Skymaster

[coreyangel 0]

Being new to the sport, I get a lot of different answers to a couple of questions. I would like to ask the same two questions here to see what everyone else thinks.

1) For those of you that teach students, what is the heaviest student you would consider putting in a Skymaster 230?

2) For anyone that wishes to answer, what do you consider is the point a jumper goes from student to novice and a novice to intermediate?

The easy answer to question one is "look on the tag on the canopy and it will tell you the max weight" this I know, but I have a lot of people with different points of view on this.

There are no right or wrong answers to this. I just want to see how other sky divers view these subjects.

Thank you.

Learn from others' mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all yourself.
POPS 10672

[countzero 7]

IMO- you go from student to novice when you get you A liscense.

going from novice to intermediate is alot harder to pin point, as there are many factors to consider. like skill set, continued instruction, and currency. plus it probably happens more than once in a skydivers jumping span, if they branch out into different disciplines.

diamonds are a dawgs best friend

[dragon2 0]

We have rules about that, wingload max 1.1 for <100 jumps, so a ~225lbs person max.

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[VTmotoMike08 0]

Quote

1) For those of you that teach students, what is the heaviest student you would consider putting in a Skymaster 230?

I am not an instructor and I am not familiar with that canopy. Is it an older F-111 canopy? If so, I believe 1:1 is the generally accepted practical maximum for any canopy made of all F-111 material. I have landed an F-111 canopy loaded at 1.2:1 and it was not really something I would like to do again.

[mircan 0]

I can only say about slightly bigger skymaster 290. we put guys with about 120kg (kilograms, I don`t have time to calculate wingload in lb (pounds) to you) but no big deal. Skymaster is humonguous. Just listen to your instructor. I jumped only once with this canopy (test jump) and even then I had about 300 jumps so far, so i can`t talk objectively. It is slower than navigator and all of our students prefered Skymaster over PD Navigator more. Even me. It packs easier.

Again, ask your instructors, but have no fear. You are gonna like it.

my 2c

dudeist skydiver #42

[Gary73 8]

Students should have a wing loading between 0.6 and 0.9 pounds per square foot, depending on wind conditions, general physical fitness, previous performance, and total experience. At 0.9 PSF, a student's max exit weight for a 230 would therefor be 207 pounds (0.9 times 230). A student rig, helmet, etc. will weigh around 30 pounds, so figure around 175 for the max student weight without gear.

Yeah, the USPA licenses correspond fairly well with the distinctions among student, novice, and intermediate. In fact the older USPA publications referred to the A, B, C, and D licenses as Novice, Intermediate, Advanced, and Master.

Actually I would say that there are wrong answers to your questions. Too many jumpers get injured and even killed because they jump canopies that they're not ready for. The Incident Reports in Parachutist are just the tip of the iceburg when it comes to injuries. No one likes to be told that they're not good enough to do something, but it's pretty clear that more people do need to be told just that.

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan

[dfairleigh11 0]

I jumped a Skymaster 230 once, when I was a student, on jump 25

Only thing I didn't like was that the leg straps on the harness were so damn tight that it made for a really painful opening.

And I was feeling a bit out of my mind that day anyway, after my first reserve ride - I jumped three different canopies that day - the Skymaster 290 that was the usual, the reserve after I chopped, and the Skymaster 230. I remember the reserve being zippier than the 230.

Chalk that up to stupid things I've done, before I had any sense at all.

"We'll start the ass kissing with you"

[coreyangel 0]

I agree with you when you say that there are wrong answers to this question, however, I was referring to this discussion only when I said no wrong answers. The one true correct answer is "your instructor has the final word. Period." I am in no way asking these questions to try to counter what my instructor has told me. The reason I asked these is because every self proclaimed sky god tries to pull me to the side and tell me what they think is the "gospel". Usually they start their conversations with "This is how it is really done at another drop zone"

I just decided to see what other people think on this subject, that's all.

Learn from others' mistakes, you will never live long enough to make them all yourself.
POPS 10672

[AllisonH 0]

Quote

The one true correct answer is "your instructor has the final word. Period."

I think that probably true 95% of the time. However, if your instructor is asking you to do something more aggressive/advanced than you are comfortable with (be it downsize, go off radio, pull lower, move on to the next jump, whatever), I think it is always within your right as the student to question the instructor. Maybe they have a really good reason for it and you need to listen, but maybe if they hear your concerns they'll back off a little and stick with something you're more comfortable with for a while.

[DrewEckhardt 0]

Quote

I agree with you when you say that there are wrong answers to this question, however, I was referring to this discussion only when I said no wrong answers. The one true correct answer is "your instructor has the final word. Period."

An AFF-I rating doesn't magically bestow knowledge about all things skydiving.

I know one AFF-I that hadn't learned enough about canopy flight in several thousand jumps to save herself from a low turn incident in which she nearly died from internal bleeding.

Plenty of AFF-I's got away with bad canopy choices during their early skydiving careers and either don't run enough students through their programs to notice the statistical correlation between increased wing loadings and higher injury rates or don't have the powers of observation to notice.

Unless your instructors are people like Brian Germain (> 10,000 jumps, designs parachutes, teaches canopy flight professionally), there are recognized industry experts that know more than your instructors.

Advice from the experts (whether oral, written, or third hand) which is more conservative than what you're getting from your instructors should be followed.

Brian Germain says that people exiting at 198 to 220 pounds should be under a canopy no smaller than 230 square feet for their first 20 jumps and that the absolute limit is around 230 pounds for that experience level.

http://www.bigairsportz.com/pdf/bas-sizingchart.pdf

Given student wind limitations, I don't think that a lower weight limit would be inappropriate.

[mjosparky 3]

This is what PISA says about it.

Sparky

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[ufk22 32]

About 140# without gear would be the most I'd want to load this canopy for a student.
The Skymaster is a great student canopy, very docile, almost impossible to stall (if not overloaded).
I've put out tons of students under the 290's. We usually kept 1 230 around for the very-very lightweight women. We sometimes let the bigger guys jump it late in their student career (over 20 jumps) but not take it to 1/1 loading.
By the way, there are right and wrong answers to this question and most any skydiving question. There may well be more than 1 right answer, but there are definitely wrong answers. Anyone who tells you that sub-20 jump students should be flying any canopy loaded at or over 1/1 is WRONG. Period.

This is the paradox of skydiving. We do something very dangerous, expose ourselves to a totally unnecesary risk, and then spend our time trying to make it safer.

[riggerrob 558]

I have dropped hundreds of static-line, IAD and FF students with Skymaster 290 canopies. We usually had Skymaster 230, Hornet 190 and Pilot 188 canopies for students nearing their A Certificates.

Since first-time students should be limited to wing-loadings of .7 pounds per square foot, multiply 230 X .7 = 161 exit weight.
161 - 30 pounds (of equipment) = 131 pounds.
So I would only loan a Skymaster 230 to a first jump student who weighs less than 130 pounds.

A heavier student would have to demonstrate five good landings (predictable patterns, into the wind, stand-ups in the correct field, etc.) before they would be allowed to progress from a Skymaster 290 to a Skymaster 230.
Then they would have to demonstrate five good landings on Skymaster 230 before they would be allowed to progress to Hornet 190, etc.