PF Pants+Jacket are here!

[kevin922 0]

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The jacket is stylin'. This is probably the coolest jacket I own -- on par with my Nintendo jacket. It seriously looks cool. Like if I wore this out to a bar, it wouldn't just be acceptable -- chicks would start making out with me and ninjas would do like seven backflips and then bow respectfully (as well they should).

Wow I see you must have taken advantage of the free crack that came with that jacket eh?

[leroydb 0]

I do a normal skydiving pull sequence. I don't use a BM type pull seq. The point of the suit, I think, was to be able to go back to a boxman and pull...

Leroy


..I knew I was an unwanted baby when I saw my bath toys were a toaster and a radio...

[ManBird 0]

Rained all weekend, so I'm jumping today and tomorrow. I will be doing a wingsuit style pull. I'm more used to pulling that way than not, and find that it works well for maintaining symmetry on any type of skydive (I always pull in a track).

Low 80s is what I do in BirdMan Pantz. I've been up to 99s over 12,000' of freefall, but haven't broken 100s yet. Let's see if that changes.

My wsExtreme just came in, too. Woohoo!

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

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[LouDiamond 1]

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Rained all weekend

And you mean to tell us that you didn't put the hood on and pull the drawstring tight and walk around outside like a weatherproof ninja? What were you thinking man!!?? We need to know how well it stands up to the elements and it's stealth factor.

"It's just skydiving..additional drama is not required"
Some people dream about flying, I live my dream
SKYMONKEY PUBLISHING

[ManBird 0]

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Rained all weekend

And you mean to tell us that you didn't put the hood on and pull the drawstring tight and walk around outside like a weatherproof ninja? What were you thinking man!!?? We need to know how well it stands up to the elements and it's stealth factor.

As a matter of fact, I did! While I didn't get to jump it, I was using the jacket as my rain gear, and it did very well. Nobody noticed or talked to me, so it's evidently very stealthy.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

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[The111 0]

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Nobody noticed or talked to me, so it's evidently very stealthy.

Ahh, so that's why nobody talks to me. I'm "stealthy". Good to know.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[The111 0]

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I will be doing a wingsuit style pull. I'm more used to pulling that way than not, and find that it works well for maintaining symmetry on any type of skydive (I always pull in a track).

I tried this once in my RW suit w/ booties. Pulled BM style out of a full hard track. My back hurt for 3 days. :(

Maybe I should have done an "arched" track as I do in the BM suit when I pull.

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My wsExtreme just came in, too. Woohoo!

Whazzat?

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[maretus 0]

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My wsExtreme just came in, too. Woohoo!

Whazzat?

The wsExtreme is the base container/harness system specificially designed to wsbase by morpheus technologies. http://www.baserigs.com/wsxtreme.html

http://www.ufufreefly.com

[ManBird 0]

Flew yesterday. Adding to Leroy's statements.

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I "abo-slutly" love them. VERY insane fwd speed.

Holy f*¢k yes! I dare say I had about the same forward speed as I get with my S3. I was totally impressed at the ground you can cover.

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The fallrate isnt all that impressive (80's), being that it was my first jump on the suit, (have been in low 90's with a RW bootie suit)

I was averaged 78 on my first jump, and I KNOW I wasn't flying the arms right for about 90% of the freefall. At about 6K, I finally felt the arm position, held it, and got down to 69 right until pull time (per charts). I saddled out at 3,600' (because I LOVE to fly my Katana). 9,300' of freefall in 85s.

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BUT the forward speed on this suit is pretty freaking awesome. I was over 1 mile out and made it back no problem. I could prob get out 2 miles and open around 2000-3000 and get back ok.

Here, here again. The suit can feel really fast, overall, because of the forward speed. It's intense to say the least. I exited 1.3 miles north of the DZ (1.1 nautical miles per GPS in plane). I flew about 3/4 miles off the line of flight, flew parallel with a little tailwind, and then cut back in, making it halfway back. So that was about 2.3 miles in 85s -- an average forward speed of 97 MPH or so (sans tailwind, it's more like 90 MPH). So, on my first jump, which I can tell was nowhere near the potential of what these can do, I had a glide of 1.25:1.

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I found the legs to be a tad twitchy and was more comfortable using my hands to control direction of flight

I see what people mean now when they say the legs are "twitchy" or "fishy". Having over 200 BirdMan Pantz jumps and nearly 500 wingsuit jumps, I found it easy to manage and keep symmetry in my feet even when I was really pushing the legs hard. However, someone without a lot of max tracking experience could definitely run into some big time instability.

I also want to note how this feels overall. It's not a wingsuit flight, and it's not a track. It really is somewhere in between. The fall rate feels like that of flying relative/compensated in a Classic or GTi, but the forward speed feels like a super S3 flight.

COMPARED TO A TRACK:

To sum it up: It feels like THE sickest, most surreal track ever. For the most part, I definitely found it best to use a pretty standard max-tracking technique, only with my legs a little further apart. It definitely takes more leg strength to hold your feet down than the BirdMan Pantz, but less strength than a mono-wing wingsuit (I feel that BirdMan suits require the least leg strength of all). Once I finally felt the arm position.

COMPARED TO A WINGSUIT:

The "fishiness" you can feel when encountering instability is VERY close to that of a Classic. It's definitely as demanding as a small wingsuit. The exit was more wingsuit-like than track like. I got out and stayed on level with the plane, like leaving with a wingsuit with the wings open a bit. Then I watched the plane drop away below me, very fast, like being in a wingsuit. I deployed wingsuit style in a full track, as I always do. I felt so much like the opening I get on a wingsuit that I instinctively did NOT go for the risers. Weird. When really nailing it, it sounded like a wingsuit flight, and the way the ground flew by looked like a wingsuit flight. If you look at the horizon and feel the forward speed on your face, it feels just like it does when diving the S3.

ONE WEIRD NOTE ON ARMS:

Where I finally nailed and held the arms was with the "ridge" of my forearm pointed at the ground, but my hands rotated flat (palm to earth), which is a little weird, but OK. To keep from going head low, I had my arms out at about a 30°. I normally don't like to let a bunch of air slip through, but when the arms inflated and I was back on level, I found that this was an exception. When the arms are right, you can REALLY feel the lift. I was really surprised to find out how much the jacket actually does. I figured it was there to look cool and balance out the pants, but properly flown, it took off 12% of my already low fall rate. I might try to the jacket with the BirdMan Pantz, as well -- see what happens.



And finally... a tandem instructor saw me from about 1,000' away and told his student, "Hey, that's the wingsuit guy! Check out how that thing flies," not yet realizing that I wasn't wearing one.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

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[leroydb 0]

(((smiles)))

Leroy


..I knew I was an unwanted baby when I saw my bath toys were a toaster and a radio...

[LouYoung 0]

I'm glad you posted some details about flying position. I've never flown a wingsuit or Birdman pants. I've done probably 5 full altitude max-track jumps, 1 full altitude group tracking dive (14-way), and 10 to 15 max-track jumps exiting from 5,000 feet.

But I flew my PFly pants and jacket 3 times last Saturday. My vertical averages where in the mid 90's. I know I can get it better than that, especially since I've done high 90's/low 100's in shorts and a t-shirt.

In the PFly pants and jacket, I was getting huge distance, but always felt like I was a little head low. Any attempt to de-arch just put me more head low because those pants were really creating a lot of drag. I experimented with arm position a bit and seemed to do a little better with my arms about 30 degrees off my body, but was still unable to de-arch much without going really head low. I was thinking that if I moved my arms any further outward that I'd be killing my forward speed, but I guess I just need to practice more.

Any more tips for the wingsuit impaired?


(BTW - I saw you a few times in TF over Labor Day weekend, but I don't know if we were ever formally introduced. I was one of the students in Johnny's class.)

[ManBird 0]

If I'm tracking with you and looking at you from the side, this is what I should see:

- Shoulders below the horizon
- Toes below the horizon
- Your back, at the center of your chest, above the horizon
- Everything else ON the horizon

When I say "Everything else ON the horizon", I mean everything. People have a habit of putting their hands too far in front of them when they "roll" their shoulders ("roll" is a bad description). Either that, or their hands are to far back and their shoulders aren't low enough.

The trickier part (especially with the PF suit) is to maintain an overall level pitch in your body.

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(BTW - I saw you a few times in TF over Labor Day weekend, but I don't know if we were ever formally introduced. I was one of the students in Johnny's class.)

Cool. There were lots of people there, but I'm sure I'd recognize you if I saw you. I'm sure we'll bump into each other again.

"¯"`-._.-¯) ManBird (¯-._.-´"¯"

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[bodypilot1 0]

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I'm glad you posted some details about flying position. I've never flown a wingsuit or Birdman pants. I've done probably 5 full altitude max-track jumps, 1 full altitude group tracking dive (14-way), and 10 to 15 max-track jumps exiting from 5,000 feet.

But I flew my PFly pants and jacket 3 times last Saturday. My vertical averages where in the mid 90's. I know I can get it better than that, especially since I've done high 90's/low 100's in shorts and a t-shirt.

In the PFly pants and jacket, I was getting huge distance, but always felt like I was a little head low. Any attempt to de-arch just put me more head low because those pants were really creating a lot of drag. I experimented with arm position a bit and seemed to do a little better with my arms about 30 degrees off my body, but was still unable to de-arch much without going really head low. I was thinking that if I moved my arms any further outward that I'd be killing my forward speed, but I guess I just need to practice more.

Any more tips for the wingsuit impaired?


(BTW - I saw you a few times in TF over Labor Day weekend, but I don't know if we were ever formally introduced. I was one of the students in Johnny's class.)

All this with just 15 jumps?

-

www.WestCoastWingsuits.com
www.PrecisionSkydiving.com

[leroydb 0]

revived...

went out on a tracking dive from 13k pulled at 3.5k and got 88sec of FF time...

even got a temp speed of 58 SAS! this was using the wide leg stance with being slighty head low...


nice even if it was done by me

Leroy


..I knew I was an unwanted baby when I saw my bath toys were a toaster and a radio...