Sugar Glider - a single flight

[Tonto 1]

Hi There.

This post is long and rambling. Read only if you're at least as obsessed as I am.

Got a chance to jump Julian's suit yesterday. It was a very positive experience. On Saterday evening, Julian got a break from team training and took my Neptune along on his flight.

Exit 10700 - deployment 2300. 145 seconds.

9000ft 41 mph
6000ft 30 mph
3000ft 49 mph (backflying)

Conditions were far from perfect with the 1st half of the dive being in cloud.

My experience is limited. I have about 130 wingsuit dives, all on Birdman suits. (35 Classics, 10 GTi, 90 S3)

Connecting the suit is easy. Took me maybe 4 min being carefull not to screw it up since I had no help. Getting in is a mission. Julian is a lot taller and thinner than I am, but I managed. The suit is very comfortable to wear. The leg stance is wide enough not to have to remove the leg wing for landing. The knees have SERIOUS padding.

I was a little uncomfortabel with my reserve and cutaway puffs being semi swallowed by the suit. This may be an issue caused by the suit not being made for my build/rig. There are also fairly long bits of cutaway cable sticking out of the ends of the arms, although in truth, they bothered those who saw them more than they did me.

I exited maybe 10 seconds after a Birdman 2 way, both on GTi's. The suit was rock stable and flying a half second after exit. I did a fairly long into the wind leg, and then turned right to start my pattern. The suit didn't respond well to the same banked turn my S3 likes. Having no experience with weight shift turns, this had to do. The feel is like comparing a deep brake flat turn under canopy (sugar glider) to a toggle turn to half brake. (S3) This results in less slip and far flatter turns, I think. On the downwind leg I could clearly see both GTi's below and ahead of me, flying maybe 30 yards off the right hand side of a big cloud and passing through a nice "C" shape on the edge. I started to push for forward speed to see if I could make it too. For those who think the Sugar Glider lacks forward speed - you're wrong. If you point the nose down, it goes fast. People later commented on the speed since we were all very visible against the cloud. Dispite the larger arm wing and my usual use of the S3's base pilot chute pouch, I enjoyed the flight enough to preclude wasting time on a practice touch. I began deployment a little higher than usual at 3500, to be prudent.

The suit shuts down very nicely and is rock steady during deployment. Interestingly, I felt a lot of horizontal drag while upright on the sections of wing along the edge of the thigh prior to full inflation of the canopy. Unzipping the arm wings and not having to bother with the leg wing makes things very convienient.

So... would I buy one?

This is a great design. I'm sure finding the sweet spot would take me several jumps due to my Birdman only heritage, but even on jump number 2 I feel I could go out and flock with Classics, S-Fly's, Matter's GTi's and S3's. I've never seen a Vampire. I'm sure most would consider my numbers poor, with 67 mph at both 9K and 6K, but then floaty flight has NEVER appealed to me and was not my goal on this flight. My best in my S3 has been 49MPH and I'm sure the Sugar glider would better that. I'd want to do at least 10 demo jumps before I make a desision to lay out another $1000 on another design which requires another technique to fly at it's optimum.

Finally, I think that so much of what we experience is how we feel in flight. While looking at numbers can help to create attainable goals and refine technique, the viseral, hedonistic thrill of banking into a sweeping turn to keep a firm, white cloud off your inside wing, the inching acceleration as you put your head down to blast through some personally targeted puffy bit, or the expression of pure, bursting joy on a fellow flockers face as you drift up and dock are profoundly personal experiences that we should seek out in any way we can.

In the words of the man who helped me into a Classic for my 1st ever flight...

"Flappy suits rock!"

t

It's the year of the Pig.

[KrisFlyZ 0]

Nice Review!!

What did you think about the strain on the arms? Is it more because of the increased wing area?

Kris.

[Tonto 1]

Never mentioned it! Because it's not there. I felt no noticable strain of any sort when flying the suit.

t

It's the year of the Pig.

[SimonM 0]

Hey T,

Noice review. I think you would find that the SG performance would improve a lot with a few more jumps, especially with a well properly fitting suit.

Julian's numbers rock, but then he is more bird than man.

You are right, it really does come down to how you experience flight and different suits bring out the ca-caaaw in different ways.

Simon

[TomAiello 25]

I did some jumps on SG this past week. I'm still trying to find time to post my thoughts, but;

Quote

I was a little uncomfortabel with my reserve and cutaway puffs being semi swallowed by the suit. This may be an issue caused by the suit not being made for my build/rig. There are also fairly long bits of cutaway cable sticking out of the ends of the arms, although in truth, they bothered those who saw them more than they did me.

This swallowing of the handles was very pronounced on my rig (I actually jumped the suit with 2 different rigs, and it was an issue on both). I ended up running super tack thread through the bottom of the handle openings (the reinforcement tape), and tying it around my hip rings, to hold the openings down past the handles. I wouldn't have been willing to skydive the suit without doing this, as I wasn't comfortable with the lack of access to the handles.

I think this was in large part because the suit wasn't sized to me (it was too large). And heck, on the vast majority of my jumps, I don't have those handles on the front anyway.

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[Taz 0]

I didn't jump the SG as I am about half Julian's height... but I was one of the GTi's exiting just before him. Watching Tonto's handles get swallowed up on the ground and in the plane was pretty disconcerting. They looked like they could be completely inside by pull time, depending on how the flight went. For me, this would be a major concern. I'm curious about whether this is something they are working on/thinking about fixing in upcoming improvements/versions of the suit. Julian did say they are still at work and that various different options would be available in the near future.

It's the Year of the Dragon.

[SimonM 0]

Hey Taz,

The suit that Tonto jumped must have been big for him (julian isnt short).

The problem is a lot less pronounced on correctly fitting suits, but I can understand how it happens on a big suit. I havnt seen my handles do it, but I havnt really tried to do it either. I dont think it would be difficult to sort out a better solution- like the S-fly's.

On a different note, I expect that you would pretty easily sustain under 30mph on a SG for the whole flight......

Simon

[Taz 0]

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On a different note, I expect that you would pretty easily sustain under 30mph on a SG for the whole flight......

I don't know about that, but if anyone out there has a demo SG to fit a 5'4" 105 pound person, please let me know!!

It's the Year of the Dragon.

[SimonM 0]

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I did some jumps on SG this past week. I'm still trying to find time to post my thoughts, but;

Come on Tom, what did you think of it!!

Simon

[TomAiello 25]

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Come on Tom, what did you think of it!!

Honestly, my results were not good. But I don't think that's fair to the SG as a suit, because the SG demo was far too big for me. So I'll just leave my comments at that, for now.

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com