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Would you want and pay for a digital version of all rigging manuals? This archive would contain all manuals from The Riggers Sourcebook forward to all current manuals your would find on line today. The archive would be contained inside of two compact di
Thomas Olson
Sr. Parachute Rigger
Skydive Supplies
http://www.skydivesupplies.com

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I voted $100 on the assumption I was a rigger, doing repacks for $40 apiece (plus the love of skydiving).

I would seriously hope it came with periodic updates. I don't know how often changes come out, but any pay-for resource that has everything "except these rigs" is not earning its keep.

-=-=-=-=-
Pull.

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Not being a rigger but having an idea of the work involved to get all the stuff together and set it up properly, i'd say 80 bucks would be a good deal, maybe 100. I guess it would sell well, which i based my price guess on

That is having updated old, bad photos replaced with clear new illustrations.
No yearly update fee, but an update CD (for little money) whenever there are enough new systems out there.

That being PDF or HTML. Both have the ability to hyperlink, PDF even inside the open document.

Edited to add: Simply scanning in the book wouldn't be worth 20 bucks.
The mind is like a parachute - it only works once it's open.
From the edge you just see more.
... Not every Swooper hooks & not every Hooker swoops ...

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Yep, but there are scanning services with scanners that can scan any number of pages automatically (used almost exclusively by hireable document management companies i assume).

I once scanned an old booklet, ran it through optical character recognition and then edited the contents for spelling errors (from OCR). Lots of work, not even imagery.

I guess it would be a lot of work to edit it (talking weeks here), but due to the output format the actual medium to be sold would be really cheap and for the rather low price of 100 bucks more people, and presumably not only riggers, would buy it.
Question is, make it a digital image collection of an existing book or a convenient resource with nifty features (computers just can't search for words in image files...).

Next question is, would it sell enough to make a profit? Tough question. Thats the one for the businessman.

Always thinking of becoming a rigger one day, i would really like to see something like that out there.

But remember, i am not a rigger, so i don't really know how much the computer-convenience thing matters to them. I just think when you do it, do it as right as to make good use of the tools the computer provides. Would also help sell it i guess.

Long topic line, btw...;)
The mind is like a parachute - it only works once it's open.
From the edge you just see more.
... Not every Swooper hooks & not every Hooker swoops ...

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I would need to be able to click on a topic in the index and it take me right to that page...



And have the content throughout all of the manuals searchable from a single search.
--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

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I would love all the electronic benefits mentioned above, but for just the scan's (in PDF for example) on disks I would pay a $ 100,- For a full electronic version I would pay $200,- And about $ 30,- for yearly updates on both. I am not a rigger, but a material nut. And the book itself (costing about $ 500,- if I'm not mistaken?) is way to expansive for me.... I already have pointers I and II, but for an electronic version (with search options etc.) I would pay about $ 30-40, if I didn't have the book already $40-50. I do want rights to install all the cd's on at least 3 computers though. (prefferably 5) Since I have a different computer at home and at the DZ and probably will buy a laptop in a couple of years.
The trouble with skydiving; If you stink at it and continue to jump, you'll die. If you're good at it and continue to jump, you'll see a lot of friends die...

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Yeah, but the book is in excess of 2000 pages of materials.



Yes, and doing the project properly would take some time, but the end product would be fantastic. Nice job for a guy on a pension, eh? A decent flat-bed scanner and some OCR software are all you really need. The TD (training development) guys at my last job were complete cavemen (the youngest guy in the shop was 64 years old), making free-hand changes to documents and then re-typing entire manuals; unbelievable. I taught them how to work an HP scanner and the OCR that came with it and they thought I was Jesus. It's still tedious work, especially when you are working with less-than-perfect copies of original manuals, but the end PDF document result is totaly worth it. I agree that simply scanning the pages as images would be pretty lame and also storage-space prohibitive.

Chuck

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Chuck, you volenteering to help on this? ;)

I know the scope of a project like this is HUGE, but with PIA only 9 months away if the product was for sale by then, it would probally sell like hotcakes there.
Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

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Not really. Many manufacturer manuals are already being distributed in electronic form, and the ones that haven't are going that way. It is, or it will be easy for riggers to download the manuals themselves.

The Mirage my we just got for my wife didn't even come with a printed manual... Just a CDROM.

_Am
__

You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

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Try and find the instructions to a Briefcase or a FXC12000 in PDF format currently on the web... Older manuals just don't exist in electronic format current. For example the current Sunpath manual does not tell how to route the cables if you have soft housings. And something like that is in the older manuals... and it is important.
Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

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and it is important.



I guess. Neither FXC12000 or soft-housings are common at my DZ, and the riggers tend to refuse to repack (or strongly recomend upgrades to) rigs equipped with either.

Just from what I've observed, its a pretty rare case where you can't find a manual online for the gear that most people are using. I don't ever plan on being a "full service" rigger, so I see little value in historical manuals.

The question posed was "Would I want or pay for....", and my answer is "no".

_Am
__

You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

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It's already been done and it's free!

Check out http://www.parachuteriggers.com/packing%20instructions.htm

I know the guy and he says if you have something you want posted he'll try to get it done.

He has a LOT of older manuals too, not all of which he has put on the site so go to the site and ask, you might get it!

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