Characteristics of Triathlon models?

[rasmack 0]

I am trying my hand at CRW for the first time this weekend. The canopy is going to be a Triathlon hybrid or competition. Should I expect the landings to be dramatically different from the ordinary Tri? I thought that the main difference would be reinforcements and retractable pilot chute but my instructor warned me that it would land like sh*t.

Having flown the normal Triathlon and flying a Spectre regularly I was wondering if his warning was just a 9-cell personality trying to describe a 7-cell landing or if the CRW Tris are really trimmed dramatically different.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[plastic 0]

In my experience people who say crw canopies land like sh*t are usually people who cannot land them or have never jumped one and have only watched pther people who cannot land them.

I have jumped lightnings for years (9) and always get good landings even in nil wind days, yet i hear many people complain about the way lightnings land.

I did jump a competition triathlon quite a bit about 10 years ago and the landings were ok even then when i did not have that much experience landing crw canopies.

Compared to the french rubis and the old ar7 landings on lightnings and triathlons are a dream.

plastic

[dragon2 0]

A hybrid Tri will open, fly and land just like a regular tri. A comp tri is an entirely different canopy. It will open much faster, fly stable like a rock and land like a reserve, if nothing special has been done to it. If it's shortlined or something however, you may have to frontriser it for landing. But I don't suppose they'd let you jump a canopy like that for your first few crw jumps. Really, esp if you're used to spectre's/tri's, a lightning or comp tri isn't that bad. Even though some instructors can't land 'em

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[dragon2 0]

I've got a few jumps on french diamants, on a no-wind day too. Give me a lightning anyday!

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[rasmack 0]

Exactly the info I was looking for. Thanks.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[plastic 0]

One other tip for landing crw canopies, you normally need some front risers on approach, either stright in or better a progressive 45-90 degree turn, when it is time to come off the risers ease them up, pause to let the canopy start to level out and then a good steady progressive flare.

You will find that you need to ease out of the risers slightly higher than you would if you were landing something like a stilletto etc dont leave it too late and put yourself in a situation where you are trying to dig out on brakes cos it wont work.

If you do hard risers and then quickly realese the risers and immediately do a fast agressive flare you will kill the speed and lift from the canopy (this is good when you are doing a swoop down to a formation, eg:8-way speed jumps, but not good for landing) it will stall and drop you on your backside.

Also i have 120+ jumps on the french diamant, i have gone back to lightnings for the last 5 years, i thinks that would sum up my opinion on diamants.

other than that, have fun.

plastic

[rasmack 0]

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One other tip for landing crw canopies, you normally need some front risers on approach...

Ehm... I don't normally do that which should be evident from my jump numbers. I think I'll go dust off my PLF. If it is a hybrid then I should be fine, though. The normal Tri is an easy canopy to land.

Edit: Oh, and thanks.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[plastic 0]

OK, the front riser is not mandatory by any means, especially if you do not normally do that.

However the part about a good progressive flare still holds true, if there is even a breath of wind you will be fine, in nil winds it may seem like you are coming in fast but just keep the flare going don't panic and jab the brakes down and risk stalling the canopy, just bleed off as much speed as you can and be prepared for a short run when you first hit the ground.

Most bad landings i have seen on crw canopies have been fast panic flares that have resulted in a canopy stall.

plastic

[rasmack 0]

Cool, thanks. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for good weather on Sunday.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[Andrelr 0]

Plastic's comments are 100%. Compared to the French Rubis and the AR7, the Tri is a dream to land.
You do however, need to put some input prior to landing a CRW Tri: front risers or a 90 degree turn to pick up some speed.
I jump a 135 Hybrid Tri for my freefall jumps and a 135 CRW Tri for CReW team training. Wingloaded at 1.44, DZ altitude (here in South Africa) either 3500' or 5000'. Never any landing problems.
We've recently acquired a new cameraman with 500 (non CRW) jumps to his credit. He can land the CRW Tri at this altitude OK as well.
Cheers
Andre

[TVPB 0]

Heres is some stuff I wrote a while back r.e. CRW canopies and landings:

CRW Canopy Landings Link

And the next link is a picture of a Diamant being landed:

Link to Picture of Diamant

What do you notice about this landing????

In a nutshell:

- come in with a bit of speed
- transition your flight - DON'T make drastic movements or give drastic inputs to your controls
- don't try tricky stuff until you are tricky yourself
- you can land any canopy OK, but you need to respect its design considerations and limitations. Use the right gear for the right purpose and fly the gear according to its design characteristics and flying envelope.

Stay Safe - Have Fun - Good Luck

The above could be crap, thought provoking, useful, or . . But not personal. You decide.

[pdsvideoman 0]

Nice shot, was that taken at the world champ's in Indonesia 1996 ?.

PD Smith

[rasmack 0]

Quote

Heres is some stuff I wrote a while back r.e. CRW canopies and landings:

CRW Canopy Landings Link

And the next link is a picture of a Diamant being landed:

Link to Picture of Diamant

What do you notice about this landing????

Looks like a goldmine of information right there. Thanks .
As for the landing it does look like someone is about to fall on his ass and the chest strap look to be uncomfortably high up. Was any of this what you were referring to?

Everything went well by the way. I got to try two-way stack and biplane both as the docker and the dockee (or whatever the terms are) but we weren't well enough matched in wingloading to get rotations going. I would pop up and the instructor would sink, and I just don't have the stamina to pull a Tri 190 down from 15 k on front risers.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[plastic 0]

In England the recommendation for one on one crw jumps with novices is not to exit above 7000' this gives loads of working time for 2-way.

A 190 crw canopy is massive, i dont know anybody who has one that big, i know somebody who has a 176 but that is only used for 16st guys.

Normally if we have a novice with a heavy wing loading the coach will either wear lead or downsize.

Even so, glad you had fun.

How were the landings by the way? should have been ok on a 190.

plastic

[dragon2 0]

2 tricks to help with getting down:
- you can put an extra set of large french links on the back risers, tilting your canopy forward a bit giving you more downward speed. The instructor could do the same, on the frontrisers...
- to pull your fronts to get down, first do a quick stab on the brakes then immediately pull down both fronts, this makes for way less pressure on them so they're much easier to pull down.

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[rasmack 0]

Quote

In England the recommendation for one on one crw jumps with novices is not to exit above 7000' this gives loads of working time for 2-way.

Well, we were at a Pink Skyvan boogie with one altitude.

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A 190 crw canopy is massive, i dont know anybody who has one that big, i know somebody who has a 176 but that is only used for 16st guys.

Normally if we have a novice with a heavy wing loading the coach will either wear lead or downsize.

I normally fly a 210, so a 190 was already a downsizing. These days I weigh in at around 235 lbs, so I didn't feel like going further down than the 190. I do realize, though that I'd better get used to the idea of downsizing in order to be able to work easier.

Quote

How were the landings by the way? should have been ok on a 190.

No problem. It was a hybrid Tri and it landed just fine even with me wearing 10-20 lbs of lead.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[rasmack 0]

Quote

2 tricks to help with getting down:
- you can put an extra set of large french links on the back risers, tilting your canopy forward a bit giving you more downward speed. The instructor could do the same, on the frontrisers...
- to pull your fronts to get down, first do a quick stab on the brakes then immediately pull down both fronts, this makes for way less pressure on them so they're much easier to pull down.

Well, I think everything is going to be smoother once we get the loadings sorted out. My instructor was having problems "popping" up to me on docks and I had trouble sustaining the dives down to him on docks. Part of the problem might be that he was under a Competition Tri (150), while I was jumping a Hybrid (190).

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[plastic 0]

Hi,

The hybrid tri's are a lot harder to front riser than the competition tri's.

One of my ex-team mates coached an internediate team a few years ago, he went up on a jump with them and they gave him a hybrid and he made the comment about it being difficult to front riser.

This could be caused by the difference on the nose of the canopy which is different between hybrid and comp tri's which is also apparently why you can take a hybrid to terminal but not a a comp.

This also could cause a difference in the glide angle which could cause the comp tri to descend faster than the hybrid.

Just some thoughts.

Of course adjusting the glide angle with extra links can help.

plastic

[rasmack 0]

Quote

The hybrid tri's are a lot harder to front riser than the competition tri's.
...
This could be caused by the difference on the nose of the canopy which is different between hybrid and comp tri's...
...
This also could cause a difference in the glide angle which could cause the comp tri to descend faster than the hybrid.

Ahh... that explains a lot. It actually might explain why we had so much difficulty keeping level. Thanks.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[stratman05 0]

I made a ton of jumps on a tri-135 hybrid with others on a lightning. I did 2 ways and 4 way stacks (and I think I closed a diamond). The tri would wouldn't dive down on front risers, but I could still get there. I don't think we really had problems with 2 ways.

[plastic 0]

A few years ago i did a few jumps where we had some guys on lightning 160's and some on hybrid tri 135's and we did loads of stacks/planes etc without issue before the other guys got lightnings.

The guys on the tri's had loads of performance on the lightnings and so docking was easy, they just used a different technique where they used a brake sashay technique to loose height then just turned in behind the formation knowing they could just use the extra performance to fly up and dock on the formation.

Trouble was when they moved to lightnings it all changed and they had to learn a whole new technique.

You don't always have to use just risers to loose height, this is where you get the opportunity to learn all the different methods and techniques until eventually you can dock almost anywhere on anything (within reason of course).

plastic

[dragon2 0]

I once got topdocked by a Velocity 96 coming from way below me, when I had just opened my hybrid Tri 120 and hadn't realeased my brakes yet (WL 1.25!)

ciel bleu,
Saskia

[TVPB 0]

Yep - that's what the caption says?? How are you going PD? Since when do pommies get 7500 altitude?????



CYA

Stay Safe - Have Fun - Good Luck

The above could be crap, thought provoking, useful, or . . But not personal. You decide.

[pdsvideoman 0]

Oh we get the altitude ok, just have to guess were we are above the ground sometimes !. Industrial haze don't you know what.

Doing very well thanks but to return to the thread Tri's are faster forward speed and abit more twichy but land nicer.

PD.

[brettski74 0]

I'm looking at buying a second CRW canopy since CRW gear is in short supply where I jump and this way I'll always have a pair of canopies to fly with others. My current CRW rig has a Triathlon hybrid 135 in it. I'm looking at buying a Triathlon CRW 135 as the second canopy, but perhaps someone with more experience with Triathlons can comment on the following questions:

1. There is lots of talk of Competition Triathlons. Is this the same as Triathlon CRW, or is there a Competition version with different line trims and/or other changes different from both a "standard" Triathlon CRW and the Triathlon Hybrid?

2. While Aerodyne only seems to have the one line trim chart for the Triathlon, is the Triathlon CRW typically trimmed differently than the Triathlon hybrid? If so, how differently do they fly? Are we likely to have compatibility problems flying a Triathlon hybrid with a Triathlon CRW canopy? If so, what configuration is likely to work best? Most experienced pilot on one or other canopy? Heaviest person on one or other canopy? It varies so just use trial and error?

3. If the flight characteristics will be markedly different between the Triathlon CRW and Triathlon Hybrid, is it worth the purchase or would I be better off just looking for two Traithlons of the same type?

Thanks.