lyosha

This is a given. But 45 mph for a Vigil is a lot more forgiving than 29 mph on a cypres. In the only other thread I found on this topic (about cypres specifically), an individual said the top vertical speed he could attain on a 1.3 loaded sabre2 was 45 mph. And a Sabre2 loaded at 1.3 is more aggressive than most wingsuitters I know personally fly. A follow up question would be - if you fly big suits in a skydiving environment, does a large main (possibly dedicated low bulk main i.e. squirrel epicene) become a necessity for your AAD to be effective?

Hi! In a recent wingsuitting fatality the max descent rate of an unconscious individual in an X-something from Tonysuits has been demonstrated to be 50 mph. This makes it seem like an AAD is more or less useless (hit or miss at best) in expert mode when used in conjunction with a wingsuit. Just to paint an even a picture - once your body slows down to 50 mph in vacum with zero air resistance it will take it over a second to accelerate back to firing speed for AADs. Factor in the air resistance that your sleeping bag of death provides, and you're gonna have a bad day. Now, I know Cypres is a dead fish. The student version has an activation speed of 29 mph. But a Vigil II has an activation speed of 45 mph, which is much more applicable to modern canopies. In addition, the student mode has a raised activation altitude which is also applicable to the increased burble altitude disparity that AADs likely suffer from when used in conjunction with wingsuits. Discuss.

Getting a low bulk WS canopy + separate smaller size canopy for non-WS jumps is more economical than having two rigs, not to mention potentially more aerodynamic ;)

Just a note: This is this guy's first camera experience with skydiving. Talking about optimizing video quality and shot quality is, in my opinion, not the best way to help him be safe. Guy: As someone not currently trying to rival Norman Kent you should get a cheap GoPro and one of these mounts: https://www.chutingstar.com/skydive/grellfab-gopro-g3-front-mount DSE forgets that he jumps with a retardedly expensive (even for skydiving) helmet with a dedicated cutaway, meanwhile cutting away your helmet was probably not a consideration in your [first time camera jumper with ~200 jumps] helmet selection logic when you got it 150 jumps ago. He probably wouldn't jump a camera without a cutaway, and neither should you. Especially as a first experience. I can tell you lots of fuckup stories from first camera jumps if you don't believe me. Stay safe. Worry about "getting good footage" later.

"What's the highest you've jumped?"

Lots of people do, especially amongst wingsuiting folk. Chest mount analog for the jump + wrist digital for under canopy + audible for, well, an audible.

Some placements are inherently more dangerous than others. The danger of some can be mitigated, while with others there's nothing you can do. http://www.watchthybridle.com/2014/08/gopro-anti-snag-mounts/ It is not wrong at all to examine where the least hazardous location for camera placement would be... The particular camera in question can only be mounted in a finite number of ways, none of which I would want my friends doing. P.S. I'm not a fan of teletubbying, and try to convince my friends to not do it. But you're a grown ass man and you can make your own decisions. Blue skies!

Can you please link me a good mount for a sony hdr100v? I don't remember coming across any. You mean the style of mount that was the reason for the fatality in Poland discussed in Norman Kent's video? The problem with side mounts is that they are usually permanent (you screw the thing on), and are actually pretty easy to snag, especially in the event of a cutaway (again - see fatality in Norman Kent video). RSL-side is arguably more dangerous than non-RSL side.

That's not the best choice of camera for a first camera due to lack of snag-free mounts. Have a discussion about cameras and snagpoints with your local S&TA. You may want to get a gopro instead, as there are less dangerous mounting options available for it. In addition, don't get footage horny. People that wait for a particular numbered skydive to arrive to use a camera tend to forget all about the skydiving and concentrate on the camera on that skydive. And then they have a cutaway because their riser entangles the damn thing, a two out because they lose altitude awareness or something equally as stupid (both of these happened to my friends). When I started using a camera it was my video logbook and nothing more for the first ~100 skydives. I turned it on at 10k and off when I landed. Kept my brain on the things that matter and not on "is it blinking?".

http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Premium-Grade-Gaffer-Gafferpower%C2%AE/dp/B00GZE3UJ8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1431716937&sr=8-1&keywords=gaffers+tape

Okay, stop. Before you go further go to Chutingstar and have a look around. There are better options, and there are worse options. Most jumpers do make what I would consider to be poor decisions with their GoPros, but this is a direct consequence of the lack of a serious conversation about cameras and camera safety - one that has been substituted for by 200 jump nonsense. Norman Kent's video is a good start, but it seems a decade late. I have a C license. Through education and confirmation? Instead of jump numbers gauge attitude and ability? I remember DSE making similar pleas with regards to wingsuit flying after a recent fatality. Having someone else videotape you is of course better, but in absence of this, videotaping yourself can be very informative. For an example, consider trying to videotape your body position in a track (angle camera down) or wingsuit flight.

And jump numbers do? Ability to assess additional risks posed by a piece of equipment and to manage those risks does. Jump numbers do not equate to ability to manage and mitigate risk. Jump numbers equate to jump numbers. I've seen greater correlation from motivation than from jump numbers. Because footage-horny C license holders have 200 jumps behind their belt already and "nothing went wrong in 200 jumps so it must not really matter". Seriously. A gopro with a reasonable mount for a beginner runs a whopping total of $200, or 8 jumps at most DZs, or about 15 minutes of tunnel time.

Not everyone jumps a GoPro to try to make awesome Youtube videos. Of my ~180 jumps with a GoPro attached to me, exactly one has been for the purpose of videography. For the rest, my GoPro is the most invaluable self-debriefing tool that I have. And occasionally (1 out of 30-50 jumps or so...) it accidentally captures something interesting enough for me to share with the rest of the world.

This is DZ.com, where the prevailing opinion of the populace forgets the adage that more rules create a greater illusion of safety, the only reason anyone would ever want to fly a camera is "mad skillz" or videotaping tandems, and education is frowned upon in favor of brute force restriction.

I hope not. Those are less stable in turbulence without the increased speed. I think all elliptical canopies will have a round nose.

http://iloveskydiving.org/view/videos/throwback-thursday-tandem-skydive-student-surfing-looks-painful/

Hey, Could you post some more pictures showing in more detail what you did? I'd be pretty interested in learning. Do you think something similar could be done with a G3?

If you don't mind me asking - why?

This is a much better video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VigfXe1vhYg

Hmm... what happened to "the best pilot won" ? Wasn't it a hybrid Aura and not a C2 anyway?

I also want to thank everyone as I have enjoyed the exchange very much as well. I know it is risky for a manufacturer to engage with the public, as we have all seen where that has gone bad fast lol... Doesn't L&B have a data logger of some kind that will link up to a phone like you and Lee have described? I have always been surprised that they have not come out with an AAD... guess they are smarter than I am lol... To be frank I'm much more interested in verifying the function of my AAD and identifying how it behaves based on my activities in the sky to check for potential pitfalls than about posting profiles of my jumps to facebook...

Some designs are more intuitive to use and forgiving of mistakes than others. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDpCSxErk_E Packer's fault, but alternate design choices may have had less dire consequences.

You shouldn't make that assumption. I was aware how Vigil's firing logic works when I commented on its simplicity. Extremely demanding but extremely cornered and extremely simplified. Skydiving, as a class of activities, is extremely variable. On one end you have people swooping and at the other you have wingsuiting. And then you have something like XRW - where someone under a fully functional canopy will have the exact same profile as someone in a wingsuit. I wish these guys the best of luck and hope they succeed, but for me to trust something that wants to make all the decisions for me with 10x the complexity of anything that already exists and probably 100x the complexity of what I use, I would need a VERY detailed decision tree and to be able to read data from it to gain confidence in its sensors and logic, and have the capacity to turn off features that don't apply to me. If I'm wingsuitting, I'm probably not swooping, after all.

are you sure you understand how your AAD works ? I assume lyosha is talking about either a loss of altitude awareness wingsuit flight, when the pilot passes below 750ft in full flight, or in a "where's the hacky" fumble position where the descent rate will be higher, but not 78 mph. What were you thinking he meant? If even that. I have more than one friend that believes their AAD will not fire in their medium to big wingsuit because their descent rate will not be fast enough if they are unconscious. Because I feel that's the real issue AADs are trying to solve, not altitude awareness. Come out with "wingsuit" mode for an AAD and I feel you have a niche market.