Prodigy performances / techniques

[cpoxon 0]

I jumped Mr. Kellett's Prodigy for the second time this weekend and was impressed by the performance. Neptune says I exited at 13800 feet, deployed at 2700 and was in freefall for 140 seconds with an average speed of 53 mph (51, 55, 67, 35 at 12k, 9k, 6k, 3k). I know it's all about the glide ratio and not about the float (afterall, Yuri can make it to the bar at the Italian Terminal wall in one) but I wonder what sort of other times/speeds people are getting on a Prodigy? I'll have to take my GPS next time to get some glide ratio data. For the record, I weigh 76 kilos (168 lbs) naked and I'm 180 cms tall (5' 11"). I found the suit very easy to float but a lot harder to glide. I found the suit quite sensitive to an agressive body position and felt like I wanted to tip head down when I tried. What am I doing wrong or is it that I'm used to a lot higher leg pressure from the larger surface area and bootied leg wing on an S3?

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[dmkellett 0]

I put 8 jumps on my demo prodigy this weekend and tend to agree with Craig on the "Feel" of the suit. It is remarkably easy to fly straight out the door from side exit, tailgate or still exit. I jumped a heli and was suprised how quickly it inflated, it felt like the back deflector pressurised within a second or two at the latest.... then i covered ground at what appeared to be a decent rate although i dumped high., (Funcky elliptical )... 5800 exit - 4300 deployment 14 second delay.) no gps data.

I was not too interested in the freefall only the exit as i plan on more still air exits in the next few weeks that will require sound heading control

Overall the suit does float very well as already mentioned, i found it easy to fly relative with a friend jumping a PF tracking suit who was at full drive. Again, as Craig mentioned when adopting a more glide ratio based body position i feel the tendancy to pitch head low more. I think this is most probably a misconception and that when held in this position good forward speed would be obtained. My impression is that the design of the arm wing means that when the head is high and the body slightly arched the arm wings are acting as a bit of a brake and giving the "feeling" of balancing the pressure of the leg wing, when we should be accepting the lower pitch angle even though the "feeling " is that it is out of balance. This is only my initial impression though and someone who has jumped the suit more should comment. I will experiment with these different body positions when closer to the ground soon and should get a better impression of body position/glide ratio relationships.

On a different note, i forgot to correctly rig an arm wing to the hip attachment point and managed a 90 second delay flying video for my (not so experienced) friend jumpin a tracking suit) with only one arm wing. It was strange but by contorting my body i found it just possible to fly!!!!

The prodigy will I believe re-write the rule book for minimum jump numbers and WS's. I think as long as people understand the importance of the WS flight pattern they are going to be able to experience horizontal flight with less than the 500 jumps needed currently in the UK......... we will see...

Overall, as a training suit, or for a fun run to catch a load and have a laugh suit, or for lower wall jumping I give the prodigy a 10/10!

A not very experienced packer packed me a monster line twister on my 104 and i managed to get to the riser's, stop the rotation before it got unrecoverable, and kick out the 10 twists all without thinking about the fact i was wearing a wingsuit. Had i been on a more high performance suit I would have had my second cutaway this weekend for sure !

Darren

P.S. anyone in the UK wanting to demo a prodigy PM me..... I now have a demo fleet of one medium and one xl. they seem to fit most people well.

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

I was very impressed with the performance Ted was getting in a Prodigy at SkyFest. At breakoff from the flock he kicked it into gear and had me stretching to catch him in my S3. The only problem I see with that suit; and I have witnessed it first-hand; is that even when properly rigged it's entirely possible to lose a wing, even both during your flight. I think there needs to be a more secure means of connecting the wing to the hip of the pants. Beyond that, the suit does exactly what it was designed for and more (in terms of performance).

Chuck

[outrager 6]

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The only problem I see with that suit; and I have witnessed it first-hand; is that even when properly rigged it's entirely possible to lose a wing, even both during your flight. I think there needs to be a more secure means of connecting the wing to the hip of the pants.

Can you please elaborate? I can't quite see how is it possible to loose a wing - the hip attachment takes some effort to release intentionally on the ground, at least on the Prodigy i flew while in Europe. I did see many people misrig it, though, where they didn't pass the webbing under the loop before snapping it.

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Beyond that, the suit does exactly what it was designed for and more (in terms of performance).

Yes, i was shocked to get the glide and speed that beat Classic, directly off a cliff on my first fligts - without any skydiving practice!

Prodigy is easy and safe, however it is very responsive when flown to the max - probably harder to keep a perfectly maxed out body position than in Classic or S3 or V1. It is more fun, though, like anything with a higher wing-loading

bsbd!

Yuri.

[Professor 0]

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Can you please elaborate?

I blew a wing on a prodigy flight. I pulled it in mid flight. I'm a big guy (230 exit weight), and I was pulling hard and driving hard to get forward and down to some flockers who were down the glide path from me. I'm absolutely positive it was rigged correctly. After it blew, I had no trouble flying straight, but getting decent desent rate was not going to happen, so I undid the other wing and dumped. I've only done 4 prodigy jumps, so I'm not sure I needed to be putting as much force into the suit as I was, but, in short, it is possible to physically pull the wings loose.
Depending on the situation, this could be an advantage or a drawback.

Ted
Like a giddy school girl.

[unclecharlie95 3]

A wing release on the Prodigy is a very very rare occurrence, as it is on any other wingsuit.

It can only occur when the wing attachment point is placed under extremely high pressure. The same kind of loading has caused seams and zips to fail on other suits.

Long flights,

J

BASEstore.it

[voodew1 0]

Alright Chuck in the past we have had our differences - we have argued about this and that but now you have crossed the line!!!!!!! You don't even know what you have done!!!!!!!! The final straw has been laid upon the camels back

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I was very impressed with the performance Ted was getting in a Prodigy at SkyFest. At breakoff from the flock he kicked it into gear and had me stretching to catch him in my S3.

Chuck you bastard!!!!!! I am going to have to hear about that little comment for the next 3 months. I hope your happy!!!! He is going to walk around for the next month with a swelled head--his camera helmet probably won't fit anymore --- you don't realise what you have done

You are no longer my boy Blue!!!!

The pimp hand is powdered up ... say something stupid

[SkymonkeyONE 3]

BWAHAHAAHA! You're killing me Jason!

In response to James though: there were two Prodigy wing blowouts at Skyfest that I know of for sure; PFI Ted and PFI/E Perry. I seriously doubt those guys mis-rigged their wings. BMI/PFI Darren Kellet just posted that he had a wing blowout as well.

Chuck

[unclecharlie95 3]

Chuck,

Perry and Ted are the only reported cases, both were flying the suit hard and both admitted to applying high pressure to the armwing.
(Perry has destroyed more than one suit with his flying!)

Regarding Darren, please re-read his post:

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On a different note, i forgot to correctly rig an arm wing to the hip attachment point and managed a 90 second delay flying video for my (not so experienced) friend jumpin a tracking suit)

BASEstore.it

[unclecharlie95 3]

Back to the topic in hand.

Nice flying Mr. P!!

To get better glide get your chin down towards your chest, slightly head low is the way to go.

You liked the Prodigy, you will LOVE the Phantom & Acro

BASEstore.it

[droquette 0]

I got 3 jumps on a prodigy at the WFFC... I really liked the differences between it and other suits, the fact you can reach the risers is great. I had a good fall rate but not as good as with the GTI i tried... I only have 11 WS jumps so my figures are basicaly useless..
I also had a wing blow out.. I was able to control it fine after i released the other wing.I think mine was a rigging error on not getting one of the snaps completely seated. I had a problem getting it seated on the ground trying out the suit. Once this happened to me i made sure to tripple check each snap before flying away.
I the suit is very well constructed and I think it is a great addition to WS offered. The features are great especiall for beginers like myself... and BASE? (thats what makes most sense to me...)

blue skies,

dan

HISPA 72 ----- "Muff Brother" 3733

[LouDiamond 1]

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In response to James though: there were two Prodigy wing blowouts at Skyfest that I know of for sure

Likewise, I witnessed at least 3 wing blow outs at the Lake Wales 4th of july boogie. It not only happened when the person stood up in the aircraft but later on while he was in flight. I watched him re-rig it in the aircraft so I know that it was indeed correctly rigged before he left the aircraft.

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

[unclecharlie95 3]

There have been 2 cases to date, due to applying excessive force to the hip attachment.

Please can you send me the persons name Scott, so that we can contact them to understand if this was a rigging error.

BASEstore.it

[LouDiamond 1]

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Please can you send me the persons name

You would be better off asking Omar and the rest of the Z-hills gang, they were sitting right there next to me when it happened. I believe he is z-hills local, I want to say his name was either Rob or Bob. I think he actually appears in a still picture on one of Omars videos from that boogie.

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

[The111 0]

I did not see this happening, but there were a lot of new people taking up Prodigys (ProdigIEs? ) that weekend, and most of them were either taken up by Scotty or Perry, so perhaps one of them remembers this happening and which student it was.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[beergood 0]

Is it possible that some of these are not routing everything correctly or only half ass fastening the snap into place so its not locked properly? I have done that many times with snaps especially back in the 80's with my fly snap up shirts! Farmer McNasty has a bone head of mine with a ProTrack in it because I half assed closing my chin strap. Everything was fine head down then went belly to dump and bam $400 down the drain. Not a flaw in the helmet So I seriously doubt its a design flaw in the Prodigy and more of a pilot error in routing or fastening a snap properly or just not paying enough attention to the gear when putting it on. Just a thought or two.

[dmkellett 0]

I think that it is this entirely. I didnt route the webbing through the small loop posterior to the two snaps on the right hand side and so all the pressure the arm wing exerted was placed against the second snap, which is not how the attachment point is designed to operate. when the snap opened, there was a quick movement along the webbing of the plastic ring attached to the arm wing and this "snatch" force would have been enough to dislodge the first snap. i successfully repeated this on the ground after the event.... but when correctly rigged couldn't dislodge the second snap at all. I suspect the wing blowouts described have probably all been due to a RTFM error by the pilot, not a design flaw in the suit.....

Just my thoughts.
Darren

[cpoxon 0]

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I suspect the wing blowouts described have probably all been due to a RTFM error by the pilot

Yank his PFI rating! (Then I'll buy his Prodigies off him cheap, rather than just using them for free all the time!) :-P

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[LouDiamond 1]

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Is it possible that some of these are not routing everything correctly or only half ass fastening the snap into place so its not locked properly?

I am sure it is possible. However, it happened to one individual who owned the suit(pilot error?) and the others were either Perry's or Scotty's students. I would assume they had been inspected and hooked up correctly as well as given a class on how to properly assemble the suit on the ground in order to prevent that. But hey, it's a snap and sometimes snaps pop off, unless it is a "pull the dot" type of snap, in which case it only comes undone when you un-do it.

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

[Professor 0]

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I suspect the wing blowouts described have probably all been due to a RTFM error by the pilot, not a design flaw in the suit.....

No way. I'm positive that the suit was rigged correctly when I jumped it. And there was no FM to R, but I did ask TFPFI/E that was sitting next to me in the plane if it was hooked up correctly. It was.

Now, that said, I'm not saying this is a design flaw. I thought I remembered reading something somewhere that said that you are supposed to be able to pull the wings loose, as a safety feature, but I can't find the post anywhere. Maybe I dreamed it up. Also, I'm sure the suit doesn't require as much pressure as I was putting on it. Voodew and I are getting our Prodigy demos in this week, so I'll definitely experiment more with this.

Ted
Like a giddy school girl.

[voodew1 0]

All you internet fuckers are killin me WTF
I am going to assume that TF is the fucking PFI/E

Just spell it out so I don't have to use my feeble blue collar working mind to try and piece together your desk jockey lingos

Thanks

The pimp hand is powdered up ... say something stupid

[The111 0]

Google it, kook. Kook is not a personal attack, I just watched North Shore recently and can't stop talking like that.

You guessed right on TFPFI/E, which BTW (by the way!) is not a standard internet acronym, so your guess is as good as mine!

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[dmkellett 0]

R (READ) T (THE) F (FUCKING) M (MANUAL) :-) D

[voodew1 0]

Thanks guys --- what is google ---J/K (thats means just kidding) that google thingy is cool

The pimp hand is powdered up ... say something stupid

[beergood 0]

At further inspection of this thread why does it seem like its one manufacturer's people throwing another manufacturers product under the bus? Am I the only one that see's this in this thread or even in the wingsuit forum in general??? Then again I am sure I am wrong.

"Strange things are a foot at the Circle K" B&T