milehigheric

Why would you not just sell it and save the hassle? It may be the perfect rig for your needs now, but no doubt something equally as perfect will be available when you choose to rejoin the sport.

Diving to formations and matching fall rate...Still struggling with 8-10 ways and going low

Thanks for the clarification. It is a PD reserve so the canopy label should tell the story when it gets pulled out next.

Oh right, I wasn't aware that the cypress jump log was introduced down the track. If it started logging after the 4 year it would make sense. It's not a big deal at all, I was more just curious as I was expecting the AAD counter to be somewhat reflective of the rigs history. As to potential reserve rides, there is no X or / in any of the entries? There may be markings on the canopy i'm not really sure - I'll check at the next repack. To me, repacks 6 & 10 look to close to be normal so I think i will just list the reserve as having 2 rides and 15 packs.

I'm just getting all the info together to put my rig on the market and have a couple of questions. Firstly I just wanted to confirm the method of counting reserve rides based on the packing card. Packing card only lists inspect/repack (ie, no mention of ride) in each entry but some entries are within 2 -4 months of each other. Do you assume that any repack entry less then 6 months (leeway of a couple of weeks maybe) was due to a reserve ride or just an early repack cycle (do people do this?) Second question is based around the cypress 2 jump log.... it is what it is I guess but the scenario just seems a little strange and I wanted to hear your opinions. Repacks in packing card 01 - 31-03-05 02 - 27-07-05 03 - 23-11-05 04 - 05-07-06 (Current AAD was installed at this repack) 05 - 20-02-07 06 - 25-04-07 07 - 07-12-07 08 - 11-04-08 09 - 03-10-08 10 - 17-10-08 11 - 29-05-09 12 - 11-06-10 13 - 02-06-11 14 - 20-07-12 (this is when I purchased the Rig) 15 - 18-09-13 So I believe the rig to have around 400 jumps on it at the moment and the current Cypress jump log shows 91 jumps (not the original unit). According to my log book, 86 of them have been mine from repack 14 (20-07-12) on-wards. This would mean only 5 jumps were logged on the AAD between 05-07-06 and the 20-07-12... 6 years . Entries 12,13 and up to when I took over at 14 indicate to me the possibility that it wasn't jumped much during this time (yearly repacks)...but really, how do you accumulate more reserve repacks then actual jumps? I dont know what to think - based on that data 300+ jumps would have had to be made before the new cypress was installed at repack 4. Could this be right or is something going on here that I'm missing? I should have probably been on to all this and asked the right questions when I bought it - keep in mind I had about 20 jumps then however.

I was there in September on a skydiving/snowboard holiday the sports scene certainly lacks from what I saw. I visited motueka, New zealand Skydiving school (methven) and skydiving kiwis (rangitata). I only jumped once at motueka, seemed like a cool DZ. I was a bit annoyed that only one load went up on a perfect friday due to lack of jumpers however. The weather closed in that weekend so I didn't have time to give it more of a chance. I didn't get to jump at NZSS due to weather and apparently this is pretty common. It is situated at the base of mt hutt pretty much so you get all that nasty weather that comes with mountains. When I was there it was 15 knots on the ground and 40 knots at 3k. Chatting to the students it seems they only get 5-10 good days a month. It is also a school at the end of the day so no drinking or the like at the DZ. Seems like a good DZ, good people, good facilities just a terrible spot Skydiving kiwis was my pick while I was there. Its only a small DZ, but size isn't everything. Lee seems to be one of the few DZ owners that still has his heart in sports jumping in NZ from what I saw. Hes also a badass freeflyer if you want coaching. Fuck work mondays are the best day, usually all the students from NZSS come down for the day (it is closed mondays). Don't bother with the rest on the south island - pure tandem mills!

All good points... Thanks guys!

I may sound a little selfish here but Skydiving, and the people that surround my skydiving have become an area of my life that truly makes me happy. The 'problem' is that I'm noticing it is beginning to effect other parts of my life - My family in particular. I know my fiance and my young daughter deserves the majority of my free time but when the weather is good I find it near impossible to not be at a drop zone I'm still fairly young, I'm still probably a bit (alot) naive but whats the big secret... how does everyone play the juggling act with work, family, plus a big selfish hobby (skydiving if you didn't guess) and not drop all the balls? This is kind of a serious question, but obviously there is no magic answer to solve an incredibly selfish first world problem. To put a simple question out there, for those of you that have done so - after getting married and having kids how did you adjust your skydiving and/or other hobbies to suit the lifestyle change? Alternatively if you had a family before you started skydiving (as is my case) how did you make it work and keep everyone including yourself happy?

It is impossible to improve on relative work by yourself so the only thing you can really learn is exits and getting stable in new body positions. Try all the differing exits as if they were a 4 way. Back flying, tracking, sit flying are all options but at 17 jumps you need to talk to your instructor to see what's appropriate.

I disagree... Downsizing or not you should be flying the canopy that suits you now. Your going to bust out 100 jumps before your ready for a downsize so base your economics off that. It may be different in other parts of the world but here 100 jumps of rental gear almost buys you a rig - and then you can sell it when you downsize. Just my opinion, I hate paying 'dead money'.

Tandem or sports jumping? I traveled around the south island last month and as a sports jumper would probably only go back to skydiving kiwis. The rest of the drop zones I saw are either exclusively tandem operations or heavily tandem based. Methven seemed OK, but it is a school at the end of the day and IMO a terrible spot for a DZ (weather wise). I heard Nzone actually made their lift tickets so expensive for fun jumpers that they aren't forced to turn them down like other DZ's - the fun jumpers turn them down

I have jumped both and no doubt the Safire opens more smoother mote often. I prefer the flight characteristics of the sabre 2 however

Would a cutaway main do much damage to a limb if your PC bridle was wrapped around it? I would expect friction burns and bruising but i can't see it ripping a limb off

From what I heard most of the mals had multiple takes to get the right shots. The horseshoe was a once only tho haha

Talk about overkill... Were talking about a platform for video editing not 3D rendering for pixer aren't we? Im not going to go into all of that novel but water cooling is an absolute wank on anything at stock clock. My advice when building PC rigs is to identify your needs and stick to the components that will meet your needs. The cost to upgrade a specific component Is usually pretty small and it can be very easy to fall into the overkill trap. By the end of the build those $40 - $70 upgrades on each component add up and you have added $300 to your build. Maybe you could use dot points chris - might make it easier for everyone :)