davelepka

Blind people can walk because they have the solid ground to use as a reference point, and they spend their entire life learning to walk without a visual reference. Comapre that to a sighted person, who uses visual references everyday for all of their movements, and can you see how the change might be more drastic than comparing them to a blind person. Without the ground as a solid reference point, you use the visible horizon (or ground) as your reference point, and that build off of that. This is the reason we have IFR flight, when there is no visual reference or solid ground to stand on, the inner ear gets confused and leads to spatial disorientation. The resutls can be more dire in an aircraft, where you can enter a spin and possibly not recover. A canopy is different in that it shouldn't produce such negative results, but if you're trying to get someone to 'feel' what a canopy is doing, removing one of their balance refernce points seems like a step in the wrong direction. A better move might be to explain what to look for, and have the student focus on that aspect during the manuver. If you're trying to illustrate the movement of the canopy relative to the jumper, you might even have them look up at the canopy, and see how it's position changes during the flare. Maybe do one or two watching the canopy, then one or two looking ahead (as if you were landing) and then 'feel' what you just saw.

As a guy who already knows it all, I don't read the SIM or keep up on the 'latest news' from the USPA. Clear this up for me, is this a USPA reccomendation (or, god help me, a requirement) for how people are supposed to learn to fly a canopy? I'm guessing it is, and it's another example of the USPA doing nothing that makes any sense with regards to training people to fly parachutes. Let's review - It all started with the USPA 'reccomending' that people take a canopy control course. They did not endorse, organize, or train people to administer a canopy control course, but they sure enough reccomended that everyone go out and take one (after you find one, and hopefully a good one. Next, they were good enough to print a poster reminding jumpers to be safe under canopy, and sent it to group member DZs to hang up. Of course this was because jumpers didn't know they should 'be safe' under canopy, and jumpers are mentaly on par with a 9 year old gril, and love to stand around and look at posters. Again, there was no extrapolation on what 'be safe' meant, just that you should do it. Now they have progressed to making an actual reccomendation of direct action a jumper can take, and it's to close their eyes and cram 5 practice flares into 15 seconds? (I'm not sure the timing and count is correct on that, but if that is correct, can you even flare a canopy fully in 3 seconds? You can jam the toggles down, but will the canopy respond and complete it's reaction to the input within 3 seconds? How long does it take for the canopy to return to steady-state full flight (like you would have on final) to 'practice' another flare? My best guess it that you 'might' be able to get 2 full flare 'practices' from full flight within 15 seconds, and I stress 'might') That aside, when was the last time anyone flared for an actual landing with their eyes closed? Why the hell would you practice it that way? Part of 'feeling' the canopy is relating it's actions to the horizon, and when you shut your eyes, your inner ear goes all wonky and you can't tell up from down (to some degree). No offence to the newbies out there, but the idea of practicing with your eyes closed sounds like one of those 'genius' ideas some newbie engineer-type thinks up at home, alone, and is going to use to really 'get to know' their canopy. It's absurd. I still cannot why the USPA has such a resistance to using the resources we have available to us, and bringing the experts in to come with a 'real' plan that jumpers can follow, or better yet, a real class they can take. There are some very smart, talented canopy pilots out there who would be honored to donate their time to developing a program for the USPA that would run concurrently with the licensing program to further educate jumpers as they make their way to 'expert' status, but instead they give us 'close your eyes and flare'?

Some tunnel time before AFF isn't a bad idea at all. If you can get stable and fly unassisted in the tunnel, it should boost your confidence when it comes time to climb out of an airplane. There's a lot going on in AFF lv1, and if the 'unknown' of freefall isn't so 'unknown', you'll probably be more relaxed. Of course, there's the physical aspect of already knowing what a good body position feels like as well. Skip the tunnel in TN. It's not an enclosed tunnel with wall-to-wall airflow, it's got a fan in the middle of an open room, and you have to balance in the middle of the airstream or you slide to one side and fall off (the floow/walls are padded). It makes it considerably harder to fly unassisted, and is more carnival ride than training tool. I think Paraclete is the closest 'real' (enclosed) tunnel to TN. Depending on where you're dirving from, there's the one up in NH as well. Just bite the bullet and drive the exrta way to one of those locations. It will be well worth the extra time in the car.

As previously stated, the concern is not damage to the camera, it's damage to the jumper (or others). That aside, if you are still on student status (meaning you do not have an A license), make sure you clear any gear purchases with your instructor, or the DZO. There's a chance that you might not be allowed to jump whatever you buy until you have a licesne based on the way that gear might effect your jump. For example, most instructors would not want their students jumping a full face helmet, as they tend to limit the amount of communication between jumper and student. An instructor can learn a lot about your state of mind during a jump from the expression on your face, and a full face helmet makes that difficult. A jumpsuit with booties is another one. Booties are a popluar option, and you'll find them on most jumpsuits, but they're a bad idea for a student. They give your legs extra 'power', but as a student you don't need that 'power', you just need to focus on making a safe jump. I suppose you could buy anything you want, just be ready to be denied permission to jump certain things until you have a license. Once you do have a licesne, keep changes down to one new thing per jump, and ask an instructor if there are any special considerations to keep in mind before you jump anything new to you.

The generic answer is that you should probably look into a used rig for your first one. You can buy a complete rig, or piece one together buying a main, reserve and container all seperately. The idea is that your first rig won't be too much different than the student rigs you've been jumping. That what you need when you're just off student status, as you're still pretty much a student. 100 jumps later, you might be ready or looking for something different, and if you bought a new rig, selling it with 100 jumps on it is going to lose you a couple thousand dollars. If you buy a reasonably priced used rig, you can sell it 100 jumps later for about what you paid for it. It's just like cars - if you buy a new Honda, drive it for 6 months, and go to sell it, you're going to lose big time. There's a big price difference between a 'new' Honda, and a 6 month old Honda. If you bought a 10 year old Honda, and drove it for 6 months, it's still worth about what you paid. Not much difference in price between a 10 year old Honda and a 10.5 year old Honda. For a more specific answer, do a search and read up on riggers and inspections on used gear BEFORE buying anything. Also, talk to your instructors about specific models or sizes, they know you better than I do.

There's always a 'story'. Even if there were 10 or 100 stories, you can't ignore the fact that F-111 main canopies are all but out-of-production, with the exception of a few 'specialty' canopies, and the VAST majority of sport jumpers choose a Z-po wing. Take automobile transmissions, for example. The automatic tranmission is hugely popular, but the manual trans is still available in more than half of the cars in production. An auto is preferred by the majority of drivers, but the manual works the same and is a preference to enough to keep them in production. F-111 is not the same. It's all but extinct, and all but extinct for a reason. Don't get me wrong, I know that you can jump for years with those canopies, and that many people did. I'm not the guy creating and shaping the sport canopy market, I'm just the guy pointing out the reality of the situation. What I know for sure is that Z-po canopies have become almost omnipresent in both gear catalogs and on DZs everywhere. What I can't say for sure is why, but given that the canopy market is a 'free market', in that consumers choose what they want, and manufacturers respond by producing products that will sell, I think it's a safe assumption to make the Z-po is the fabric of choice because it's just better. It's not less expensive, and it's harder to pack, but people seem to choose it to the extent that F-111 is all but gone from the sport canopy market (reserves excluded).

The major problem is that you keep making the assumption that every DZO is selling these at a loss. Breaking even is not selling things at a loss, and breaking even is only breaking even for one person, the DZO. Breaking even implies that all expenses are paid, such as the TIs, packers, pilots, aircraft, fuel, gear, etc. To all of those people/catagories, a tandem that breaks even on costs is a full-paying gig. Like I said upthread, if a DZO can make a break even deal with Groupon, and use the capacity to their benefit, there's a place for it in skydviing. You chose to ignore all of that ans suggest I was a moron who didn't understand business, but my point remains valid. Selling anything at a loss is dumb. Selling a shitload of them is a shitload of dumb. We didn't need you to point that out.

Maybe so, but shooting ranges don't have the power (and money) of the FAA behind them. If the city made a move that threatened the FAA money that's supporting that airport, then they could count on losing most of the tax revenue from any business being done on the airport and in town by airport users. Keep in mind the city is pushing for an expantion of the airport. The reason is that they want to attract more airport users and their money, and that the city doesn't have to spend anything to make it happen. The FAA will foot the bill, but that means they have the city by the balls. The city has to play by the FAAs rules, or the FAA takes it's money and runs.

Looks compact, and easy to read. Regardless, make sure you limit this to solo jumps with no other canopies in the sky. Ground speed info, for canopies, is generally just for shits and giggles. You can't really control your speed that much, you're not trying to time an arrival at a waypioint, and you're not trying to manage fuel consumption, all the things an aircraft pilot would use the info for. The catch is to remember that an aircraft pilot in flight is generally not in the direct vicinity of other aircraft (unlike a canopy) and when it is, it's in radio contact with the tower or the other aircraft themsleves. Times when they're using the GPS for IFR flight, they're definitaly in contact with ATC, as are all other aircraft in the sky. Keeping your eye up and scanning for traffic is (literally) one million times more important than knowing your ground speed under canopy. The problem with your GPS being so compact and easy to read is that it's tempting to wear and read it more often. Keep in your jmpsuit or on the ground on anything but solo jumps with no other jumpers exiting on that pass.

Just to be a little more specific, a PD 170 is probably only good for jumpers under 140-ish pounds. If you add 25lbs to get their exit weight, that would put them at 165lbs, and under 1 to 1 WL on the 170, which is where a newibe would need to be on that type of canopy. Just for reference, PD only made that model down to a 150, and that was considered a HOT canopy that very people dared to jump. The design and material just don't lend themselves to loading of more that 1.1 to 1, and that's for 'experts'. I'm sure someone out there has a 'story' about how the canopy is great and they jumped it at a higher WL, but that's just a story. A newer jumper, who was trained on modern student gear (Navigators and newer Mantas have Z-po top skin) will not be preparred for jumping an F-111 canopy at anything over 1 to 1. Put it up for sale, but be sure the buyer knows exactly what they're getting. You might even provide a link to this thread in the idea of full disclosure. New jumpers have a way of being especially dumb and cheap when it comes to buying gear, and the idea of a 'fairly new' 170 for $200 or $300 would be right up their alley. Back in the day, before the internet was huge and all-encompassing, you would always see one or two of the new guys from last season show up with rediculous gear they bought over the winter. Outdated, badly worn, improperly sized, round not square, etc, etc, and they were all 'shocked' when they weren't allowed to jump it.

The best way to get a gear check is just to ask. You always want to check your own gear, and operate is if you are on your own, but beyond that, two sets of eyes are better than one. Note that I said two sets of eyes, not two sets of hands. Not everyone is qualified or trained to handle your gear. Each rig is unique, and the way you pack it may be unique, so if you're asking for a visual gear check, you could ask just about any licensed jumper on a load. When it comes to putting hands on your gear, that's another story. Your main pin flap will need to be opened in order to check you pin, and that's a job best reserved for a 'known' person. If you're not at your home DZ, look for an instructor or other DZ staff member, and have them point out a qualified jumper on the load who can handle your gear. Don't get me wrong, many, many jumpers know how to open a pin cover, check the pin, and properly close it, but the problem is that some of those who don't, aren't aware that thety don't know. They may be doing it improperly, and not realizing that they are making a mistake. The way to avoid this it to get a 'referral' from an instructor (guys wearing tandem rigs are generally instructors, as are people dealing with students) or a DZ staff member. They'll know who you can trust to touch your gear (or more importantly, who should not be touching your gear). If you are away from your home DZ, you may find yourself getting together with other visiting jumpers who you end up making mulitple jumps with. In that case, you can take a minture between jumps, and ask one of your new friends to be your 'buddy'. You can then proceed to brief them on the proper way to check your rig (using your actual rig to show them hands-on how it's done) and have them brief you on their rig. Now the two of you can count on each other to do a proper gear check.

Come on, really? Is that a typo, and the gentleman's name is really 'Jack Little'? If not, come on, really?

That's not true. Groupon is good for local service-type business that are seeking return clientele. Restaurants, dry cleaners, dog groomers, etc, can benefit from getting customers to 'try' their service. If you find a place that has great food at a fair price, you'll go back without a Groupon, and just pay the fair price in the future. Of course, a DZ is not one of those places. 99% of DZ customers are never to be seen again, and no amount of selling, or USPA hyping, or anything is going to make them come back. Most people nut-up once and make a jump, and then go back to living a more pedestrian life. The only way a DZ benefits from a Groupon deal is if they severly limit the number of deals sold, and then limit the number of deals serviced on the weekend. If you can hold it back to 10 on Sat and 10 on Sun, and book the rest during the week when you're slow, a DZO who is breaking even on the deal will bring in work for his TIs, packers, and pilots during the week, and maybe use up enough fuel to get a couple cents off per gallon on the next truckload. Keeping in mind that breaking even means covering the slots, if the DZO is making a plane payment, then there's some dollars to put toward that as well. That said, I don't think any DZOs are using it that way, and I think that after doign 100's of tandems with no money left in the DZOs pocket, they'll get the message.

Above was my honest, fairly stated question to rwieder, Below is my answer, via PM - Edited so as not force the guy into a public personal attack (it's OK via PM). That's the entire message. My post is my only communication to him, I did not send a PM containing other comments or language. The above is his entire response to my post, and I'll let everyone draw their own conclusions based on that.

All kidding aside, are you bi-polar? Manic-depressive? Half of your posts are you crying that life is unfair, women are impossible to understand, you need some sort of meaning or fullfillment in your life, etc. The other half of your posts are sexist, materialistic, immature, disrepectful towards women and generally repulsive. Do you see the dichotomy?

Serious post here, you're missing the point. When the guy quoted 'hot refueling', he wasn't making a joke or being sarcastic, he just wrote it that way. His literal thought was that your view on hot fueling seems baseless and arbitrary, and you could replace the term 'hot fueling' with the term 'skydiving' in any of your posts, and it would sound just like a thousand mothers and grandmothers who protest their child staking up skydiving, but they have no real reason as to why. I think it's a valid point, do you have any incidents you can site where hot fueling led to an accident? I don't think I've ever heard of any, but I'm also willing to admit that I would have probably only heard of any that happened on a DZ. Without any incidents to site, I'm not sure how you can call it an unsafe practice. Does it require training, diligence, and continuous oversight? Yes, but without any incidents to site, you have to admit that either it's sufficiently safe, or that operators have been employing training, diligence and oversight with great success. Please address the idea that if you cannot produce evidence of an incident (actually enough incidents to rule out an anomoly), how can you classify the practice as being unsafe? It's not a new practice, nobody is trying to rewrite the rules, it's something that's been done without incident (as far as we know) for decades. How can that be wrong?

I think the other Dave hit the nail on the head in the first reply, it's a long ways off, just worry about now for the time being. Things will change between now and then. New canopies will come out, new ideas will surface, maybe a new jumper will show up at your DZ and change your thinking all together. In the next year or two, and several hundred jumps, you'll learn a ton, see a lot, probably jump a handful of demos (or borrowed) canopies, and all of this will guide your actions and impressions when you're ready to jump a Velo. Worry about it then. It's like all the guys with 3 jumps asking about cameras for when they're ready to jump a camera. God only knows what will be available by the time they're ready to jump a camera, so either ask him or just wait until the time comes and see what things look like then.

Great. Thanks for the joke, how about backing it up with something constructive, as opposed to just leaving it as-is, which sort gives the impression that it's 'cool'. How did you come to be in this circumstance? What was the plan for the dive, and what do you think led you away from the plan? What are you thoughts about avoiding the same problem in the fututre? See? Constructive.

I'm not sure how well a cutaway handle with a cable on the top and bottom would work. Think about the motion of cutting away, you don't really pull out from the webbing, you pull down, in the opposite direction of the cable. In your example, there is no opposite direction. In terms of custom length cutaway housings, call any rig manufacturer and see who can cut a swage you a set. Maybe Jumpshack? They seem to build a lot of their own parts.

I'm not sure how to answer. In my experience, pulling on the rear risers (or pumping the toggles) will tend to speed up the openings, not make them longer. The only thing I could think of to make an opening longer would be to unstow the brakes and toss the toggles mid-snivel, but I'm not sure how that would work out. I did pack a Sabre with the brakes unstowed for a while to slow the openings, but it was a little crazy and you were hauling ass once the slider dropped. Along those same lines, I also adjust the cats-eye for the brake setting further down the line to ease up the hard openings on my Stiletto when the line set was out of trim. Both of those are 'premeditated' attempts to slow an opening, I can only comment on speeding up the opening mid-snivel, and I've always done this by tugging on the rear risers.

Sure. Do those look like BASE canopies in the video? Between the WL, apsect ratio and the airspeed at deployment, the needs of a HP skydiving canopy are different than a BASE canopy. The primary goal in a brake setting for a skydiving canopy is a soft, controlled opening, not the airspeed of the canopy after it's open and before you unstow the brakes. Like I said before, the solution is in the planning and performance of the jumpers, not the canopy. When making a group freefall jump, it's up to the jumpers to break off high enough to allow for a sufficient track before opening. I'm surprised your mentor didn't tell you to keep your BASE jumping techniques off the DZ, and your skydivign techniques away from your objects. It's two different activities, and two different shools of thought in more areas than just canopies and brake settings. Consult your BASE mentor for BASE issues, and your skydiving mentor for skydiving issues, and try not to take it upon yourself to intermingle the two when giving advice.

Not really. It comes back to my point about who gets the experimental or prototype canopies, these guys are on the podium before the get the canopies (which is how they get them), and they would still be there without the 'top secret' gear. One thing to consider is the gap between the top guys and everyone else. Is it created just by the canopies they jump? Would they lose that gap without those canopies? The other side of the coin, what's to say that these canopies are an improvement over what's out there? Maybe the canopies are hold them back because the 'theory' of the new canopy doesn't match up with the reality of the new wing. I've got near 1000 jumps on my Velo in the current configuration, and I put 3000 on Stiletto 107s before that. That's a lot of time and 'practice' with those canopies, how much time/jumps do the top guys get with their 'experimental' canopies before bringing them to compete? I'll admit they train hard, but not 1000+ jumps on a prototype hard. Your idea has some merit in lower classes, but even then, how would you regulate it? Are you going to check the trim on every canopy that makes it to the podium? What about a beat up canopy that's just plain out of trim, but the pilot rocks it an wins? The trim will be out of spec, as-if they used a non-stock lineset, but that wouldn't be the case.

Good point. I've gotten into the habit of doing a traffic scan while my canopy snivels. Looking at the canopy isn't going to help anything or effect the opening, but looking around might certainly help out if you pick up on a traffic problem, you'll be ready to manuver as soon as the canopy becomes 'controlable'. The idea is that the skydive doesn't end when you track off. You might think you're alone, but there are still other jumpers up there with you, and you're not alone. Along the same lines, once open, I've gotten into the habit of scanning up and down the jumprun for the groups that exited before and after me. I'm looking to see that they are open, and not flying in my direction. You know the 'line' jumprun follows, and you should be able to spot those groups with no problem before beginning to fly your canopy along jump run. Along those lines, an area of specific concern is in the last RW group and the first freefly group to exit on a pass. In that case, the later exiting freefly group will pass the RW group in freefall and open before them. It's important for both groups to be aware of the differences, and mindful of them. The freeflyers need to hold back from flying back down the jumprun once they are open, or they risk flying right under the still-freefalling RW group.

I'm not sure what it was that lead you to that conclusion, but that's (I'll be nice) not that smart. First of all, you can clearly see by the position of the tail that the brakes are certainly stowed on that canopy. Second, you don't see enough of the opening sequence to determine that there was any surge at all. If you figure that a HP canopy will fly at 15 mph forward speed with the brakes stowed, that gives the collsion a 30 mph closing speed. Add in that the jumper was most likely using a wide angle lense, which makes things look further away that they are, you have two canopies fairly close together with a closing speed of 30 mph. How quickly do you think that gap will be closed (here's a hint, watch the video). The answer here is not gear modification, the answer is better planning and technique with the skydive. Both jumpers needed to track further, or straighter, and that either means opening lower or breaking off higher. That's the solution.

Packing - great pay, very hard work, long days, no weekends off. You might get to jump on the first load/last load on the weekends, but mostly plan on jumping during the week. Not pakcing - you might get weekends off, and be able to jump with your friends and have fun. There's no clear cut answer. You have to look at your earning potential, and what you want to do with your time and your life. If the DZ job is going to require some 'investment', factor that in as well. Overall, I agree you should get your license reinstated no matter what you do. Once you have it, it's free (mostly) to keep, and something you're going to end up needing. Hot tip- see if anyone near the DZ has a room to rent for the season. It's not uncommon for jumpers or friends of jumpers to rent out a room in their house. The rent is usually cheap, and you can either walk, ride a bike, or bum a ride to the DZ. A house is way better than a trailer, and you save the money you would spend buying a trailer. Maybe that option will let you save some packing money, and get your license back at the end of the season?