JohnnyZ

The HDR-CX100 is avialble for Pre-Order at Crutchfields http://www.crutchfield.com/p_158CX100/Sony-HDR-CX100-Silver.html?tp=6662 No one in line let... Be sure to get one off of that first shipment!

Here's the Para Concepts RDS for a JVX. The JVX requires the flaps on the sides of the slider. One for a Velocity or other canopy wont have those. The full RDS is a little bit of an older picture when I had the stainless rings on it. The new alloy rings are shown in the other pic.

I'd like someone to tell me why they think the PEA sliders are better that Para Concept's. I can see one lesser quality feature just by looking at the pictures - the rings. Kirk was using the thinner stainless steel rings like PEA appearantly is using and searched long an hard for a better solution. He came up with the alloy version that was released last season. I have probably 400 or so jumps on each style of ring and the new ones are definitely better... Mainle because they're lighter and thicker. Why is thicker better? -- Less line wear. I'm probably going to get 50% more jumps out of a set of 350 HMAs just because of the new rings. Kirk overengineers everything and really put a lot of thought and research into this. The rings are machined in Germany and then spend a crazy amount of hours in a tumbler in his loft working out ANY edges. IMO, it's doubtful that there's a better RDS out there.

I bought a Lotto ticket tonight... If I win I'm going! That would be so bad ass!

I have no idea about the size difference, but that's going to be a huge jump in performance and speed for you. The Neos isn't quite in the same league as the Velo/JVX. I only put a handful of jumps on a 98 Neos when I was regularly jumping a 111 Velo and it still felt more docile to me. You're going up in canopy performance plus wing loading, whereas I only went up in wing loading and down in canopy performance (I hope that makes sense)... So be carful with that transition.

Safire 2 and Crossfire 2 (if you're ready for it) are about the nicest opening canopies out there, IMO.

I'm not sure what company makes the swoop shorts the PD team has been using. I think it might be Tony Suits, but I'm not 100% on that. I've been jumping some made by Deepseed and am really happy with them. The U.S. Dollar converts nicely into NZ dollars these days too... Check them out! http://www.deepseed.com/skydiving_equipment/swoop/swoop.html

I jump only Deepseed gear (Swoop pants, Freefly pants, Freefly top and Camera top)... I've never jumped one of their suits with grips, but I came across a Deepseed sponsored Australian team that was and they looked to be really nice. The main reason for the FF suits with grips is for VRW. They are much smaller than your standard RW grip and shouldn't have any effect on your freeflying. Jumping an RW suit, on the other hand, will greatly effect you while freeflying... Especially while sit flying. In my opinion... Go for it. The suit will only be more versitile if you want to use it once in a while for RW... And you will not be dissapointed with their product. They build a great suit at a great price!

Way to go Greg! Keep it up

What is that thing, cross-braced and airlocked or something else? Got any pictures?

Werd

I got bored so I slapped this together tonight. It's a little half-assed, but there's some pretty good footage in there. Sorry if I missed one or two swoops... Enjoy http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=7280

Damn... We went from $10 to $15 for hop & pops this year at Skydive Chicago. I thought that was bad. What do they charge for altitude at Mile Hi, $30 or so?

We'll be having the last CPC meet of the season at Skydive Chicago this Saturday, August 9th. We're going to do it over the pond again. Try to be out there by 8:30... We'll be trying to get up by 9:00 am. Crooch has been talking shit, so prepare to see him get his ass spanked!

I agree that the stainless version Para Conceps was using probably wore the lines a bit more than the origional teflon ones. I just hooked up a set of the new ones Para Concepts is using... Kirk is a nut when it comes to only putting the best thing he can find out there. These things are considerably thicker than the stainless ones but about half the weight. They spend like 40 hours in this new polishing machine he bought getting all the rough edges smoothed out. I'm diggin them.

Damn... It's going to cost $600 plus jumps to compete in the CPC, PST and USPA nationals. I think two outa three will have to be good enough... Or maybe just one outa the three.

Well, I called CSC earlier today and they're cool with rescheduling it to July 19th. Sorry Karl, I really won't be able to get up there at a early enough time to set up the course and get things going at a decent time. If someone else wanted to set things up (I doubt that'll happen) I could be out there by 8:30 or so, but I already called CSC and told them about the change after seeing no responses before I left for work this morning. Derrick and Karl, I hope that you guys can somehow make it. I hoped to not inconvenience anyone. Please pass this along to anyone else that should know and might not get here to see the schedule change.

Does anybody have a problem with changing the date of the Hinkley meet from July 12th to July 19th? Dan was going to be in charge of setting up for this one, but as most of us know he's moved out of state and I'm taking care of it. I know Derrick wanted to make it this one but the date wasn't the best for him either... Anybody object? I'll give you guys till Monday night to speak up, otherwise I'll change the date.

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a382/jzagoda/ParaConceptsRDS001sm.jpg http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a382/jzagoda/ParaConceptsRDS003sm.jpg

I know it's not as easy as it sounds, but why doesn't someone just rename and continue the PST and CPC?

I make it a common practice to be in the saddle by 2800-3000 ft. After I open I point myself where I want to go and start pulling my RDS off and keep looking around. If I do see someone else under canopy flying towards me I can make light turns with a little harness input or a light pull on a rear riser. It usually only takes 15-20 seconds to pull it down, roll it up and stuff it in my RDS pocket.

If you're going to remove the slider you might as well fly with the full RDS in my opinion. Reattaching the slider is the only time consuming part of the process. I almost always jump with mine. If I'm jumping hard and want to save time I'll take off the bag and pilot chute and hook them to the canopy and throw the ball-bungee and rubberband on my container.

We're up at East Troy on June 21st... Who else is coming? Troy can't compete because he hurt himself, but he's coming to help out. Macino got sucked into the tandem world and forgot how to swoop, so he's not going. Henry and I are definitely going to be there though.

So I saw the ad on the back cover on this months Parachutist and looked on their website, but I'm not really finding any real info. Anybody know how this setup works? Is it a spin-off of the Skyhook or something different?

The Century .3 is a multi element lens. The Century .5 (or .55, I can't remenber) is the single element lens you're thinking of.