TOO TIRED TO FLARE?

[raiderscott 0]

I keep seeing ad's in skydiving mag that say's Too Tired to Flare. Any info on the technique that is said to give new life to old canopies?
Thanx
RaiderScott

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

Unless it's a different person, the guy is somewhere in Texas. I cannot remember what he coats them with, but it definitely adds lots of life to worn out F-111 parachutes.

There I was, no shit: sitting on the dropzone watching The Deland Gang land their Excalliburs while training with the USAPT for the world meet in 91 (or was it 89? too long ago to remember). They were swooping the piss out of those things and I was jealous. At the time I had three rigs, all with FTS (now APS) Bogy 9-cell mains; two 150's and a 175 for CRW. Back in the day, these were nice canopies and I didn't pay anything for them due to a family hookup. Anyway, they were getting TIRED so we began "thinking outside the box" for a fix. My sometime-roommate and rigger buddy, Isreal Harris, and I came up with two ideas: first, Scotchguard; second, vinyl-top and handbag spray paint! After a full day of jumping we retired to Casa Azul and hung up a main. We Scotchguarded that thing with like four cans of the "red" topped version. It made the main quite slippery, but gave no performance gain whatsoever; oh well. Next, we went down to the local auto parts store and bought six cans of this crazy vinyl paint stuff. We let that rascal dry one night, packed it up and headed out to the DZ. I wasn't really concerned about the thing blowing up or anything. It opened up, flew great, and landed just like a Sabre (which nobody had yet). Everyone was duly impressed, but we noticed that some of the paint had flaked off. The white stuff would fly off the main on opening like dandruff or something! This went on for about eight jumps, then the thing was so flaky and freaky looking that I decided to shit-can it. It was pretty funny; most people thought that I was out of my mind, but had I not screwed around and Scotchguarded that thing first, it probably would have lasted quite some time. A friend of mine, Dan Feess, did the same thing to an old main of his on my "recommendation" and said it lasted over 100 jumps. Total cost: $20

Chuck

[riggerrob 558]

Every few years someone else invents a new scheme to re-seal F-111 canopies. Sometimes it works and sometimes it results in painfully hard openings. None of these companies seem to stay in business very long.

[alan 1]

One thing to remember is that the fabric that canopies are made from is "calendered". The fabric is woven from a filament that is nominally round. The woven fabric is then run through a series of high pressure rollers (calender) that flattens the filaments. This helps to seal the spaces between them, making the fabric less poros. ZP fabrics additionally have a silicon based coating applied that efficiently seals the remaining spaces between the filaments that calendering does not seal. It is very durable and can last over 2000 jumps.
Over time, and with use, F-111 type fabrics will become more poros as the "flattened" filaments return to their natural shape and the weave looses its tightness. Getting the canopy fabric wet will accellerate the process. After market applications can temporarily improve performance, but will need to be re-applied on a fairly regular basis. A used ZP canopy might be a more practical approach to getting an economical improvement in performance over the long run. You would also probably get the benefit of a newer design with better technology and therefore an additional improvement in performance.
alan

[riggerrob 558]

May I think out loud for a minute?
I was wondering if some of those people who blew-up re-sealed F-111 canopies were sloppy packers to begin with?
Fat Dacron lines and porous old F-111 fabric forgave many bad packing habits, but when they re-sealed their canopies, their sloppy habits caught up with them.
Let's hear more from people who jump re-sealed canopies.

[rapper4mpi 0]

The Too Tired to Flare ads you are seeing are from Dick Swanson, from Dick's Rigging in New York. He is a certified rigger who has been jumping and involved in the sport for almost 30 years. He is also a DZO, aircraft mechanic, instructor, Tandem master, has his PRO rating etc...
Without going into how he actually "treats" the canopies I can give my personal account.
I was jumping an old Fury 220 about five years ago. It was tired and would consistantly stall and drop me down on my flares. Being short on cash and not able to get a new canopy, Dick treated the canopy. This changed the landings considerably, with the results that made me land more comfortably and added considerable "power" to my flares. The treatment lasts about 150-200 jumps or so, depending on the canopy. My openings remained about the same. The canopy has since been retreated and to my knowledge is still being jumped. If you have any questions regarding this technique, I'm sure Dick would be happy to answer them. He actually gets quite a few canopies sent to him from all over the country, with pleasant results.
-Mike