Line twists under a Velocity really suck!

[ccowden 0]

Well, it took 2,285 jumps, but I got my first cutaway.

Last load of the day and I deployed at 3,300 feet under my Velocity 96 loaded at about 2.1. It got to line stretch and just started to snivel when it started pulling me around hard to the left. Once she started to go, there was no stoppin' her. by the time it was fully inflated there were two full line twists and it was diving to the ground in a hard spin. I watched it for a second to see if the twist would stop, but it just kept going. By the time it had 5 twists in it and wasn't slowing down, I knew there was no stopping them, let alone getting out of them. Peel, peel, punch, punch and I was under my reserve. Very quick, nice opening.

I followed my Velocity to close to where I figured it would land and landed next to a road near a farmer's field. Friggin' Raven 135 flies and lands like garbage, but it saved my life, so I guess I can't complain too much. Lost sight of my pilot chute and freebag and have yet to find it.

Actually was kinda fun! Sid's Rigging for the save and the amazing service! I woke up the next morning to a packed up, ready to jump rig, never missing a beat! You rock Peter!

And yes, I bought my beer! And a bottle of Parrot Bay for the rigger.

So, I guess the lessons are: 1) Always be prepared that the next jump may be a malfunction. It took over 2,000 to get one for me. 2) Keep fresh on your emergency procedures for any type of scenerio. 3) If you are gonna jump a highly loaded canopy, you have to be ready to deal with something as simple as line twists becoming a big problem in a hurry. 4) Don't get in the habit of deploying any lower than you are ready to deal with. I bet I lost 1,000 feet in the time it took me to get under my reserve. If you dump at 2,000 feet, you could find yourself in a big mess in a hurry.

Just wish I had been wearing my camera!

[blueskies120 0]

Good Job. What did you have for gear? RSL? Glad you did the right thing. I plan on having a reserve ride on every jump.

Peace Jay

[ccowden 0]

Javelin TJN
Velocity 96
Raven 135
Cypres
No RSL

[ianmdrennan 2]

Yahoo baby!! Welcome to the silver streak club

Nice job on saving your ass.

Now get that reserve all packed up for next weekend.

See you then!!

Blue ones,
Ian

Performance Designs Factory Team

[sundevil777 94]

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Friggin' Raven 135 flies and lands like garbage,

A familiar story for highly loaded Ravens (sudden stalls often part of the story also). My last 2 under my spare have been beautiful stand-ups. A much better way to end an exciting jump.

People are sick and tired of being told that ordinary and decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I’m certainly not, and I’m sick and tired of being told that I am

[diablopilot 2]

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Friggin' Raven 135 flies and lands like garbage,

At your loading (Aprox 1.45 to 1.5?) yes.

I'd never advise someone to jump a Raven Dash M at over about a 1.3 loading.

The R-Max is a different story.

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

[skymedic 0]

what is your wing loading on your raven? I didn't have any problems on my cutaway with my Dash-M loaded at 1.1.

Marc
otherwise known as Mr.Fallinwoman....

[diablopilot 2]

If he's 2.1 on the 96 it's safe to assume he's about 1.45 to 1.5 on the 135 Dash M.

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

[speedy 0]

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It got to line stretch and just started to snivel when it started pulling me around hard to the left.

I had exactly the same problem yesterday with my velocity. I managed to stop it going into twists by pulling on the right rear riser. The problem then was as the snivel ended it suddenly changed to a hard right turn that nearly put me in twists.
The last time it did this I went into twists and that also resulted in a reserve.

Dave

Fallschirmsport Marl

[ccowden 0]

Loading the Raven at about 1.5

The stall point was at about my ears. Had a pretty hard landing with no chance of standing it up.

Up to this point, I never heard that a Raven would fly like that when loaded at 1.5. Now that I know, I am looking into replacing it.

Definitely something to learn from that turned out well.

[ccowden 0]

I really think the key is to just lay as still in the harness as possible even if it starts to turn. I have tried to correct it by countering with the oposite riser as well, and it really can get ugly. On this last one, I may have started to "follow" the turn in my harness without really thinking about it. I think if I would have just tried to stay still and straight in the harness, it wouldn't have been so bad. Then again, maybe not. Sometimes it is gonna do what it's gonna do, whether you like it or not.

[sid 1]

btw - I lowered the level of the Parrot Bay a little last night, congrats on saving your ass. Looked for your pilot chute this morning (until this storm rolled in) but no luck. Looks like you're stuck with the dorky one

Pete Draper,

Just because my life plan is written on the back of a Hooter's Napkin, it's still a life plan.... right?

[Hooknswoop 19]

Quote

Loading the Raven at about 1.5

The stall point was at about my ears. Had a pretty hard landing with no chance of standing it up.

Up to this point, I never heard that a Raven would fly like that when loaded at 1.5. Now that I know, I am looking into replacing it.

Definitely something to learn from that turned out well.

There has been a lot of discussion about how Ravens fly and land. I have flown a MR-109-M and a PD-106R and the PD out-performed the Raven in every way.

Derek

[NickDG 23]

I had a similar thing happen twice on a Stiletto. (I had also reached 2000 plus jumps without an un-intentional cutaway)

The first time - I opened with a couple of twists but the canopy was stable. When I reached up to try and clear the twists the canopy took off like something possessed. The canopy went into a violent spin inducing more line twists and placing me almost horizontal to the horizon. I reached for the cutaway and reserve handles but the twists were now traveling down through the risers and I couldn’t pull the cutaway handle. I dropped the reserve handle that I had removed from its pocket with my left hand and used two hands on the cutaway. Then the yoke of my rig (an early Reflex) began to tighten around my neck. The twists are now travailing into the harness and I feel like I’m being strangled. I pulled with all my remaining strength and if the cutaway didn’t come I was going to roll the dice on the reserve handle before I passed out. At that point I finally managed to cutaway and after that it all went normal.

The next time it happened I opened, looked up, saw about three lines twists and just chopped it. Since that time gear manufacturers have addressed the hard cutaway problems to some extent with short cutaway cables and hard housings.

Small canopies are something we still haven’t come to terms with yet as a sport. A small canopy will, sooner or later, inevitably bite you right on the a$$ . . .

Nick DBASE 194

[FrogNog 1]

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The next time it happened I opened, looked up, saw about three lines twists and just chopped it. Since that time gear manufacturers have addressed the hard cutaway problems to some extent with short cutaway cables and hard housings.

By "to some extent", do you mean that hard riser-side cutaway cable housings could still allow tight twists in the risers to cause a hard or impossible cutaway? Or do you mean there are other factors in the difficulty of a cutaway that are not addressed by hard riser-side cutaway cable housings, e.g. dirty cables?

-=-=-=-=-
Pull.

[The111 1]

From your "peel, peel, punch, punch" description it doesn't sound like you hesitated in between your handles. What are people's thoughts on this? I had a cutaway 8 weeks ago from spinning linetwists on a Spectre 170 (I'm sure not nearly as dramatic as yours, but still seemed scary to me). As soon as I chopped I felt really unstable so I arched hard and pulled silver 2 seconds later once I felt somewhat "belly to relative wind". I ended up with a hard whiplash inducing opening, but that was because I had a wingsuit on and left my legwing open in those two seconds before silver, sending myself headlow.

I've read a few descriptions lately of cutaways from spinning tiny Velocities. Most of these descriptions imply that the handles were pulled back to back with no pause. Does that scare anyone? I realize the risk with waiting "2 seconds"... you could wait too long, among other things, which is one reason for an RSL. But many people who jump pocket rockets say they don't want an RSL because they don't want their reserve coming out IMMEDIATELY after cutaway. But then if they pull their handles back to back they are effectively creating the same situation.

I guess I'm wondering how serious of a risk there is of your reserve spinning up if you deploy it right after a fast spinning mal. Being a newbie wingsuit jumper who hasn't perfected his deployments yet, and aspiring to jump high performance canopies in the very distant future, I forsee having to cutaway from linetwists again sometime. I'm still trying to figure out whether I should "punch punch" or "punch wait wait punch".

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[Hooknswoop 19]

Preventing and Curing Line Twists:

Line twists have gone from a common nuisance to a common malfunction on small, highly loaded elliptical canopies. There are techniques for reducing the chances of incurring line twists and correcting them if you do get them.

The first step to handling line twists is to prevent them in the first place. The looser the chest strap is the wider the 3 rings will be on deployment, which makes it harder for line twists to develop. Of course, be sure that your harness is secure enough to keep you from sliding out of it. Make sure your leg straps are even. For free flyers, a piece of bungee or elastic between your leg straps will help keep the leg straps from creeping to the back of your knees and keep the risers loaded evenly on deployment. Evenly loading the harness on deployment by keeping your hips and shoulders level with the ground will help keep the canopy opening on heading. A pre-mature brake release can easily cause line twists and limits your ability to steer away from others immediately after deploying. When stowing the lines on the deployment bag, keep the stows neat and even. Refer to your owner's manual or call the manufacturer for the correct size rubber bands. Leave 12 to 18 inches of excess line between the side with the least amount of excess and the corner of the reserve container. This will prevent the lines from hanging up on the reserve container and twisting the deployment bag as it leaves the container. A worn out pilot chute can spin on deployment, which can spin the deployment bag. Replace a pilot chute that has holes in the fabric or tears in the mesh. Re-line a canopy that is out of trim. If one end cell “A” line has shrunk more than the opposite side, the canopy will open turning in the direction of the shorter line. Also, if one steering line has shrunk more than another or has excessive twists in the line, the canopy will want to turn in the direction of the shorter line on opening. Take care when setting the brakes of your canopy and take out any twists in the steering lines, which shorten the line. Pulling the slider down to the 3 rings can prevent self-induced line twists and most importantly, smooth control inputs.

Even if you take all possible precautions, line twists still happen. If you find yourself under canopy with line twists and the canopy is flying straight, simply kick out of the twists. Make sure you are kicking in the right direction. You can also twist the risers to bring the twists closer to you and reach above the twists for leverage to get yourself out of the twists.

Let's say that you weigh 170 lbs. And that when you open, you have 60% of your weight on one leg stap and 40% on the other. So the harness shifts on opening, so that the links are not even. The canopy begins to spin, creating spinning line twists, i.e. harness steering. As the spin rate increases, so do the "G" forces. Initially you had 102 lbs. (60% of 170 lbs.) in one leg strap and 68 lbs. in the other leg strap, a 34 lb. difference. Now, because of the spinning, you are pulling 2 "G"'s. Now in one leg strap there is 204 lbs. and 136 lbs. in the other, a 68 lb. difference.

If the canopy is spinning with line twists, react quickly, look up at your links and make them even by shifting your weight in the harness. Be careful not to overdo it and cause the canopy to spin in the opposite direction. At the same time, make sure your brakes are still set. You can use any reference you want, but I’ve found using the links to make the risers even is easiest. The canopy should stop spinning and fly straight. Now kick out of the line twists. Again, make sure you are kicking in the right direction. A canopy that is spinning in line twists loses altitude rapidly. It is critical to maintain altitude awareness. If you are on your back, it is because as the canopy opens and you sit down into the harness, you are in a de-arched and stable back-to-earth free fall position. The speeds generated by a spinning canopy can be close or even overlap with free fall speeds. The same aerodynamics forces that would put you back-to-earth in free fall will put you back-to-earth under a spinning canopy. Remember under a highly loaded elliptical, you don’t have much time depending on your pull altitude and you do not want the twists to include the excess cutaway cable in the back of your risers. This can make for a difficult or impossible cutaway. Riser inserts and keeping the cutaway cables clean have been proven to reduce the pull force during a cutaway.

Derek

[ccowden 0]

The reserve handle wasn't pulled immediately after the cutaway, but it was pulled quickly. I would say there was about a 2 second delay. After I pulled the cutaway, I thought very clearly to myself, "Ok, I am clear of my main and not on my back." Other than that, there was no reason to think any longer or try to get into a more belly to earth position. From the way it felt, I would say I was flung outward from my canopy and the relative wind would have been going from my feet to my head, making it quite unlikely that the pilotchute would go anywhere but into clean air.

Atleast that's my take. I don't think I would advise hesitating very long to pull the reserve, even if you feel pretty unstable. A spring loaded pilotchute will generally "find" clean air.

[plankton 0]

At my dz i have heard an advice from person jumping highly loaded elliptical, crossfire, that to prevent line twist you need to grab and hold risers as soon as opening process starts. Never tried that myself. Please, comment is it good or bad advice.

[lewmonst 0]

Quote

Loading the Raven at about 1.5

The stall point was at about my ears. Had a pretty hard landing with no chance of standing it up.

Up to this point, I never heard that a Raven would fly like that when loaded at 1.5. Now that I know, I am looking into replacing it.

Definitely something to learn from that turned out well.

Yep. Replace it. I'm sure you can dig up some threads on here about bad experiences with -M's. I had one. Another jumper broke his back because of one...

My -M is sitting in a box here. I haven't even sold it. Not sure what I'm going to do with it, but I'm not going to jump it, that's for sure.

peace
lew

http://www.exitshot.com

[towerrat 0]

I have also heard that, unfortunately in my limited experience, it hasn't worked. It actually made my openings worse due to a tendency to oversteer. Some highly experienced pilots told me to make sure my feet and knees are together and watch the horizon. It has worked wonders for my openings. I truly believe that it's all about body position.
Unfortunately, no matter who you are, if you jump highly loaded ellipticals you are bound to get a spinner some day no matter what you do.
Just my meager offering

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes!

[The111 1]

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Unfortunately, no matter who you are, if you jump highly loaded ellipticals you are bound to get a spinner some day no matter what you do.

Everybody says this, but I have read the bios of some pro swoopers with 5k+ jumps and zero cutaways. Luck?

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[ccowden 0]

Quote

Quote

Unfortunately, no matter who you are, if you jump highly loaded ellipticals you are bound to get a spinner some day no matter what you do.

Everybody says this, but I have read the bios of some pro swoopers with 5k+ jumps and zero cutaways. Luck?

Yes. To some extent, for sure. They were not always Pro Swoopers. I doubt they were much different than any of us when they had lower jump numbers on a high performance canopy.

Of course, with experience comes knowledge and we can certainly do what we can to reduce the risk of malfunctions, but we are never immune from things going wrong, no matter who you are or how much you know.

[tbrown 26]

Quote

From your "peel, peel, punch, punch" description it doesn't sound like you hesitated in between your handles. What are people's thoughts on this?

The last time I had a cutaway, 24 years ago (I was out of the sport for a long time before returning last year), the moment I pulled my 3 ring I knew the main was gone because it felt like falling through a trapdoor. As for getting stable after a cutaway, there have been suggestions that people should try it from about 3500 ft with an intentional cutaway rig. It generally takes longer and burns up more altitude than a lot of people would feel comfy with, especially as a lot of cutaways happen at or below 2 grand.

Let's not forget that the only fatality at last year's WFFC was a jumper who appeared to be trying to get stable after a cutaway from below a grand. His Cypres even re-acquired his accelerating freefall velocity and in fact released his reserve pilot at about 200 ft - too low and too late.

It has been pointed out by RSL proponents that we're about as stable as we're going to be at the moment of cutaway release, at least for the next several seconds. So if you've dumped whatever kind of canopy at 3 grand'ish and it's acting up on you, you're probably at or below 2 grand by the time you decide things are out of control with your main. And you're probably lower than you realize. I can understand some jumpers (camera jumpers, CRW jumpers, or people with high performing ellipticals) not using an RSL. But once you've chopped you've got ONE priority - get something open while there's still time. You're more likely to run out of time & altitude than you are to twist up a canopy that has to open with 3 line twists just to get its TSO approval.

Your humble servant.....Professor Gravity !

[lewmonst 0]

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It has been pointed out by RSL proponents that we're about as stable as we're going to be at the moment of cutaway release, at least for the next several seconds.

What? I disagree. That may be the case in some malfunctions, but many, especially the one we're talking about in this thread, are violent and can put the jumper on their back. You should be altitude aware enough to know if you have a few seconds to regain stability before deplying your reserve. And if you have the altitude, you should get stable before pulling your reserve, especially when releasing from a spinner. Your decision altitude should be high enough so that you do have that time. 1500 feet is plenty high when cutting away to take 2 seconds and regain stability if needed.

peace
lew

http://www.exitshot.com