flaring inconsistency

[schon267 0]

I need to pick everybody's brains!!
I can't seem to be consistent landing on my feet. it's really frustating to execute a landing great one time, then the next time I'm sliding in to second base!! I am 192lbs jumping a 210 or 220 sq.ft main. which I've been jumping for probably 40 jumps. (I have 68 total jumps) I feel comfortable with the canopy.
the thing I think I am is paranoid about is flaring to early, so consequently I may flare a tad to late, which leads to the sliding into second base thing .

I have talked with all the instructors I had at z-hills and their all outstanding people! I've taken a canopy class too with martin and sally, but something is just not clicking?

did anybody else go through this problem, and if you did, what set you straight? I have no desire to be a daredevil when landing, and I do not turn hard when low, nice soft 1/2 brake turns, but I just need to be consistent at standing up my landings!!

help please, thanks, steve

[NewGuy2005 51]

Here's a trick I used:

If you are landing near a structure, like a hangar, use it to time your flare. If the roof is about the right height, it makes it easy. When you are level with the roof, FLARE!!

You can't always do this, but when you can, it helps. I just had to do it a few times and now I can judge the height the "normal" way.

[schon267 0]

thanks, sounds like a good trick, you jump pretty close to the same size canopy, are you figuring on about 12' high to start your flare?

[councilman24 36]

Okay, first off IGNORE THIS ADVICE

Quote

Here's a trick I used:

If you are landing near a structure, like a hangar, use it to time your flare. If the roof is about the right height, it makes it easy. When you are level with the roof, FLARE!!

You can't always do this, but when you can, it helps. I just had to do it a few times and now I can judge the height the "normal" way.

Okay, maybe a little harsh but......

This probably works for the poster but MAY NOT work for you and your canopy.

Just one variable for each landing..... Perceived response to the flare in relation to the ground depends on wind speed. The canopy doesn't act any differently in relation to the air, but to the ground it does. If your only moving 3 mph GROUND speed because of 18 mph wind speed (the canopy's AIR speed either flying or during flare doesn't change ) you have to slow down much less to get a no step landing. If instead your ground speed is 30 mph because you going downwind in a 9 mph wind you have a lot more speed relative to the ground to bleed off.

Each landing and flare are different depending on the conditions, not only wind speed but density altitude (hot, humid, cold, dry), loading (lots of winter cloths?), turbulence effecting the efficiency of the parachute air foil, etc. etc. And the height to start a flare is not consistent.

Eventually you will learn to "feel" some of these things in flight and adjust your dynamic flare to the situation.

I'm old for my age.
Terry Urban
D-8631
FAA DPRE

[diablopilot 2]

I pounded in for my first 100 jumps. Really.

Without seeing you fly I'll just mention one thing.

Looking down at the ground where you're going to touch down makes it very difficult to cosistantly and accurately determine your height. So if you ever see your feet when you're getting ready to flare you're probably not looking where you're suposed to be. Try looking at the bigger picture by looking ahead of you, you'll be able to tell how high you are more easily no matter what wind conditions are.

----------------------------------------------
You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[DSE 3]

I struggled with ths for the first 20/30 jumps as well. Two different instructors gave me differing advice, combining their advice worked for me. YMMV;

1-pick up your vision so you're not looking at the ground, this will alleviate the fear/feeling of intense ground rush and help you time you flare better

2. As you feel that you need to flare, hesitate; flare when you feel your at the last possible second of flaring.

Only by flaring too soon or too late will you figure it out. It doesn't vary greatly from canopy to canopy, IMO, but that's based on my owning only five canopies so far. Maybe that opinion will change when I've owned ten.
The whole "Teeth/Tits/Tush" sequence (Some call it Eyes, Chest, All the way down) starts as a three-stage process, but eventually becomes one fluid motion.
You might hire someone to shoot your landings and have an instructor go over the vid with you in slow motion. That should help a lot.

[darkwing 4]

It would be useful for us to know what kind of canopy you are jumping, not just the size. Flaring techniques can vary considerably depending on the canopy.

-- Jeff
My Skydiving History

[NewGuy2005 51]

Quote

Okay, first off IGNORE THIS ADVICE

Quote

Here's a trick I used:

If you are landing near a structure, like a hangar, use it to time your flare. If the roof is about the right height, it makes it easy. When you are level with the roof, FLARE!!

You can't always do this, but when you can, it helps. I just had to do it a few times and now I can judge the height the "normal" way.

Okay, maybe a little harsh but......

This probably works for the poster but MAY NOT work for you and your canopy.

Can't argue with you on that. It is a pretty crude technique, but it will help you stop flaring at 30'

[councilman24 36]

It IS a good technique for the very new jumper on student type canopies, especially non zp canopies. But this can be dangerous past a few jumps and with smaller or ZP canopies, especially as you change canopies. As you will learn flaring is a dynamic process with as many variations as jumps.

And it doesn't help when your out in the middle of the corn field. BTW do NOT flare for the top of the 8 foot tall corn.

I'm old for my age.
Terry Urban
D-8631
FAA DPRE

[drdive 0]

You are in FL. Take a Scott Miller canopy course in Deland. He videos every landing and works with you in improving technique, as well as canopy control in the air tips too. I took it at about 250 jumps, and learned a lot.

Ed

"We saved your gear. Now you can sell it when you get out of the hospital and upsize!!" "K-Dub"

"

[Thanatos340 1]

Quote

did anybody else go through this problem, and if you did, what set you straight?

I think Most people go through this problem.

My suggestion: Talk to your instructors at the DZ. Pick ONE person and listen to them. Having a bunch of different people making different suggestions can be very confusing.

A couple years ago There was a Girl at my Home DZ that was having a lot of landing issues. (It didn’t help that she was a Cute girl) so every canopy Pilot would come up to her after every landing and suggest something different. She was being told 10 different things by 10 different people and trying them all.

I finally pulled her aside and said come with me. I took her to a Cessna DZ not far away where there was one and only one person (the DZO there) that would help her. It worked. After several jumps there she had it and I dont think she had any trouble after that.

The canopy pilots at the Home DZ were certainly much better Pilots but when you have a bunch of people telling you different things, It will only confuse you more in my opinion.

[AFFI 0]

Lot’s of advice you will receive for asking, some good, some applies…

The common denominator is that it takes everyone X amount of landings before they begin to get it dialed in.
For me, I was slow to learn how to pilot a canopy and it took me hundreds of landings before reaching a level of proficiency.
So don’t be hard on yourself, learning to land safely in varying conditions is one of the more difficult aspects of this sport.

The trick is, while you are getting it “dialed in”, you do not want to injure yourself.

If you are “sliding” in you are most definitely increasing the possibility of injuring your tailbone.

Have an instructor go over what is commonly referred to as the PLF landing. Sure there are arguments over the semantics, but the idea is to take a landing that you are not going to standup and distribute the force of the impact to your body in a manner that will lessen the chance of an injury

First point of contact should be your feet.
Then the idea is to keep your extremities close to the body as your roll out the force of the impact.

I was fortunate to have instructors that encouraged me to practice the PLF technique off of a training platform, so practice I did – a lot.

Learning how to PLF is most definitely the only reason I have not sustained any serious injuries so far with a botched landing and I still incorporate them to this day.

Learn it, and keep it fundamental.
-

Mykel AFF-I10
Skydiving Priorities: 1) Open Canopy. 2) Land Safely. 3) Don’t hurt anyone. 4) Repeat…

[shropshire 0]

I did a Canopy course... which helped no end....

I hope this article helps too.....Click Here

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[2cmyzx 0]

Here is what helped me,
A: Find a small cessna dz
B: Buy Hop and Pops for 10 bucks 100$=10 jumps or if you perfer 10 landingsC: Seek out the best canopy pilot at that DZ and have him watch your landings.
D: If possible get a video of each landing and have said canopy pilot debrief you on itE: a couple of days of this and you will feel much more confident in your landings

[schon267 0]

thanks for everyones help!!

one note though, I don't look at my feet when I'm coming in to land, I do look out in front of me. like I said before, I think I'm paranoid about flaring too early. don't ask me why, I guess because if I did flare too early, I think I would still be 10' off the ground or something?

question, if you did flare a tad to early, and ended up say 8' off the ground at the end of your flare, would you just gently float the rest of the way down?? I watch people land all the time, trying to pick up techniques, sometimes a person looks like they flare to soon, but they just float the last few feet down.

thanks for all the help, I will take another canopy class, or have someone work with me personally.

oh, I've been jumping mostly student gear, but the last few times I've been, I've ented demo gear with zp canopys. thanks again, steve

[Skydivesg 6]

It's very difficult if not impossible for someone to give you decent advise without watching you (or a video of you) flying your canopy.

The best advise is the one who said to go to Scott Miller's Essential Skills Canopy Course.
You commit to making five hop & pops from 5000 feet in one day. He films every landing and coaches you for about an hour during the debrief after every jump. You will have more knowledge about canopy flight than you can ever imagine. And you will know exactly what it takes to get a good landing under your canopy and pretty much any canopy you ever jump.
If you ask "what is the course like?" it would be like some who has never jumped asking you what it's like to jump. You have to experience it.

If I were you I would do whatever it takes to get to his course. Even if you had to not jump for a short time to afford the course which is very reasonable.
He is in Deland. His number is (386) 837-9647.

Good luck and Safe Landings
Sandy

[mangledspoon 0]

First 100? That makes me feel a little better hehe.
What was your reason? Just looking at the ground or were there other factors?

[SethInMI 145]

I had the same "flare too late" problem. If I didn't stand up my landing, it was because it was a butt slide. I think it all stemmed from my FJC when we watched a vid of someone flaring at about 30' or so and then dropping straight down onto his/her tailbone. That scared me into always flaring at the absolute last second (or 1 second too late), and having too quick a toggle stroke.

I cured myself of this by starting to flare higher and more gently. Several times I did flare too high (not 30', more like 5-10'), but when you do flare a little too high, it is not the end of the world, just don't let up on the toggles and prepare to PLF. Almost everytime I flared high I was able to stand it up.

The few times I flared high and did not stand it up it was because my toggle stroke was not even. When you flare high, you end up having to sit in deep brakes for a few seconds, and a slight uneven flare will eventually cause you to turn and dive to one side and end up dumping you on your side. I fixed this uneven flare problem by practicing flying in deep brakes at altitude, intentionally starting turns by moving a toggle slightly and then stopping the turn by applying opposite toggle. This practice made landing in deep brakes (from a high flare) much easier.

From one buttsliding noob to another, I hope that helps!

Seth
I jump a Tri at about 1:1 WL.

It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

[VTcnix 0]

I cant say anything any better than what has already been said by people who have way more experience than I do, but I feel the need to chip in since I am one of those people who struggled with landing up to about 200 jumps..
I think that my main problem was that I fubared a few and then let those really wreck my confidence about landing. I would be so anxious about screwing up in front of everyone and embarassing myself or having my DZO see me and kick me off of the DZ for being such a horrible canopy pilot. This anxiety led me to overthink all of my landings and resulted in the self fufilling phophecy of me rolling around in the dirt.
No advice that people gave me about how to improve my landings helped because what I needed to do is to simply stop stressing about it and start "feeling the landing".

What I did:
I purposely started landing at the far edge of the dropzone... That way I wasn't right there in front of everyone who was spectating... If I fell, I fell and no one would see it... The extra walking was well worth the allieviated stress.
Once I stopped worrying, and accepting that I was not going to get it right everytime I started have steadily nice tip toe landings.... those increased my confidence to start landing in the main area and things have been great ever since...

Oter than that the best advice I have heard (I have heard quite a bit "Fly your canopy to the ground" a very simply thing, but alot of people will actually stop flying right before they get to the ground because they are in such a hurry to have their feet touch the earth... Don't be in a hurry to touch down,.. work through the flare and remember to keep correcting your canopy to straight and level flight til you are done...
Hope this helps! Good luck

BTW: I've heard Scott Miller speak before and he is a great person to gain some knowledge from if you get the chance

[schon267 0]

you guys are great, I take all the advise in stride. thanks for the opinions.
you know, I am a 5 time fl state eight ball champion at pool and have done everything I've got into above average, I guess that's why not executing these landings is giving me the proverbial red ass!!!
thanks again, steve