CrazyL

THE REASON FOR THIS POLL : the answer lies in the post above. Go to the incidents forum , Lake Elsinore fatality. Read on sky brothers and sky sisters, take a good hard look. Read it. Just what will we do. I caught a wave today. I caused a wave last week, feel the ripple? Gimme feed back once you've read the thread.

THE REASON FOR THIS POLL... go to the incident forum , Lake Elsinore Fatality. Read on sky brothers and sky sisters, take a good hard look. I would like some response after the thread is read please. Thanks, Crazy Larry P.S. Skydiving camera people, just trying to save some for later.

Good performance imo. So you do not loosen chest strap, do not release wings, nor swoopcords, nor booties. To me that gives you more focus on the more important stuff. Canopy and traffic checks, fly to dz and land without causing serious injury or death to you or anyone else, and for a bonus, you have fun with your cameras while having fun flying your parachute and enjoy enhancing the tandem student and possibly the TI's skydiving experience. All the while being on ready alert for canopy collision among other things. Your harness is still snug under canopy, not loose, which in turn puts your cutaway and reserve handles in a easier position to see and get to just in case you decide at or above your decision altitude that you want to use them while under canopy for whatever reason. Glad to hear you have a good time while shooting, me too. Do you have an RSL or AAD ?

I thinl it's a good thing you leave a length of chest strap to grab and retighten. There are 2 scenarios that you are more prepared for 1 of them you'd better be fast and correct. What scenario would you need/want to retighten your chest strap?

I have been conducting tests to see what it takes to pull the reserve handle with a loosened chest strap, soft pillow and D ring. Several factors are involved to get the 'perfect storm' type of scenario from what appears to be a simple mal to deal with.

thanks for your input. Similar to many others you loosen the chest strap and lastly unstow the brakes. So far so good right? No issue doing it that way right?

true.

Once you have toggles in hand, they should remain there, keeping your canopy in control until landing (with the rare freestyle exception). I usually do chest strap, slider, toggles. If a brake fires while taking your slider down/off (has happened once or twice), your chest strap is already loose, so you don't have to deal with it after getting your toggles in hand. Agree about the toggles except the rare freestyle exception. Do CRW? downplanes? 4 stack? dragplane? twist 180 under canopy while docked on the bottom of a crw stack? pull high above 8,000ft.? cross country? If when you pull down the slider a brake fires, i'd bet you have velcroless toggles. Mine were changed back to velcro toggles on my rigs to alleviate that scenario and then some. Loosening the chest strap is questionable now in my mind.

Oh ya, the FJC saved me once. seems simple to look grab peel pull, look grab peel pull. add loose upper harness with a swooper extra long chest strap, and flopping wing material and clip in your visual trying to see the handle. would you fumble around or easily look grab peel pull?

you guys are great! My procedure is/has been very similar to each of yours at times. what is cosistent is we release brakes lastly , fly and land. I learned something here, thanks. swoop cords, i've jumped them too mine have all been 'fixed loop' in position for me, and have a habit of tucking them in the cuffs. The kind that can 'cinch' can cinch onto the reserve ripcord swedge area, wow. oops. swoop cords can tie hands together essentially 'hand cuffing me' ,woe. and keeping the chest strap tight and with no need to release wings for the entire jump would keep my handles in better position and my wings from covering my handles so in case I cutaway due to a steering problem my handles may be in a decent place to see and/or get to fairly easily which would increase my chances of pulling the reserve in time. Sweet.

Like the majority of swoopers , me included basically will stow slider, loosen chest strap, then lastly unstow the brakes. If you jump camera wings with detachable clips, you also will normally release the clips on the wings prior to releasing the brakes. Your getting where i'm going with this but don't know any reason why you'd unstow brakes first. other than bigways and /or pulling low here's a reason i'd like for you to assess and let me know if it's valid or a fluke and I should'nt worry so damn much. Even for those who can visually inspect there brake stowage as the main is open and flying prior to releasing the brakes. It is easy enough to have the brake line stowed in a manner that the toggle 'had' been accidentaly routed above the guidering between the steering line and the rear riser causing a sort of half hitch around the guidering. There are other ways too that can cause a control issue. Here's my crazy scenario. Open at 4,000 do the checks and the 3 things : 1.stow slider 2. loosen chest strap 3. release brakes. oh shit! right toggle is f'd up ahh pull left toggle correcting turn issue,sweet, flying flat and level caught it quick li'l hot rod likes to take off in a spiral if i let up,damn. gonna chop it , gonna fix it, i'll chop at 2grand if i don't have it fixed by then ,damn , cypres was sent out for service, rsl, ya right. no biggie, i got this, take me to the pond li'l hotrod with an f'd up steering might land you and me in the pond where it's soft just in case we're landing hard. here comes 2 grand it's not fixed, shit . decide decide decide chop'n this bitch flying flat and level oh ya the toggle in my left hand it'll easily slip from my hand if i just cutaway with my right and let go of the toggle, gotta light grip on it so i don't dare trail the main when I chop. Chop chop. (and possibly, ouch that jacked my left arm)beep beep beep 1500ft. soft pillow reserve handle, li'l terd where are you? li'l f..r, damn wings flop'n all over my sh..t, harness is swimming around over my shoulder down my arm i can fix it to get that handle, shrug , tug , gotta get that handle dammit,go'n for it with either hand c'mon baby, shit, the harness, shit, the wing, f'n handle, got it sort of, c'mon ,c'mon, pull you f'r. oops. Is it just a bad dream or could this scenario be for real? Dave?

ditto. About letting go of VELCROLESS toggles in flight, bad idea. nothing is holding the toggle in place except brake line pressure pulling the toggle up to the guide ring. Forward speed of canopy will make the toggle blow around and very easily can get wrapped around a riser among other things like camera. And it's more difficult to get hands back into the velcroless toggles while there being blown around. VELCRO toggles on the other hand I have and do occasionally have the need to reattach my toggles to the velcro on the risers while in flight and take my hands out of them. When I want control of the canopy back, the toggles have a nice loop form and are predictably in the place where i left them making them easy to put my hands back in and very quick. I have 3 complete rigs on deck 2 with velcro risers which i jump alot, and 1 with velcroless toggles which will be changed if I jump it much which is doubtful.

i'm not a fan of toggles in hand and dealing with chest strap for my gear , too awkward with inputs. I have modified my velcroless risers/toggles to old school velcro risers/toggles. One basic reason. When i want to release the toggles from my hands for any reason the velcro gives the toggles the ability to be in the same position as i left them when i want them back in my hands. velcro holds toggle in an open loop shape. velcroless toggles will blow around so easy anytime their are released from hands.

Thanks Lew, your busy and well organized. would'nt you want your harness to be snug till after you release brakes and control check? in case you get a hung steering problem and you had to correct for a turn and decided to cutaway your little hot rod and did'nt want to build up g's or dive the canopy so would you cutaway holding onto toggle with light grip and cutaway or let go of toggle then cutaway while in heavy spiral, high g load, dropping out of the sky. if the chest strap is loose at that time and wings and booties a flop'n and your in freefall looking for this little terd shaped tie dyed fancy little pillow handle amongst the floppy wings oh ya and loose harness that just likes to be shifty in freefall and you gotta find the terd and pull it within 8-10 seconds could you do it without fail without an aad or rsl?

your procedure works for sure. each scenario listed works. Are you a little bit of a fan for releasing brakes prior to loosening the chest strap?

i'd bet you always release brakes at some point above decision altitude. don't worry about the other selections yet. Friday i'll have the big 'reason' why i created this poll. check in Friday night.

No doubt, did you vote? There are still those out there that do not stow their slider too.

what is your procedure? is it your vote? please list the other 2 possibilities.

Among the other things you do, for this poll i'm mostly concerned about the order of which you deal with each component listed. If there is another order please post it .

Among the other things you do, for this poll i'm mostly concerned with the order which you deal with each component listed. If there is another order please list.

I'm so lucky. parked the '84 toyota 4x4, it gets 17 mpg at best. Bought '02 Cadillac deville with 32 valve V8 comfy ride likes to go fast. Cadi gets no less than 20 mpg in town and no more than 27 mpg on highway. A/C and Bose sound system rock big time. Can fit 3 of my 4 surfboards inside the car in the passenger seat, bitch'n ya. Had 5 rigs in the trunk 4 were in gearbags and still had room for gwedo in the trunk. It's a fat person car and i'm a skinny fella. All 4 seats have a built in massager. Is on a 3 year note and will be paid off in 2yrs and 3 mo. It's a bad boy cadi. It likes the expensive gas. Here in california that shit is expensive. I can still afford it. driving roundtrip to dz's is 2 and a half to 3 hours. Still jump avidly. 3 weekends a month has been the average this past year. I live by the beach, it's expensive too. But now i'm taking off atleast the next 3 months going from avid jumping at approx 480 jumps last year cutting back to maybe 0 the next 3 months to maybe 50 by the end of the year . would be my longest layoff since I started jumping over 16 years ago. Just gotten burned out on the death i've witnessed, scars on my heart for from fallen friends has built up a bit much. never ever used a cc though or borrowed money to buy skydives. My dad did co-sign at the bank so i could buy this brand new top of the line parachute i really wanted. I was 20 and onto my second canopy a top of the line modern day hotrod a sabre 120 $900. Yes i paid it off in /on time. Still today all my debts are paid. I keep on working and paying.

Yo, is'nt there rep at the ranch. jon?

Yea, but don't tell my wife that... She thinks the nights and weekends at the loft are actually a high paying respectable gig... like piano player in the whore house... hahaha! She's right. does she know parachutes are expensive like $800 and freefalling is free?

You got the right idea, rainy days in the loft with the rigger. I did that for 4 winter seasons before getting the license. Was'nt in a hurry and thought i'd be worthy if I first learned from several riggers and manufacturers. Now I live an endless summer in SoCal and skydiving is year round. Rainy days are rare here, so is my time to teach a person thoroughly. If you got a rigger,loft, and rainy days, you got a good situation. Take them a little food and drink and a good attitude it'll take you far.