Hard Cutaway

[Hooknswoop 19]

I exited at 7,000 ft for an intentional cutaway. I had a Stiletto 97 as the cutaway canopy (at about a 2:1 wing loading). I deployed immediately out the door (for video) and watched the bag spin around twice before the canopy began to deploy. It deployed into two line twists and we were off to the races. It was spinning fast w/ me on my back. I went to even the links to stop the spin and they were even (I am going to check and make sure the steering lines are the same length). I thrashed about a bit as my legs starting going numb, trying anything I could do, just to see if I could get out of the mess. Well nothing worked and looking down to check altitude wasn't working all that well because the ground was pretty blury. So it was time to leave. The cutaway system is a loop of cable just above the chest strap. There is about 10 inches of soft housing, floating free, going to each three-ring. Cutaway forces have been very low on previous cutaways on this system. The excess cable was allowed to float free, it was not in the back of the riser (which does have inserts). Well I pull on the loop, nothing. I grab the loop w/ both hands and pull hard. It came out slow enough I could watch the ends of the yellow cables on their way to the white loops on the three rings.
Most (90%+) of the tension had to be from the white loops on the cables. I am going to look at the risers hard and see how close to RW's specs they are.
Hook

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

Derek,
was the purpose of this intentional cutaway to see what force would be generated on that three ring system with that Spinetto? Please elaborate.
My webpage HERE

[rgoper 0]

Hook:
could you elaborate further, and tell us how the rest of the dive went? I'm curious which canopy you deployed after un-jing the stiletto. Do you have this one on video, i'd be keenly interested in looking at it.
Richard
"The Real Fun Begins At Deployment Time"

[amir1967 0]

What rig it was (RW) so it was a Vector (?) and did you have a belly extra reserve ? is there also cutaway handle for the rear reserve ?
AM67

[skycat 0]

Actually he was just going up to do a normal intentional cutaway, not up to anything other than to mess with the 97. I feel kind of bad cause I was the one who packed the terch. Any way I saw it from the ground spinning, at first I thought he was just doing spirals, but after about the 7th or 8th one and he choped it the first thing I said to the girl next to me was I bet he had spinning line twists. After chopping the stiletto he deployed his Safire 189 normal and other than the 97 being a little bitch when he tried to snag it the first time he managed to catch it the 2nd time and landed on the DZ with it. So he was planning to mess with the 97 and chop it, but line twists weren't part of the plan. I mean how many times though do you do an intentional cutaway and actually have a malfunction.
The set up is a Javalin J4 with a safire 189 and a big ass green 220 something or other reserve with a terch on the front which for this jump had a stiletto 97.

[Hooknswoop 19]

I was just playing. Figured I would go up and stall the snot out of the stiletto and maybe some stall turns, just to see what happens. The Stiletto was in the chest mount and was deployed first. Also, after cutting away I payed careful attention to how long it took me to get stable to pull the main. It took about 200-300 feet before I was belly-to-earth.
Hook

[Hooknswoop 19]

Normal dive after cutting away, deployed the main, a Safire 189. No video.
Hook

[rgoper 0]

Hook:
did it "spook" you, even for a moment? that'd be my luck, go up do an "intentional" and have a mal! YUK.....
Richard

[billbooth 10]

"Cutaway forces have been very low on previous cutaways on this system."

On the previous cutaways, were you spinning? A poorly designed 3-ring system might work fine on a 1 "G" malfunction, but yield a hard or impossible pull on a 3 to 5 "G" spinner. After you check out your risers at the Relative Workshop web page under "technical", let me know how far off they are. Your soft housings may also be a problem. They cannot stretch to meet riser stretch during a high "G" malfunction, and therefore put a lot of force directly on the white loop, instead of letting it be reduced by the rings. Without actually looking at your "breakaway rig", I can't offer any more guidance than that.

[Hooknswoop 19]

I suspected the risers specs weren't up to RW's specs. I will check them and post the results. The soft housings have plenty of slack in them, don't make any hard turns and are fairly short. Previous cutaways on this set-up were from non-spinning, non-malfunctioning canopies.
Hook

[rainman 0]

Bill,
Thanks again for posting the 3-Ring guidelines on your site. Even though I am not jumping a high performance elliptical (Merit 190 loaded at 1:1) , I was wondering whether those guidelines are still valid with the PdF 'inverted' risers ( I don't know the proper term for it, but I mean the type of risers that has the three rings facing down instead of up)?
Blue skies,
Ramon

• Quote

[billbooth 10]

Ramon;
I assume you mean PdF's "Integrity", or backward facing risers, which have no grommet through the main body of the riser. Instead they have a small tab with a grommet on it for the locking loop to go through. (This type of riser came about because of the belief that the through grommet weakens the riser. This is not true, however. Risers actually break where they go around the harness ring.) Nonetheless, the ring alignment rules also apply for this type of riser. However, because the white locking loop does not double back on itself, forming a 2 to 1 pulley, these risers generally have only have half the mechanical advantage of properly made risers. I have tested several different incarnations of this design, and found that while some were better than others, none were as good as the "normal" 3-ring design. Another problem here is that I can't find any published design or performance specs for this type of riser to refer you to. So there is no way, other than dynamometer testing, for you to determine how good or bad your risers are. Sorry. Bill

[NathanL100 0]

If the risers that I have on my rig don't meet the requirements is it possible to use a different companies risers as a replacement without causing a safety hazard?
I would think that a different riser could cause riser flaps to become more prone to opening in freefall and maybe even catch on the bottom of the reserve.
Just keep your mind open and suck in the experience. And if it hurts, you know what? It's probably worth it.

[rainman 0]

I indeed meant the 'Integrity' risers.
Thanks very much for your answer, I'll be talking to my rigger about 'normal' risers!
Ramon

• Quote

[billbooth 10]

Nathan;
Generally, risers are easily interchangeable. Just make sure the whole system, once assembled, meets the requirements posted on the Relative Workshop website under "technical". However, if you add new risers that are more "bulky" because of the introduction of dive loops or short hard housings, tuck tab riser covers on certain rigs might not stay shut as well as they used to.
Bill

[Rdutch 0]

Sunpath relies on Relative Workshops testing standards and follows their specs on risers take a look at them youll notice the similarity. Not a copy just a good design.
Hook low Flare late