Anyone have an Argus?

[skydiverton2 0]

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I would recommend you to buy a Vigil II which is more tested than the Argus and way more advanced than the Cypres and more user's friendly. I personnally had a Vigil I and got 2 firings when needed and can tell you that it worked as designed. I now have a Vigil II and I am very happy with it. Having the Vigil interface allowed me to download the data and see my jump graphs and determine that my former Sabre II-170 was opening on 340 feet vertical distance average. Now with my Vigil II download I can tell you that my Katana 170 uses 600 feet average to open. Isn't interesting to have a device you can download the data.

You needed a computer to save your life.....TWICE......?????????????

From a reliability point of view the more complex the software the less reliable..... BY DEFINITION.
The hardest thing to certify for aerospace use is.......software.

Using your droque to gain stability is a bad habid.
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Also in case you jump a sport rig!!!

[CrazyL 0]

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After gaining confidence in the Argus AAD I then began installation. As I got close to the container pop went the cutter. Cutter fired and I have yet to regain confidence in the Argus.

I would like to add that this incident occured in April 2006 All these units (43) have immediately been recalled.

Warm regards,
William

Was the incident of the argus firing in Texas on a student rig that was hanging on a rack part of the 43 recalled units? When did that happen? 2006 was only 2 years ago. Has a year or two of refinements on the Argus worked out ok? Is it everything you'd ever hoped for in an aad? Gotta go change my BOC and install my cypres still it's getting late.

[verticalflier 0]

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I have one and highly recommend them. They pack up clean, I like their strong casing, they're waterproof, the batteries are easy (and cheap) to replace, and they have great customer service... as a rigger and active jumper I've got no complaints!

Ben

I second that. Have had an Argus unit for almost 2 years now. I am very happy with it as well with customer service. I just ordered another unit for my second rig.
Thanks to Karl and Argus team for their hard work!
Leszek

[TrojanHorse 0]

Was the incident of the argus firing in Texas on a student rig that was hanging on a rack part of the 43 recalled units?***



We never had an incident in Texas. We never had a unit that activated while hanging on a rack. This must have been an AAD of another brand.

We had in April 2006 a unit that activated while being installed. That was the reason to recall the 43 units.


William
Aviacom/ Argus

[CrazyL 0]

Thanks William. I have had issues with the Vigil as well. AAD's that fire prematurely, that cut loops prematurely and too easy are not part of my gear. I still havent got confidence in your product. I still do not do rigging for any jumper with an Argus or a Vigil in there rig. It's about confidence. As jumpers are replacing the original cypres these days and are shopping around for the next best thing why not choose cypres 2. As many jumpers seek my objective opinion and respect my suggestions on which AAD to replace the cypres 1 with, I still choose the cypres 2. I still choose to only install an aad that I have confidence in. Sorry yours still has not worked out, maybe in a couple of years, we shall see.

[erdnarob 1]

As I said I have had some posts about my 2 firings on this forum but for you I will say it again.

1) First time was at Perris. I had a low pull (at about 1400 feet) since 5 girls of my outside loop were tracking above me and I waited too long. My Vigil fired when my main was deploying then I got a nice biplane which I landed.
2) Second time was at Rantoul in the DC9 still on the ground when the pilot started pressurizing the airplane. The Vigil approach is to have its device ready all the time while the Cypres is armed if you reach first 1500 feet and the Argus at 1400 feet. With a Vigil you are protected as soon as the airplane climb past 150 feet.
In both cases, after dowloading the data from the Vigil, I could see that the device had worked as designed. At Perris if I had pulled 1/8 of second earlier, the Vigil wouldn't have fired.
BTW I made more than 1700 jumps without of an AAD. I got a Vigil when I reached 60. Other questions ?

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

[erdnarob 1]

Confidence????? when Airtec recently recall 900 Cypres 2 !!!!! Are you reading your technical bulletins?

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

[CrazyL 0]

Yes and i've checked all my customers. All good here considering Airtecs recall. The Argus recall. The Vigil cutters. Yes and i'm just a little bit upset about aad's. Risk management. It's risky having one and it's risky not to have one. It's even more difficult as a rigger to take on the responsibility of installing such a questionable device. aad's have increasingly become a pain in the butt to deal with as a rigger as well. For what I make in money per aad service and install versus what I must keep up with concerning manuals/ updates/ recalls/ service bulletins and coordinating shipping and receiving for the customer along with having to 'trust' that aad's in the rigs that i service will perform properly. I lose on aad's. I trust the jumper and the H/C and the reserve canopy way more than an aad. I like the idea of an aad. So which is your aad of choice and why? why not the other aad's on the market?

[danielcroft 2]

I have a Vigil 2. My wife has a Cypress 2.

WARNING: Noob opinion follows!

Seems to me that all the AADs have had issues at some point or other, so I bought one that was meant to be user friendly, good quality and relatively inexpensive. I did some research and didn't find any major issues reported on the Vigil 2 (when I bought it) so I went ahead.

[erdnarob 1]

One has to remind that Airtec is established for more than 16 years while Vigil is there since 2003 and Argus since 2005 if my memory is right. Airtec, has sold a lot of AADs during those years and is certainly more at ease financially than new comers like Vigil and Argus. Airtec has also had its share of problems and still has some. Too bad that Airtec is still providing AAD's with a not so friendly display window and very fragile wiring. But now Airtec has serious competitors.
OTOH there is a difference between what the companies decide to do and the reality. I know there is service bulletins but we as riggers have our own judgement too. For instance, there is a "recall" in order to replace all Vigil cutters of type 2 because of the possibility they have a burr inside the hole. I had one of those (a spare one) and I tested it. How? I put a foot long of reserve closing loop cord in a vise and threaded the cutter to be tested on that cord and applied tension at the end then I manipulated the cutter back and fore straight along the cord and at all possible angles for about 3 minutes to check if the cutter was damaging the loop. Afterward the loop was perfect and not frayed at all. I appears that Vigil recall them all since they might be some cutters still with a burr in a very specific batch. I wiil not hesitate to use that cutter on my own rig even if Vigil is ready yto change it for free with a cutter of type 3. Comparing the 3 devices, there is no doubt that 2 are more advanced than the third one.

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

[CrazyL 0]

The cutter check. I did similar test with the vigil cutter , argus cutter and cypres cutters. I tried to simulate the angles of the line as it passes from side to side through the grommets in the flaps. The vigil and argus cutters frayed the cypres loop line during my field test. I had 2 rigs that I serviced in the past that had the vigil cutter fray the closing loop. Could'nt see the fray or tell that the cutter did do the damage till after the rig was opened back up for service 120+days later. I understand the construction and design and assembly and inspection and packing bla bla bla of a H/C and canopies. I hardly know squat about the aads construction ,design. I'm supposed to. So in the past I ask reps from each aad. The most useful people to deal with were representing the cypres and vigil. The Argus guy put me off as some low life idiot. Totally disrespectful. So I really did'nt get a good education from that guy Carl about the Argus. And I was in the shop where the one fired in my hands and the cutter frayed the loop material. This was also the place that had 20+ Argus aads hanging in the balance pushing me to install such crap. I woulod'nt install any Argus after having one fire in my hand on the ground in a shop. Having been belittled by the Argus rep. Having found that with similar test to their cutter as other aads, and the Argus cutter failing, I choose not to install an Argus till I have a good understanding of it's design and construction, have good communication with the company. Otherwise what is your choice of aad and why, and why not the others?

[piisfish 135]

I think you should open a new thread entitled : VigilII, What else ?

The OP asked about "who has an Argus and what do owners think about it"

scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM

[TrojanHorse 0]

Dear Larry,

We do respect your opinion, but all things that you are writing dates back to April 2006. These issues have been dealt with in a responsible way and are history.

More info you can find at our website www.argus-aad.com.

If you need even more info you can contact us at [email protected] or call +32-485 868788. You also can Skype: williamargus2006. Feel free to call anytime.

Warm regards,

William
Aviacom/ Argus