psychoswooper 2 #1 August 24, 2003 This is mostly a question to other riggers/ and or very experienced Tandem packers.... Lately our DZ has had what to me is an unacceptable number of Tandem line-overs on our EZ-384 canopies...with 6 slider grommets. Some of these have been able to be cleared by the TM's some not...resulting in lost freebags, down time on rigs & general pain in the butt inconvenience.... Before you blame the packers...I should point out that 1 was packed by an FAA rigger with over 30,000 Tandem pack jobs and (if I am to believe my staff) the most recent by myself, an FAA Rigger with over 10,000 Tandem pack jobs. We are not careless with the steering lines. We go way beyond PD's "flip" method for centering the lines & actually pull the tail up & physically place each & every steering line into the center, then wrap the remaining tail around very carefully. Or we flat pack, placing all the steering lines right in the center. This has only started happening recently...The line sets avg around 300 jumps each......we have not changed the way we pack....Out of our combined 40,000 Tandem pack jobs 8 of his & 3 of mine have malfunctioned. Maybe these aren't really bad numbers, (1 per 3,636 pack jobs) but it sure is bugging us...And the numbers are worse for our lesser experienced packers, although they pack just like us....just have a lot less packjobs at this point.... The problem only seems to happen on the canopies with 6 grommets...any field info/ opinions on this would be greatly appreciated. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
KevinMcGuire 0 #2 August 25, 2003 One possibility is that the canopys are out of trim. The RWS recomends new line sets for tandem mains at around 300 jumps. The biggest indicator is that these mals have just recently started happing. I As I'm sure your'e aware, the further out of trim a canopy gets the more aberant the openings can become. Another possiblity is that the canopys are getting tension knots. These mals can often look just like line overs as they tend to pull on other lines caught in the nots. As the lines become older, the loose the slikness they once had when they were new and the potential for tension knots increase Here at skydive AZ we began having a rash of mals just like you have described and when we replaced the line sets, the problem went away. It must be noted that skydive AZ does not employ any 6 grommet sliders on their tandem mains and therefore the solution I have suggested may not actually fit. With out actually inspecting these canopys I'm really just offering an educated guess. When in doubt call the manufacture. Good luck. I hope this helps Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AggieDave 6 #3 August 25, 2003 The 6-grommet EZ-384s are much more prone to line-over mals then one with 4-grommets. If the linset is in trim, contact PD/RWS to get a 4 grommet slider for the EZ-384 and see if that helps a little bit. There is a downside to this, though...the 4-grommet slider is more prone to a stuck slider (slider up) scenerio, but that can, more often then not, be worked down with the risers/toggles by the TM. You know, the Sigma main canopies kick ass... They fly a lot better then the EZ-384, have better flare and open better...but thats my humble opinion. Oh, as painfully obvious by my profile, I'm not a rigger, I'm a low time jumper (700-ish jumps) and I'm a new TM. I have packed quite a few Sigmas before I got my RWS rating, though. What was stated above about the grommet/slider issue was explained to me by my rigger who is a RWS Course Director with over 1000 tandems to his credit. We sat down with a EZ-384 on night about 9 months ago, as he showed me why the 6-grommet is more prone to line overs, etc. Note: We have a 6-grommet EZ-384 (as well as Sigma 370s), although we haven't had a line over problem (actually, we haven't had any line overs and we use the PD "flip" method).--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline." Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bclark 0 #4 August 26, 2003 We have a Strong SET 400 main with a 6 grommet slider. It is a relatively new canopy (maybe 200 jumps on it). We have had 3 cutaways on this canopy in the last year. All of them have been due to tension knots. There have been a couple of times that the problem has been cleared without a cutaway. It seems to me that the 6 grommet slider is more prone to problems. "never pet a burning dog" Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
