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LongWayToFall

One Toggle not functional. Land on both rears or one rear and one toggle?

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you just had a line over on your reserve.



chance of this happening is so small that this subject is not worth discussion. I'd say beware who do you allow to pack your reserve.



Happened to me @ Elsinore in the mid 80's...here to tell ya, be damn careful with the hook knife, I got 3 lines...two I didn't mean to cut!


...and it's kinda hard to know your rigger is having a bad day until you are under the product of said, in my instance the pack job was videoed...it showed clearly mistakes were make.

I changed riggers...& that rigger quit filming pack jobs.










~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

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So, you just had a line over on your reserve, and you used your hook knife to cut the brake line and clear the malfunction. Now you only have one good toggle/brake. Do you land using both rears, or one toggle and one rear?
Discuss.



If I recall correctly, the general consensus among base jumpers -- for whom a lost toggle is closer to routine than it is to almost-unheard-of -- is that you use one toggle and one rear riser.

The reason? The toggle gives you way more control than a riser and your toggle muscle memory is dominant almost to the point of unconsciousness -- which means you can concentrate on making sure the riser side follows the lead of the toggle side, as in, using just enough riser to keep it flying straight as you flare with the toggle.

The toggle side, in other words, serves as a guide for the riser side so that you don't over- or under-flare with the riser side.

Finally, if you have time, TEST IT ahead of your landing flare, exactly the way you should test the reserve flare if you have both toggles because of course your reserve is a different animal than your main.

In the base community, there is still some discussion that using both risers is better, but as I recall the various discussions, the people who have actually had to do it almost unanimously favor "one-toggle-one-riser," and the ones with no actual experience doing it think two risers is best.

B|
SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.)

"The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

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Get a reserve for a demo...
http://www.performancedesigns.com/demo_sport.asp

"We offer all available sizes of the PD Reserve and the Optimum Reserve, set up as mains with an attachment point for your d-bag and pilot chute. This is a great opportunity to become familiar with your reserve canopy without being in a stressful emergency situation and to decide what size you are comfortable with in every situation."

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Last Tuesday I cut one steering line from a main because of a stuck half brake.

I tried for a short while to unstow the brake, unsuccessfully. Then I got out the knife and snipped the offending brakeline. It did not occur to me to hold on to the toggle. I did restow the knife, though. I also cut just the one brakeline, not both. I still had time to cut the other one as well, but it did not seem necessary. Flew a conservative pattern on rears, with the remaining toggle restowed (the toggle, not the brake). Flared on both rears. Sufficient wind that I did not need to run out the landing even, just take two steps.

Strong ZP 170, exit weight ~220#, jump number 1819. Normal canopy is a Velo 111 and I'm no stranger to rear risers. I did not fly and flare on muscle memory, but on sight and feel; the canopy stalled just (just!) after touchdown. Where I normally push rears outside (and then transition to toggles), I grabbed between the lines on top of the links and flared down instead of out on this one. That's what I normally do for flying (as opposed to levelling) on rears as well.

Flying on rears was not really any different from normal brakelines-still-attached flying (that's why I didn't cut the other brakeline).

I am somewhat used to flying on rears e.g. while doing recreational sport CRW and did not have stress in the air really. Well, a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. I did have a beer afterwards though without considering I still had to drive home, which I normally would not have done.

I shall make a separate post in Gear&Rigging for the gear issues we determined afterwards.
Johan.
I am. I think.

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So, you just had a line over on your reserve, and you used your hook knife to cut the brake line and clear the malfunction. Now you only have one good toggle/brake. Do you land using both rears, or one toggle and one rear?
Discuss.



Release the other brake, pull at least a 90 front riser swoop to finish on rears. Smile for the cameras.

Oh yeah - perhaps don't jump too small of a reserve?
Every fight is a food fight if you're a cannibal

Goodness is something to be chosen. When a man cannot choose, he ceases to be a man. - Anthony Burgess

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Tail deflection caused by a toggle and pitch deflection caused by a rear will not be consistant and depending on the canopy can easily change dominance as the flare progresses. Muscle memory and training has taught you to flare symmetrically so introducing controls that require an assymetric flare would be bad. Both rears will be consistant throughout the motion and would be better.

Reserves are generally trimmed a little steeper so they should be farther from the stall point at full flight. Fly the canopy through the flare, don't just reef on the rears and you're not likely to stall it out. Falls under the don't forget to fly the thing category.

-Michael

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Interesting to hear the current base thinking as Robin reported.

Using a toggle and riser is not quite as bad as having to think to pull the riser, say, 1" for every 4.5" of toggle movement. It's a closed loop system, not an open loop one, so you use feedback from what's happening:

Basically what you are doing is flaring with one toggle, and countering with the opposite riser to stay level.

I've never tried that, but on a small crossbraced canopy have flared with one toggle and either a partially stuck toggle (wrapped around lines) or a lost toggle (grabbing brake line above the guide ring with one finger). It sort of worked, flaring with one side and doing whatever was needed with the other not to dive off sideways into the ground.

Still, I'm personally still not convinced that I'd recommend riser plus toggle over both risers.

Big base canopies can be more forgiving of errors so one smaller canopies, if you aren't really sure of being able to do riser plus toggle, staying with both rear risers might be safer, despite having less overall flare performance available.

In any case, like Robin says, test your alternatives first.

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Tail deflection caused by a toggle and pitch deflection caused by a rear will not be consistant and depending on the canopy can easily change dominance as the flare progresses. Muscle memory and training has taught you to flare symmetrically so introducing controls that require an assymetric flare would be bad. Both rears will be consistant throughout the motion and would be better.

Reserves are generally trimmed a little steeper so they should be farther from the stall point at full flight. Fly the canopy through the flare, don't just reef on the rears and you're not likely to stall it out. Falls under the don't forget to fly the thing category.

-Michael



As I said, in the base community, there is still some discussion that using both risers is better, but as I recall the various discussions, the people who have actually had to do it almost unanimously favor "one-toggle-one-riser," and the ones with no actual experience doing it think two risers is best.

So I'm curious: Have you ever landed a canopy with one toggle out of action?

B|
SCR-6933 / SCS-3463 / D-5533 / BASE 44 / CCS-37 / 82d Airborne (Ret.)

"The beginning of wisdom is to first call things by their right names."

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I have landed a Triathlon 120 on rears.. I was dumb and had dropped my toggles as I prepared to do a flour accuracy drop.. (I lost miserably :-) When I went to reach back up to grab them, one of the toggles had flipped through itself and locked in place.. If this had been 2 grand, no problem. But I was now at 600 feet headed the wrong direction..

I just grabbed my rears, turned around and landed softly into the wind.. It was quite simple. I admittedly have a lot of CRW jumps though so I'm very aware of where the stall point is on rears..

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I landed on rears on my 5th jump. My student rig had a toggle improperly replaced so when I grabbed my toggles I came back with one fine and one just the toggle, no lines. But at 5 jumps I thought "well its there, its square, and I can stear with my risers right?" So I kept it (probably stupid with 5 jumps, but what did I know?). By the time my instructor got on radio and noticed my problem I was too low to cut away. He had me do several practice flares on rears and talked me down using those. I ended up coming in quite softly on my butt. I got all my rear riser work on my A card signed off and a beer for keeping the toggle :D:ph34r:B|

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As I said, in the base community, there is still some discussion that using both risers is better, but as I recall the various discussions, the people who have actually had to do it almost unanimously favor "one-toggle-one-riser," and the ones with no actual experience doing it think two risers is best.

So I'm curious: Have you ever landed a canopy with one toggle out of action?



Howdy Robin~

I've landed both ways..each time on demos, for me anyway the 'rears only' worked better.

Probably an ethnic background kinda thing, simpler for me to have both hands doing the same thing.;)

IF I ever have to do it again it will be on rears...just more comfortable for ME.

You DO have to know your canopy well and be fully aware of the flare & stall points.





AND ~it's not something ya wanna do on a tandem...at a demo...with a woman on front! :ph34r: ...but that's a whole other story.










~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~

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Depends on skill AND currency.

An experienced, very-current canopy pilot can do it, reliably, with one toggle and one riser. And that's fine.

But for those with less than that level of skill AND CURRENCY - so I'm including a lot of multi-hundred-jump weekend warriors in here - KISS! - keeping it simple - i.e., having both hands doing the same thing and landing on rears - is a good idea.
Landing on rears is a skill that everyone should train for - at higher altitudes - fairly early on in one's jumping career.

Having said that, if you're of a mind to have "one rear and one toggle" in your tool bucket, train for that before you need it, too.

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Having tried both now (not with science in mind, just Shit Happening), I definitely got a better result with one-riser-one-toggle. Though that may have been because I had lots of jumps on that canopy, was landing the other for the very first time.

On the gripping hand, the plural of "anecdote" still isn't "evidence", so I reckon I'll defer to the guy with more samples.
--
"I'll tell you how all skydivers are judged, . They are judged by the laws of physics." - kkeenan

"You jump out, pull the string and either live or die. What's there to be good at?

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I had a brake line snap on opening. All I did was use the other toggle to fly straight, and landed with a PLF. I have a larger parachute (160), so this might not be applicable if you jump a smaller canopy.

If you need to flare I would definitely use both rears.

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If you need to flare I would definitely use both rears.



And hopefully, one has already practiced rear-riser flares up high. The idea is discover where the stall point is on rears so that one doesn't exceed it when flaring for landing.

I quit counting rear-riser landings...do 'em for fun.
No, I'm no swooper. although I did swoop the pond one time.
I missed the water by mere.....hundreds of feet.
:D:D
My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

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I have done two intentional practice landings on my rears only, so I'll probably go with "what I've tried before"...

Very hard to stand up due to lots of forward velocity I didn't eliminate enough (I slid one, I think: Several years ago).

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So, you just had a line over on your reserve, and you used your hook knife to cut the brake line and clear the malfunction. Now you only have one good toggle/brake. Do you land using both rears, or one toggle and one rear?
Discuss.



When I had mine.. it was a sunset load I had deployed and on opening pulled my handles from the keepers... and had nothing but a handle in my left hand with that steering line trailing out nicely behind my main.

So sunset load... out about half a mile over the bayou.... with Swamp Thing and his little buddies looking up at me.

I opted to keep the canopy and land it with rears since it was flying very very nicely.... so I did a few practice flares with the rears while still at altitude

I landed with both rears... in zero wind with no issue other than a bit of a butt slide on the turf...

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So, you just had a line over on your reserve, and you used your hook knife to cut the brake line and clear the malfunction. Now you only have one good toggle/brake. Do you land using both rears, or one toggle and one rear?
Discuss.



I think this should be a 'sticky' thread, wouldn't hurt.
What goes around, comes later.

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I've twice had one toggle hung up and landed both times with one toggle and one rear riser. And I have no problem remembering how to PLF.

One was a Samurai 136 and the other was a Katana 120.

I teach cross control (which is this similar scenario) in my canopy course. When I ask the class to do this they are usually a bit nervous. But after my explanation they all do the excercise.

I also fly 80% of each of my canopy flights with harness and rears only. I just feel more in control.

I've also made numerous demo jumps on my PD reserve. The combination of my practice cross control flights and the number of demo reserve rides allows me to feel very confident of my decisions to land in this way.

It makes no sense to me to have that program available from all these parachute companies and not take advantage of it.

The cost is one pack job for the PD tour rep if you do it at an event and less than $100.00 if you have one shipped to you for two weekends.

For those who choose not to practice all flight modes or demo their reserves before they need it............ I guess they should keep asking for advice on these forums.
Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.

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Both rears 3 times so far all good (2 on Triathalon 220 1 on Comp Cobalt 170)
come in a little hot? slide it in, just like a Tandem
Worked for me.
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