrible news. Vicki was truly a wonderful person, and we will all miss her. See you when we get back to DeLand. Bill and Terri Booth

Ripcord stops "killed" people when they were on the MAIN ripcord...and then, if I remember correctly, only when front mounted reserves were used.

Heat has many affects on nylon.... not all are good. I'd ask the manufacturer about that one. NEVER apply heat from a lighter to Spectra. It has a low melting point, and you might easily create major damage.

The housing ending is called a ferrule. I always use this style of housing, from this manufacturer, because i haven't seen a "sharp" ferrule yet on one of their housings. However, anything is possible. Because there are so many individual fibers, and the ripcord is "doubled" at this location, damage should be very easy to identify before is becomes serious. In other words, the ripcord would look like a "Q tip" before its strength would be seriously compromised.

Please remember that I used Spectra ripcords for over 10 years on Sigma mains, where they were pulled on EVERY jump, before I started using them on reserves. There have been No failures that I know of. People often get over 1,000 uses out of them between replacement. Secondly, in real life, the vast majority of reserve ripcord pins are pulled by RSL's, which are not stainless steel, and are often a piece of nylon tape which is far weaker than our current Spectra ripcord. A Spectra ripcord would have to lose 66% of its original strength before it would not be legal, and over 90% of its original strength before it could cause a problem. The example in the photo has probably lost less than 5%. Give me your shipping information, and I will send you a new ripcord section free of charge. Just loop it onto you existing handle, which, by the way, is also not stainless steel. I will pull test your ripcord section to destruction, and send you the results of the test.

I priced my first "Wonderhog" at $225, which was the same as a new Para Commander. I wish now I had priced it at $550, which is what the first commercial ram air, the Para Plane, cost at the time. If I had, rigs might be twice as expensive as they are today, and I would have retired long ago. Jacques Istel once mused to me, that if he had just priced the PC $100 higher, he would have made a million dollars more on the 10,000 total PC's that were ever sold. What amazed me about that statement, was the fact that only 10,000 PC were ever sold. After all, it had little or no competition for a long time. Just shows how much smaller the sport was back then.