Anachronist

Dislocated my right shoulder a bunch of times over several years after an initial injury, I've even dislocated it in the tunnel, a friend provided traction to reduce it in the antechamber and I kept flying. You should go see an ortho to find out what is wrong and if it warrants surgery. Then you need to look up exercises for shoulder rehabilitation. I had a couple of "that felt funny" moments in free fall which made me go at PT hard, haven't had any issues since. Specifically I have a torn labrum, it can be surgically "fixed" at the cost of light duty for 6 months and reduced range of motion. Because it responded to PT so well I have opted not to get cut on. For now anyway. Good luck, PT hard

You could try using knee pads packing, I see some of the paid packers use them as well. Does your packing mat have padding? To me there is a big difference between packing on carpet/concrete versus carpet/pad/concrete; if it helps, it might be worth looking into. The good news is that it may get better, though my knees aren't injured, I remember them hurting when I started packing, but I don't notice it anymore. If you ease into it it might get better over time, depending on your knees of course. And as was previously mentioned, you can do most of it sitting down if your hips are agreeable. As for landings, take some professional canopy courses, jump in good wind conditions, and if you are able, look into paragliding. It is low impact and will teach you to fly much better than skydiving. The skills you learn paragliding will help you out skydiving (not the other way around though).

Lots of WS from a PAC, including a few crappy exits. To me the big issue is the height of the door. If you can crouch down far enough then everything is fine. As for hitting the tail, you should be able to exit without moving straight backwards in any aircraft, I exit looking down and flying steep, you can practice that from an otter too. Here are some photos, you can see there is plenty of clearance as long as you don't pop. I wouldn't recommend climbing out, but if you do, when you let go think "fly to the earth as fast as I can" for a few seconds. Also if you are trying to launch more than 3 WS then the whoever goes last needs to be able to play catchup well, the PAC isn't a good aircraft for flocks of 5+.

To put this review in context (all numbers are approximations), I have about 300 wingsuit jumps, roughly 50 on a P3 and a S-Bird combined, 30 on an X-Wing (like a X-1), the rest are on an original Havok with a handful on other suits. I’m not an especially talented pilot but just a regular fun jumper with zero BASE experience. I’ve put about 10 jumps on the Colugo 2 at the time of writing this so it is an “initial impression” type review. As far as dealing with Squirrel prior to and during ordering as well as after the suit was delivered, I can’t say enough good things. They responded very quickly and thoroughly to all of my inquiries and sent updates when the suit was finished, when it would arrive, and when it actually shipped. They quoted 4-5 weeks for delivery and I think it came in at 4 ½ weeks. They also followed up to make sure the fit was just right. Trying it on and checking everything out: I tried it on without a rig and everything seemed to fit well, the arms seemed just a touch long (like ½ an inch) but that was made perfect after trying it on with a rig. I was already familiar with Squirrel construction and zippers, no surprises there. On a side note, I’m not a fan of any innie-outie system since I don’t BASE jump so there is that, but take a look at how Squirrel suggests assembling it with the bungee routed between your body and the lift web and the handle swallowing problem is considerably reduced. On the ground, in the plane, during flight, and under canopy, my handles haven’t been gobbled up yet. The fit on the ground was a little snug in the crotch, when I sent a photo and asked Squirrel if it was suppose to fit like that they assured me it was not uncommon and as long as I didn’t feel it in flight then the fit was perfect, which is the case. The zipper comes very high on my neck, the only time I could completely zip it up would be during flight. This is a problem I’ve had on every suit I’ve ever jumped, some worse than others. In general I zip it as high as is comfortable, leaving about 2 inches unzipped, I don’t notice it during freefall or canopy flight. Over all the fit is “snug” and comfortable, perfect for flying in plain clothes but would likely be uncomfortable with any insulation underneath. If you jump with layers, I would suggest asking Squirrel about making it fit to allow that. The last thing to mention is the arms, they also fit “snug,” making a fist causes the arm to become a little tight, again feels great in flight but requires a little more effort at pull time. It comes with two sets of arm padding, thick and thin, the thick stuff is way tighter than I am comfortable with, I made a few jumps without any padding which was very comfortable, then added the thin padding which seems to be a good compromise between comfort and keeping the leading edge nice and shapely. How it flys: I’m not a big suit expert and my only other experience is an X-Wing. I was impressed with how smooth the exit felt, immediate pressurization and transition into flight. (I made the first jump with the vents ¼ unzipped, don’t bother, just rock out full pressurization.) The suit immediately felt more stable and controlled that I expected and in a relaxed position it is very fast. I made a few small turns to make sure I could fly where I wanted to go and the input was incredibly intuitive. Then on to some nice big and hard turns, the suit stayed locked in exactly the orientation I put it in, it felt just as stable in a steep bank as it did flying flat and level. I then flew in a deployment position for a few seconds, again the suit was stable and controllable during the whole process and I could steer just fine with both hands on my rig and my knees bent. A few more turns and a little playing with pitch changes, the C2 responded precisely and stable to every input I gave it. Subsequent jumps have included chasing Funk range suits, very steep dives, cloud carving, trying to max out glide and speed, and chasing an Aura 2 flown by a much more experienced pilot. The recurring theme is fast and stable. The C2 really likes to run, but I was able to shut it down, dig my knees in, and preform surprisingly smooth slow speed maneuvers chasing the smaller and slower suits. So far I am very impressed with how it preforms both in raw speed/glide as well as intuitive control and slow speed flight. I’ve still got a lot to learn about it but I’m glad I chose the Colugo 2 for my upsize. If you are coming from a Havok/Funk style suit then this should be an appropriate choice to upsize, it will feel a bit more ridged and sensitive to input so make your first couple of flights about learning to go where you want and getting comfortable at pull time (I suggest jumping without any arm padding at first). It will also feel like it wants to pitch steeper but just relax and it will settle into a nice glide, don’t be afraid of feeling you are pitched down, just go with it, the suits wants to fly nicely in a relaxed body position. If you are coming from and earlier X-1/2/3 then you’ll notice that the leg wing is a lot more flexible, you can actually tap your heels, and the arm pressure feels a little lighter. That said it is certainly faster than the X-1 even though it isn’t as stiff and the tail is a little shorter. It will also feel much more stable and controllable. The only thing I’m having trouble making it do is fly slow and floaty, but it wasn’t really designed for that, and I’m sure it will come with more jumps. May not be the best choice for XRW unless you are a very light or highly experienced big suit pilot. Everything else it eagerly obliges to.

No worries, English is a weird language sometimes (particularly written). I read it again taking that into account, and the sentence is rather nuanced. (And a lot of the posts on DZ.com are silly, so I can see how you thought maybe I was an idiot )

Ohhh, then you just need to work on your English, that isn't what my post says. Common sense should also tell you that you have an error in interpretation. English 101: The last subject mentioned in a sentence or paragraph is assumed to be the subject of the following sentence or paragraph if no other subject is explicitly stated.

You realize the C2 is the template for the Freak right? It is a bit more appropriate than "I have a Funk/Aura." I believe it has even been described as a "tweaked C2" by Squirrel (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong).

Buy a rigger you like a case of beer and ask them to give you a hackey to leg strap orientation. There are a LOT of differences in gear but they all do pretty much the same thing, so at this point just try and absorb the basics. If you can find an older rigger, they will be able to give you some history on development of the systems too, and it will probably make their day that someone who is learning is into that stuff (Hackey to legstrap with the main completely out that is e.g. top to bottom)

26" collapsable ZP PC with 9' bridle, semi-stowless bag. Jumped with medium to big suits and several canopies 190-170. Deployments are clean and comfortable. Also works great for normal freefall. I think with big suits, body position is most important, but the 9' bridal is a must have (my understanding is that anything over 9' isn't helping anymore). I've seen a (rear facing) video first hand of a ~5 second hesitation with a 6' bridle (Suit was an X-1), the pin was pulled the whole time the PC just couldn't get into clean air, it wasn't until the jumper looked over his shoulder that it extracted the bag from the container. (The canopy was an appropriate size for the container, btw). As for the main, never jumped a Stiletto but I get the impression that it isn't a great choice (as mentioned already). I have wingsuited a Saber2 and it worked great, snivels a little more than I like but the openings were fine, 150 should still be ok if you are comfortable with the WL, starts getting iffy around 120/135 with huge suits from what I've observed. The SkySnatch is of course a nice PC, but IMHO, a bit of overkill for skydiving, not to mention $$$.

Sorry, haven't jumped a Freak but have a Colugo 2. (Since no one else has chimed in I figured I'd add this anecdote) For what it's worth, my initial impression was it flew exactly as described by Squirrel. I'm always skeptical of marketing propaganda, but in my experience, Squirrel is right on target with how they say their suits fly. They don't seem to be sugar coating anything. If you like what they are saying about it in the vids, you will probably like the suit. If you are transitioning from something like a Funk/Ghost/S-Bird then it should be a comfortable upsize. I was blown away by how smoothly and controllable the C2 flew, even on the first jump.

I jump regularly with someone who is over 300 lbs (athletic/tank built). He can fly with everyone else no problem. Weight alone isn't the limiting factor. As previously mentioned, fit/athletic, yes, Jabba the Hutt, no/lose some serious weight. But you should invite him to come have a chat with you so he knows that it is going to be a different learning curve than most people, so he understands what he is getting into before he drops money on (all probably new) gear. It might be good to send him to a tunnel if possible to work out some of the kinks as well.

Very interesting, I've never jumped a flysight so I have no idea what my horizontal speed is. Might be worth a shot to find out.

Yes, it's not about the actual bottle, it is a symbolic gesture. A fun and lighthearted one in my opinion and it's nice to give and receive. I've had two cutaways and bought both riggers a bottle of their choosing (and both chose something less than $15, I assume out of the whole mutual courtesy thing). For the first one I drove more than a hour out of my way to do it and it happened to be a manufacturer's rigger who packs scores of anonymous reserves every year. He laughed and said that almost no one who wasn't a local ever thanked him, much less showed up in person to buy him a bottle. But he appreciated it and I felt good doing it. If a local didn't at least acknowledge a save I think that would be pretty weak. The "beer tax" for everything is stupid, but the bottle for the rigger tradition is one that I appreciate. Oh, and as mentioned earlier, I also make an effort to thank the pilot for the ride if I'm close enough for him to hear me without yelling obnoxiously on jump run and when I see him on the ground.

It might matter to most people's bank accounts. Feel free to start another poll that is of interest to yourself if you don;t like ths one That is all relative. What is more impressive. 75 self paid for the ramen eating packet who has pitched a tent in the ghetto, or 400 self paid for the trust fund baby. Neither of them have an impact on my back account! Indeed, everyone's jumping experience is different and no one else's affects yours, but getting a feel for a general trend is somewhat interesting. The posts so far and the poll are pretty consistent with my observations, 100% fun jumpers rarely have more than 1,000 and virtually everyone with more than 2,000 has been paid (or at least they were free) for a large portion of them. Probably partly due to finances and the generally short "skydiving career" of most fun jumpers and partly due to interest/effort. e.g. pounding out 10 jumps in a day stops being fun, but if you are making money off of them then you're more inclined to jump as much as you can. Speaking in broad generalities of course.

That looked pretty good. I've never had the pendulum/whiplash issue after my first 5 or 10 ws jumps. I bring my knees up and reach for the risers as soon as I feel line stretch (old habit from having line twists fairly common in the beginning) which might be helping me get more vertical under the risers but I'm not sure. I also lean and look back usually seeing the end of the snivel and the slider come down which could be contributing to it as well. Only had one bad neck jerk and it was a free packed slider up BASE canopy, the muscles in my throat were sore. Oddly enough, more so than anywhere else, maybe I just have a beefy neck. But that deployment was virtually instant, I would guess less than 1 second from line stretch to full inflation. The attached photo is about as good of an angle I have been able to achieve during extraction (using the method I initially mentioned).

~400 and ~4 years in the sport (with some down time). That would put the total @ $9,600. The DZs I jump at all charge $24 for full altitude, which are the vast majority of mine. Add $1,100 for AFF and about $6,000 on gear (almost all bought used), total cost comes out to ~$16,700; which comes out to ~$42 per jump (assuming I don't recoup any gear value). Some of my down time was due to injury, which cost me about $7,000 out of pocket, so if you added that in it would be about $59 per jump. Skydivin ain't cheap if you aren't getting paid to do it. Just in my personal observation most non-paid fun jumpers get between 50 and 200 per year (limited by time, interest/effort, and money depending on who it is). The most I've seen unpaid in a year was 600, but he mentioned that he couldn't repeat that due to finances.

Have someone at the local DZ who is doing just this but as of yet doesn't have a TI or AFFI rating (though he has posted AFF "training jumps" on his FB page). He travels a lot and jumps at various DZ's so it's hard to pin him down but it is virtually impossible he has the jumps he claims and his skill doesn't reflect it. He has also blatantly lied about jumps gone wrong (always someone else's fault or "I did that on purpose"). Little time in sport and doesn't get that what he is saying is stupid. Best I figure is warn the folks in charge and let them handle it. But in your situation where the DZO is encouraging it then it becomes a lot more difficult. Skydiving is bizarrely forgiving of f**k ups. In my limited experience it takes a smoking gun for any action to be taken and it is often barely a slap on the wrist.

dthames - yes I think we were just talking about different things. I appreciate the input. Thanks for the info, it'll definitely give me something to play with. My deployments have been very consistent and very good, line twists are uncommon and for the most part they are very comfortable. I've just been trying to "optimize" them in the sense that everything can be made better. Wicked - I have jumped some free packed BASE canopies slider up (ws and belly, it sucked, a lot, but not my forte so I was probably doing something wrong (I also just pro packed them)

Thanks, I'll play around with trying to maximize the flare. I don't expect to get anything like big suit results but just slowing it down will be nice.

Ahh thanks for the info, so basically do what I initially mentioned but harder and faster?

So maybe I should have prefaced this with I have ~300 ws jumps, not looking for anecdotes or first-flight esque "advice," though I appreciate the enthusiasm.

I'm basically looking for soft and slow. As close to a hop and pop as can be accomplished. I would say slow overall speed, I've tried sinking out and while it improved the angle, didn't do much for softening the opening. This is a good example of what I'm trying to do I suppose (minus the line twists). Start at 3:00. https://vimeo.com/123245477

Just adding to the list. Ordered a Colugo 2 in July, 4 weeks and 4 days from order to delivery (exactly as quoted). Communication via e-mail was excellent, always had a thorough reply within 24hrs. Nice update when it was finished that it would ship on x date and arrive on x date as well.

So I've been trying to improve my flare prior to deployment (no BASE). I seem to be able to bleed off a good bit of speed but don't have anywhere near the pitch up rotation that I've seen from some folks (which I associate with deceleration and a better d-bag extraction angle), my deployments are at best 30 degrees from horizontal. Any suggestions? WS is a Havok, my method has been speed up a little, press arms down hard then dig in a little with my knees. Any tips? Thanks in advance.

Well, the most memorable thing I ever had said to me was as I was climbing out of a 182 and the pilot leaned over and yelled "I hope you die!" then started laughing wildly... you could give that a shot.