Max Wingloading for 280 jumps

[KevinSpencer 0]

I'm stuck in the middle of battle here between my roommate (Jeff) and my DZO. My roommate (Jeff) has 280 jumps under a turbo Z 165 loaded at (1.33). My DZO says he can buy a semi-elliptical loaded at 1.5 max. Jeff feels that the DZO is out of the times and is holding him back. Jeff feels he can handle a semi-elliptical loaded at (1.7-1.8).

Jeff is a very talented canopt pilot and has just about done everything to his current canopy. But he has never had any canopy coaching.

My question to you, What do you think the Max loading for Jeff should be?

River City Crew Rocks

[marks 0]

the dzo is holding him back.


as he should be.
if you ask me, the dzo is being VERY generous.

[AggieDave 6]

Well, obviously with 280 jumps your roommate is a MUCH better skydiver than the DZO (whom I'm willing to bet has been in the sport for a good while and has a good number of jumps). Its painfully obvious that experienced skydivers are only wanting to hold new jumpers back so that they can maintain the skill level over the much better low time jumpers. There's no other reason for it.





Ok, seriously, I was jumping 1.7:1 early on in my skydiving career and I just got flat out lucky sometimes. Looking back I know now that if I had stuck with a lower wingloading and a good solid canopy like a Sabre2, then I would be a MUCH better canopy pilot today. Live and learn I guess. If your roommate doesn't listen to the advice from the experienced jumpers that watch him land every weekend, then hopefully he'll live long enough and be well enough to stay in skydiving long enough to try to help another low time jumper that "knows better." Help that jumper from making the same mistakes that he made.

I am very passionate about this since I was "that guy" and I want nothing more then to help people not make the same mistakes.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[dharma1976 0]

so he has 280 jumps under the turbo z at 1.33

how many total..

what is his canopy flying experience/wish...

and by the way the DZO knows his flying and is mosty likely making a wise decision based on what he does under it...

Dave

http://www.skyjunky.com

CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing.

[KevinSpencer 0]

Jeff started jumping his turbo z around 80 jumps. Now he has 280 jumps total. He wasn't loading it as high back then due to the fact he has put on about 40 pounds.

DZO wants Jeff to buy a saber2/safire2 150- 1.46 loading

Jeff wants Safire2 129 or Safire1 139 (we know safire1 are smaller) loading at 1.7ish

Jeff is 220 pounds with gear and he likes cookies.

I'm just trying to be the non-bais moderator here, cause i'm sick of being in the middle

River City Crew Rocks

[bob.dino 0]

Jeff should get some top-level canopy coaching before he buys a new canopy. Then he'll realise how good he actually is as opposed to how good he (or his DZO) think he is.

[PhreeZone 15]

How current is he? Did he do 280 jumps in a year or are those spread out over a few years?

When in doubt, look back At Brian Germain's table. Accourding to it at 1.3 he is right at the max for his experience currently.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[FrancoR 0]

Quote

Jeff is a very talented canopt pilot and has just about done everything to his current canopy. But he has never had any canopy coaching.

My question to you, What do you think the Max loading for Jeff should be?

We had two low turn accidents with highly loaded canopies at my home DZ in germany last year. I was there when one happend. I also know an occasion where a fairly inexperienced jumper was approved by an experienced jumper to jump a high WL and was later injured in a related accident.
Better to jump a big canopy that crash an not jump at all.

Have Jeff look at one of the wingloading recomendation charts.

Franco

If it does not cost anything you are the product.

[rwieder 0]

1.3:1 to 1.4:1 Max, depending on your instructiors observations of your abilities, and your currency. Confer with your Jump Master(s) A.D. gave you excellent advice as well, he has a wealth more of experience than i do.

-Richard-
"You're Holding The Rope And I'm Taking The Fall"

[dharma1976 0]

jeff should totally buy the 150 sabre or the 149 safire

that would be a sick as hell canopy for quite some time...

I used to get like 100-150 feet swoop easily out of the sabre 2 150 loaded about the same

then he should seek out scott miller or brian germain and get a lot of coaching so he doesnt have to buy one of my "got titanium?" shirts

Cheers

Dave

http://www.skyjunky.com

CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing.

[Fast 0]

Good thing its the DZO that doesn't want him to fly that canopy.

Let him buy it and waste his money... if it was my DZ I would tell him to go somewhere else. I don't argue with people anymore about canopy size. They are going to do what they want. I will have one good conversation with a person then it comes down to "If your gonna be stupid, you better be tough"

In the case of 1.7-1.8wl @ 280 jumps, when your friend fucks up, and he will fuck up, EVERYONE fucks up,... your friend will hurt himself if he is lucky and be killed if he isn't. He might get _really_ lucky and not do either of them two things, but statisticly speaking, thats not likely.

Who is anyone on here to say though. If you come to dz.com asking about wingloading your gonna get the response I just gave. This kid might be god's gift to skydiving, but based on the fact that your DZO doesn't want him jumping over 1.5 I don't find that likely. He also need to get some coaching from a pro. Not just the hot shit swooper of the dz, he needs coaching from someone who knows how to teach canopy flight. Al la, Brian Germain, Scott Miller, or take the trek down and jump with some of the PST guys that offer coaching. Its expensive, but he might as well get all he can get out of what he is doing before he ends up in the hospital.

~D
Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me.
Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

[davelepka 4]

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Jeff started jumping his turbo z around 80 jumps. Now he has 280 jumps total. He wasn't loading it as high back then due to the fact he has put on about 40 pounds.

So 200 jumps on the squarest of square canopies, and he thinks he ready to take on the world. As far as your comment in the first post that he has 'done it all' with his current canopy, I disagree.

I don't know the guy, and have never heard anything about his skils, but jumps 81 thru 280 on any canopy will not have up to speed on that wing. MAYBE if it was jumps 1001 thru 1200, he would have a good handle on things. Maybe.

Also, what the deal with the 40 lbs? Weightlifter? Roids? I hope so. If it's fat, I'd like to see him try to run out a landing at 1.7. On top of that, if he blows it, and hits the ground, that 40 lbs will just hammer him that much further into the ground. Good stuff.

Clue your buddy in, the DZO is pushing it with what he'll allow. He's being very liberal, and your buddy should be thankful for that, and try not to let his ego spiral him into the ground.

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

in twenty jumps I would let him jump at 1.3 at this dropzone.

Chuck

[padawonMonkey 0]

The wingload/canopy selection issue is to skydiving what abortion is to politics. It is THE hot button issue. Here are some things to keep in mind when commenting on a pilot you do not know.

First, and IMO the most important, what do his friends think he is ready for. What a skydivers friends, the ones that watch him on every jump, think he is ready for is probably a good place to start. The DZO may have never seen this guy jump or only observed him once or twice. A DZO who is responsible will always err on the conservative side when he is unsure.

For the pilot a good think to keep in mind is "baby steps". If you think about the different canopys available you can classify them in catagorys of perfomance and size. Its better to try and keep transitions within one size or one performance category while you are learning, once you have achieved the level of a swoop guru (not saying I am there by any means) you can pretty much jump whatever you want. What helped me progress quickly was having a butt-load of canopys to use to quickly downsize but never moving more than one size or performance category.

I hope this makes sense.

edit: what up Chucky...MOTORCYCLE

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"But I'm Just doin what I have to do to survive"-MM

[davelepka 4]

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First, and IMO the most important, what do his friends think he is ready for. What a skydivers friends, the ones that watch him on every jump, think he is ready for is probably a good place to start

Really? Who the hell are his friends? I got a ton of what turned out to be bad advice when I was starting out. Advice that I would never give anyone in the same boat.


Anyway you want to cut it, you've got a guy with 280 jumps total, and 200 on a square canopy loaded at 1.3 who thinks he can do it all. You don't need to be close to the situation to know that jumping to a higer performance canopy at 1.7 is a bad idea.

[padawonMonkey 0]

Agreed, thats the point I was trying to make with the second part of my post.

The first part was more aimed at combating generalizations based on jump numbers alone.

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"But I'm Just doin what I have to do to survive"-MM

[Fast 0]

Quote

Agreed, thats the point I was trying to make with the second part of my post.

The first part was more aimed at combating generalizations based on jump numbers alone.

Generalizations based on jump numbers when it comes to canopy flying tend to be pretty spot on. Even if every jump this guy ever made was a full altitude hop'n'pop, 280 jumps is still only 280 landings. It wouldn't change my opinion that he doesn't have enough time around the sport and in the air to know what the hell he is doing. It took me over 300 jumps, in the course of 1 years time, to even start to understand what was going on with my canopy. That was after already having 300+ jumps worth of skydiving experience.

You can't fake experience, you either have it, or you don't.

~D
Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me.
Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

[berchtoldaj 0]

I recommend people read up on the opinions of highly experienced canopy coaches. he may want to check out Brian Germains book. This book would suggest as a guideline that he not exceed 1.2 until he reaches 300 jumps.

************
Watch out for planters.

[dharma1976 0]

you know whats funny I just watched a guy loaded at 1-1 destroy his pelvis on a 170 sabre 2... those sabres turn awful quick when you start jabbing at things...

you know its amazing to me that people dont understand what can be done with larger canopies...it comes down to "its not the shoes that makes the basketball player"...

it helps but it really is the pilot that makes the canopy fly and not the wing.

so maybe your buddy needs to go through the downsize check list and then when he has completed that...then he should take brian germaines advanced canopy course and see what he can really do with his canopy...

Dave

http://www.skyjunky.com

CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing.

[KevinSpencer 0]

Thanks for your input guys,
Thats all I need to hear

Kevo

River City Crew Rocks

[aneblett 0]

Dude!

1.7 is too high for him.. I don't care what wing or what the poll says, or what Brian Germain thinks (even though he will agree with me) or Tim thinks. That is just my opinion based on experience, reading and others experience.

Brian Germain will be in town 2 weekends from now! Are you guys gonna come?

Hope so.

Listen. I don't know if jeff respects my opinion or not but if you guys want to do beers and chat about this. I am game. I mean shit.. i think we only live like a few blocks from each other.

PM me and we will hook up.

A

S.E.X. party #2

..It is far worse to live with fear, than to die confronting it.

[rhys 0]

I have over 2500 jumps and i have only just got a 2.0 loading. i had a 1.5 for 500 jumps and had a ton of fun. i am not doing as many sportys at present and kinda wished i still had my crossfire 1.5.

i did my first 800 jumps on a maveric 200, whats the rush?

"When the power of love overcomes the love of power, then the world will see peace." - 'Jimi' Hendrix

[dharma1976 0]

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Dude!

1.7 is too high for him.. I don't care what wing or what the poll says, or what Brian Germain thinks (even though he will agree with me) or Tim thinks. That is just my opinion based on experience, reading and others experience.

Brian Germain will be in town 2 weekends from now! Are you guys gonna come?

Hope so.

Listen. I don't know if jeff respects my opinion or not but if you guys want to do beers and chat about this. I am game. I mean shit.. i think we only live like a few blocks from each other.

PM me and we will hook up.

A

And there we go someone who knows him agreeing with us.

Dave

http://www.skyjunky.com

CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing.

[DrewEckhardt 0]

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The wingload/canopy selection issue is to skydiving what abortion is to politics. It is THE hot button issue. Here are some things to keep in mind when commenting on a pilot you do not know.

First, and IMO the most important, what do his friends think he is ready for.

What his friends think is completely irrelevant.

Facts:

1. While quantifiable differences in forward speed, turn rate, control sensitivity, etc. are the same for everybody how people react to them varies. What one person does on a given size/shape change is not a good predictor of how another person does. Perceptions don't change linearlly with size. Doing well with one change doesn't mean you'll do well with the next one. I never had any problems switching from a 155 to 135 square, or 135 square to 135 elliptical; but changing from a 135 elliptical to a more responsive 120 had me not allways landing straight.

2. When everything goes right it's not hard to land a highly loaded canopy with minimal experience - I tried an Extreme 105 after maybe 500 jumps without issue. Things are a lot messier when you are cut-off on landing, have to land out on a night jump, etc.

3. Most people have a different frame of reference that's not going to translate. Jumping elliptical canopies loaded over 1.6 pounds/square foot for much of a decade makes it easy to forget that they have sharp pointy teeth. Experiences with lower wing loadings don't translate either.

Implications:

It's not appropriate for people to recommend any change in wing loading beyond "follow accepted practices."

It's unwise to change more than one size or shape at a time. It's unwise to change size or shape without having had 100-200 jumps to explore a canopy's performance envelope and make mistakes which show what happens when things don't go well.

Since wing loading changes about .15 - .20 per canopy size, putting 150-200 jumps on each canopy is a perfect match for the accepted 1.0 + .1/100 jumps wingloading rule of thumb. That said, you learn more in 600 jumps on one canopy than 200 jumps on each of 3.

Something like a Sabre-2 170 would be the conservative recomendation.

[padawonMonkey 0]

What his friends think is relavent and it works both ways. If those that watch him on every jump think he is ready for it then he probably is but if they don't then he is most certainly not. This is a much better theory than the generalizations that are currently applied.

That IS what they are GENERALIZATIONS.

I agree that the one size or one shape rule is a good rule to start from but that still doesn't apply every time.

Generalizations are dangerous. I know people that have 200 to 1000 jumps on stilettos and need to be on a size larger sabre 2.

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"But I'm Just doin what I have to do to survive"-MM