nicknitro71

Read my first post again. It did not help. Memento Audere Semper 903

What mark said is the actual case also as per SSK's own words. Memento Audere Semper 903

Well I guess we got three lemons The webbing is already a double layer of 7 and 8 so I would not add one more. We position the chest strap as per RWS instruction no more, no less. If you guys do not believe me, fit a harness the way you do it and then hang the person via the top snaps. Then loosen up the diagonals only and hang again and check where the chest strap ends up. Again I will not use OUR sigma harnesses anymore. Memento Audere Semper 903

Granted that I have sent an e-mail To Bill Booth (without a response) I would like to hear if this is an isolated incident or not. The problem is slippage of the diagonals on the Sigma Student Harness. IMO the problem is due to the use of SS adapters. The old VII harness had non-SS adapters with the spring-loaded keepers (great design). Anyway we have three Sigma harnesses. One went back to RWS because of slippage of one of the laterals. The other two suffer from slippage of the diagonals making the harnesses very unsafe because the students drop down during the FF not matter how tight the diagonals are prior to leaving the airplane. One of my students had his chest strap right on his neck after opening. Keep in mind that we are not a tandem factory and that each instructor dons their own students and we are very, very anal how the harness fits. This is not a problem of poor donning, trust me on that. Anyway I tried to sandpaper the adapters and we also washed the harnesses but the problem remains. As of now I am refusing to jump with a Sigma harness. Fortunately we have three VII harnesses that we can still use. I was wondering if anybody else has having similar issues. Memento Audere Semper 903

I am reviving this thread. Yesterday I did a complete blindfolded jump. I used a black bandana to cover my eyes and goggles and a frap hat on top of it. I could not see a thing not even the some brightness of the sun when I asked to be pointed at it. It was as pitch black as it gets. As for the jump I was wearing a student rig (Maveron 240), a radio (of course), audible altimeter, and I jumped out 5000 pulling at three. I jumped in a sit, then made a back flip, got belly to earth and waited for the Dytter to beep or for the 15 sec mark.. Smizo (cessna54tango) filmed the jump. The idea was for him to pull at 4 grand and fly a borrowed Falcon 215 around me. Little Buddy (swooper120) was the radio man and he literally had my life in his hands. My plan was to never got unfolded unless radio failure. I would handle malfunctions and cutaway if needed all blindfolded. Anyway, the FF part is just like a normal FF, no difference, really. We fly using our sense of touch and balance. I knew my body position, I mean the whole thing. One can definitely do any solo activity blindfolded including freely and wing suit. Of course making bigger ways and RW jumps might be more of a challenge but I see ways around it like air-to-air communication and such. Now, the canopy ride is a totally different story. First you got to put a lot of trust in the radio person. Secondly the feeling is very weird, not knowing where you are heading, barely feeling the turns due to the big tarp and such. On final I was told to flare a bit too high and I waited forever for the ground that came very unexpectedly. I did not even plan to stand up the landing so I set myself for a PLF that worked quite well. When I took my fold off I saw Smizo few feet away with a white reserve tarp! What the fuck! Now Smizo normally jumps a 83 Xaos 27 and he is a helluva swooper and in his many jumps he never had a cutaway. On this jump the rocket scientist who packed the Falcon 215 (not Smizo) forgot to cock the PC and Smizo when he checked the pin apparently did not notice anything wrong (legitimate mistake if you will). So Smizo is at 4K filming this blindfolded mother, he pitches and nothing out. He reached back to pull the bridle on his own but the rig is too big and next thing the silver is out. Once under the Raven II that I packed (A bottles of Jack Smizo) the main d-bag comes out and Smizo cutaway. The left 3-ring does not release despite the cable being all way out so Smizo grabs it and he is now trailing the main bag. He trails it until he is on final, drops it on a filed, un-stows the breaks and lands uneventfully. So in the end everybody has some excitement. I honestly recommend such a jump to all experienced jumpers given a very good radio person. By the way Little Buddy landed me 20 feet from the target! Memento Audere Semper 903

Well a pic is worth 1000 words so here are a couple of thousand words. Memento Audere Semper 903

That's my IP dude. I removed the Al Gore BS and added Tony Suit on the list. Memento Audere Semper 903

Ryan, What's up? Too bad we did not get to flick in Rantoul... I pretty much second what Ray said. There are people posting here that would not even jump the potato w/out a vented BASE Tarp I also see a lot of people with the latest and shiniest BASE tarps who do not have the first fuck how to fly a tarp and that includes some self-coined BASE instructors. Anyhow, you got the canopy skills, no doubt. Given your weight and experience a Fury 220 with the right mods will be a great BASE tarp for you. Furies are among the best flying 7-cell out there. It's just one of those tarps that was borne with the right set of genes. As for the DBS...1" below the stall is IMO way too deep especially on a Fury but then again only trial and error can give you the answer. Here is what I always do when I modify skydiving tarps for BASE. I find the stall point of the tarp and mark it with a sharpie. To give you a frame of reference, the SBS on a Fury is pretty shallow, on a Super Raven III is quite deep. My Fury 220 at my weight stalls 12" above the SBS, my SR III 7" above it, my Ace 240 11". What I do next is mark the mid-point between the SBS and the stall point and go 1" above that so in my case I set the DBS on the Fury 7" above the SBS and 4" for the SR III. The SR III is much less sensitive flying close to the stall point than the Fury. This again has worked for me but read below what you should do. Find the stall point and put a series of DBSs 1" apart up to 1" below the stall point. Find a friendly object that you can jump slider down and have fun fining the right one. Now you got the DBS. Do the same for the SBS: put a couple of SBS 1" and 2" above the stock, make a skydive H&P and see which one gives you the less forward speed w/out surging or rocking like a banshee. Furies have very shallow SBS so I know there is some room for improvement there as well. S Ravens are very deep to begin with. I use my Fury exclusively for unpacked jumps so I did not bother to tune the SBS. Remember that a perfectly calibrated DBS is a life saving device. I laugh my ass off seeing kids jumping the super-duper-valved-multi-on-heading-BASE-machines with the DBS all fucked up and coming in for landing in a field the size of Michigan in breaks and pound in. No matter what you jump, fly a tarp like you stole it. Hook the shit out it, speed is always your friend if you know how to use it and I know you do. Oh, don't forget to put big fat always open hook loops on those front risers! PM if you need more help. Memento Audere Semper 903

What up GUS? In my rigging world AIR should never be used...Yes I heard of Aeration Inspection and Repack but to me it means Assembly, Inspection, and Repack that does not make any sense it's either A & P (Assembly and Pack) or I & R Inspection and Repack), those are the only two sets of initials I use. The whole AIR gets really under my skin Memento Audere Semper 903

You guys are both right. He fucked up big time and just luck got himself not killed. It happened in front of us. The guy stated he pulled at 2000' while instead it was about 1000'. Cypres fired and as the main was finishing inflating the reserve pop open. He did not react to the situation at all and when the canopies got unstable he cutaway @ ~50' and landed on top of tent 3. A few CRW jumps should be mandatory in anyone's training, just my 0.02. Memento Audere Semper 903

No he did not. Having jumped with Peter, he is a helluva BASE jumper. He was super fast on the toggles, got the tarp turn around, avoid the overhang, and landed safely. It was for sure a close call but his skills and reaction time saved his ass, not luck by any means. As for the swoop in the shark cage, as lame as it gets Memento Audere Semper 903

Could someone with the right knowledge please post how many Icarus companies are out there? Am I the only one very confused? Memento Audere Semper 903

Chances are the main drogue release got dislodged so when the TI threw the drogue the main canopy deployed. It happened to another TI yesterday. Both of us were hauling two students off a 182 (not much space to pay around with). When he stood up to hook up the student his main release came completely out. Fortunately I saw it and I was able to re-route it through the 3-ring. I know he would have noticed it but I doubt he would have been able to re-attach it on his own w/out removing the rig. We jump VII. Some rigs out there are designed to avoid this problem. Some fixed this problem while introducing others that can have much more severe consequences than a long tarp ride. Memento Audere Semper 903

Very false. Gravity at sea level is different than gravity at the top of Mt. Everest. Not even Witten himself would make such a bold statement and he is probably the one who at this point in time has the greatest understand of gravity. NOBODY understands fully what gravity really is hence the total lack of its control. We are able to "produce" all the other three forces but we have no clue, well some, how to produce gravity. So how in the hell we sent stuff in space and men on the moon? There is a difference between external and internal aerodynamics. Do you mean an object using air as a medium? Memento Audere Semper 903

Last year we were jumping from the DC3 with half the number of seat belts. Last year one of the otters dump skydivers over the line of flight of the carvair and people had to track like banshee to avoid freefall collisions. This year people were jumping over clouds (read major overcast) all the time. I stop counting the number of people not buckling up. But hey you are so busy skydiving and busting people packing BASE tarps that you seem to ignore not just FAA violations but major safety issues. Dude, use some Windex on that mirror of yours and take a good look at it. Memento Audere Semper 903

So again you do not give a rat's ass about safety, according to you if you can work the system out then it's all good. I could not care less for the FAA FARs or USPA recommendations. Anybody is free to jump from an aircraft at 1000' (the FAA does not say anything about jumping or deployment altitudes). Doing so under a velo loaded 2.4 with a TSO harness and 99 reserve is allowed by FAA but very, very stupid and unsafe common-sense wise. Performing the same jump with a base rig is much, much safer but not allowed by the FAA. FAA for the most part does not understand skydiving and we are lucky enough that they allow us to do it. Getting them involved in trivial stuff like this (read non-safety related) will hurt all of us in the end. You really cannot see the big picture here you are just interested in whatever it takes to feed your ego. Your train of thoughts is dandy, just dandy Memento Audere Semper 903

Priceless. Memento Audere Semper 903

Dude, nobody forces you to jump between t-storms. I sat on my ass for many loads because I thought it was too fucked up to jump while many inexperienced jumpers where going up and down. It's your call man and just your responsibility. Memento Audere Semper 903

When I was jumping in the army a Sargent Major on my load had his finger cut off because his wedding rig got caught on the door of a C 130. The funny thing is that the finger did not fly away and the jumper next to him grabbed it, put it in his jump suit and gave it to the paramedics on the ground. They wear able to re-attach it. I never wear mine while skydiving or BASE. Memento Audere Semper 903

I'd personally get out as low as 500'. Memento Audere Semper 903

I'd let some riggers build me a whole rig when stoned and others not even pack my main while being completely sober. Memento Audere Semper 903

Definitely not someone packing a BASE rig with the intention or not to jump from a balloon with it. For bigger problems like a gross rigging error or a stoned or drunk pilot for instance, I honestly would try to solve the problem w/out getting the FAA involved because in the end it will hurt all of us. The more the feds stay away from skydiving the better off all of us will be but you seem not to get this message so keep ratting out. Memento Audere Semper 903

Priceless. Let's keep ratting each other out. No wonder why we have the lowest retention rate than any other sport. And by the way, jumping BASE rigs off balloons has been the norm for many years. Also, I bet all the money you want that your actions were not driven by safety Memento Audere Semper 903

Second that. Get a suit with booties. Fly with your legs and use your arms to check your handles and play around with the sudents. If their legs are up your ass there is no way they can take control over the flying despite what they do with their arms. Memento Audere Semper 903

If you are not trolling here is my 0.02. A Super Raven IV will make a fine BASE tarp after few simple mods like a tailgate, tail pocket, and properly tuned DBS. Stay away from the Ravens (before 03/88), they are junk and they do not make decent BASE tarps. Will it open cleaner than a BJ 280? No. Will it glide and swoop like a composite Ace 280? No. Nonetheless it'll make a decent BASE Tarp. I just picked up a Super Raven III for my wife. And by the way, if you are a light jumper (less than 150 LBS or so) a Fury 220 also makes for a decent BASE tarp but it does not seem your case. As for the height it depends...not all 220s are borne equal. If you got a nice landing area beneath you it's one thing, if you got boulders or obstacles to clear with a good glide then it's another story. Ravens have a very steep angle of incidence and a SR IV is a big tarp to inflate w/out the extra help of valves. I'd jump a SR III in virtually 99% of all my jumps. Memento Audere Semper 903