swilson

RS Components carries more stuff like that than you probably care to look at, and they serve the UK. Pretty decent prices too.

how is that not a good thing? and man nick, i just read your whole post instead of just the article. you really hate us. dude, this is what happens to amazing new sports. all of them. i like you and respect you dude, but, shite. Ummm... Just a thought here, doesn't the NPS also have the jurisdiction/right to grant permission for BASE jumps in parks? I could very well see the building owners/city granting BASE access to a building just as often as the NPS does in parks. Disregarding Bridge Day, it will never happen. Not on this continent, anyway.

The music for Superterminal can be found in this post by Hans, who had a thing or two to do with the movie and what I think is the most amazing BASE video soundtrack selection to date:

Yup, I was aware of all that, but I understand where confusion may have arisen. Upon rereading my post, the part where I referred to "steel links" is not as clear and precise as it could have been. I was assuming that the OP was comparing genuine Maillon Rapide links to soft links (slinks), and answered as such. In my post, instead of "on opening...", I should have said, "If the (Maillon Rapide) link comes undone, opening shock will probably stretch the link open..."

The thing about slinks is that they really only have one failure mode, as long as they are connected properly in the first place (RTFM). They don't crack or deform, and in the highly unlikely event they come undone, you know about it right away, because the canopy is no longer safely landable - you will only be connected to your canopy by 3 risers. If they fail due to wear or damage, it will happen during opening, not when you are landing. They also don't damage your slider grommets. Now compare them to steel links, which can can, but should not come undone without you noticing it, if they have not been properly torqued. On opening, the link will probably stretch open, but might still retain the lines. I certainly wouldn't want to take the chance and land that. Also, if you don't maintain some sort of bumpers at the line connections, your slider grommets can be damaged, leading to line damage. Both systems work, both have their pros and cons. Personally, I don't see ANY problems with, and prefer using slinks. (I am sure a search would have turned up plenty of reading on this topic too... )

If it smells like rotten eggs, is there any chance that someone spilled some mercaptan? It's the additive they put in natural gas to give it its smell, and we can detect it at extremely low concentrations. It comes in barrels, and I imagine that if someone dropped a barrel and it split open, that you could smell it for a looooong ways. I also imagine that if anyone in the vicinity of the spill got it on them, they would REALLY wish they hadn't. http://www.columbiagaspamd.com/community_outreach/mercaptan.htm

Not directed at anyone in particular, but the comment has been made that we need to find some way of keeping everyone as safe as possible (most important), while keeping everyone as happy as possible (somewhat less important). It has been stated before, and I agree, that given the canopy traffic, doing even a 180° turn from downwind to final, in order to execute a swoop, can be, as one poster put it, tricky. I also understand that at the boogie in question, there were rules laid out that were neither strictly adhered to, nor strictly enforced. The simplest solution that immediately comes to mind, which will still allow people to swoop, with likely the greatest amount of safety for all parties involved, would be to limit turns "in the pattern" to 90°, and STRICTLY enforce it. You don't want to play by the rules, they send you home, no exceptions, no matter who you are. You are at a boogie, not a swooping competition. I am only beginning to swoop, but I think almost everyone will agree that you can build PLENTY of speed with a properly executed 90° turn. Enough speed, in fact, that if you aren't in total control of you canopy, you will still be a potentialty fatal hazard. No, you're not going to get the same distance as if you had done a 180 or 270° turn, but you can still have fun. The biggest difference is that with a 90° turn, you only have to clear the airspace in front of you through the 90° flight path of your turn. You don't have to watch the whole flight path of a 270° turn, some of which will be directly against the crosswind traffic flow of a normal pattern. I'm all for people being allowed to swoop, but the events of the past week have shown that we need to learn from the mistakes of others. If this is looked after at the DZ/S&TA level, and ENFORCED, I believe that the rest of the problem will take care of itself.

I would strongly recommend against using acetylene and oxygen in a standard-issue spud gun. Been there, done that. I got away without any scars, but I think it was just dumb luck. We got exactly one shot out of it, couldn't hear for a little while, there was shrapnel EVERYWHERE, and I have NO idea where the potato ended up... Sched 40 PVC pipe isn't nearly strong enough to withstand the pressure generated when you light that sucker off, and it takes surprisingly little acetylene to do it (we used less than two quarts). A garbage bag full of oxygen and acetylene probably has at least as much energy as a stun grenade, and it's not too picky as to mixture ratios. Acetylene has one of the largest explosive ranges of all combustible gases - 2.5 to over 80% acetylene in air, whereas gasoline is only explosive from about 1.5 to 7.5% in air. In short, this stuff can hurt you even if you DO know what you're doing. If you have the know-how and the resources, you can build a mean potato gun out of stainless steel, though...

We have some snow we could give you...

Tom, any word on how many BASE jumps the deceased had?

All of the BASE canopies currently made are either full F-111 or part F-111/part ZP 7 cells. There are plenty of new ones readily available, and PD even builds some of them. And they even land pretty decently...

The really unfortunate part about this is that the "stacks" at a nuclear power plant are cooling towers, and the "exhaust" is water vapour (picture a waterfall with the mist rising, but inside a tube). The cooling water is below boiling temperature, and not nearly hot enough to make popcorn pop. Sorry to rain on your parade. Would still be funny as hell if you could find a way to make it work, though...

If you're talking about a doing a barrel roll about the roll axis, I would argue that it IS possible with a skydiving parachute. Brian Germain has done it on video with (I believe) a Samurai. If you're talking about a forward roll about the pitch axis, that is probably an entirely different animal... Either way, like you said, energy management is key.

Just to let you all know I at least wear long sleeves when Im riding it until I get some leathers. A long sleeved shirt won't do a damn thing to save you from road rash. Nor will regular blue jeans. Nor will a regular-weight jacket. Been there, done that. I was wearing jeans and my leather jacket when I... forcibly dismounted. I slid on my back for a good distance before coming to a stop.My upper body never had a scratch, but my legs were quite a bit the worse for wear. I was only going about 45 mph. Maybe you can't afford a tricked out set of leathers right now, but your body cannot afford you not having a decent set either.

You're looking for something like this? 700 jumps or so on the canopy, the black and magenta have both faded somewhat, but I think the magenta has faded more. I've never been told that visibility is a problem...

Find CyberLink PowerDVD. It plays fine on that...

Get some daylight balanced lights for your home and/or office. They approximate the spectrum of sunlight and help with the physiological symptoms and effects of a long dark winter... They're pretty cheap too.

Depth of field is a function of subject distance, focal length, aperture, and media size (1.6x CMOS or CCD, 35mm film, or 6x6 medium format film). Going to a faster lens (ie: f/2.8 or f/1.8) is not going to help anything. A larger aperture (smaller number on the f/scale) will only make the DOF smaller. For daylight skydiving pictures, you will need to be around f/8 or f/11 to get good depth of field, and this range is covered adequately by the lens you have now. I would imagine you are using the wide end of the lens (28mm), which will help somewhat. In bright sunlight, at f/8 and 100 ISO, you should be getting a shutter speed around 1/250. Bump the ISO to 200 and you should get around 1/500. Try setting your camera to Av, set the aperture at f/8, and let it adjust the shutter speed as needed. Google "depth of field calculator" and "exposure calculator" and play around with those a bit...

Have you tried a magnesium supplement? I've found that the little muscle twitches go away with only one pill. They seem to be a sign that the body's lacking something. Magnesium also helps if you've been having those wonderful leg cramps when you're sleeping.

Okay, I misread this. I did some messing around in Maple (math software) and using the implicit differentiation command I came up with -(e^xy - 1)/(e^xy + 1). Is this closer?

When you take the derivative wrt x of the exponential, you're left with the y multiplied by the original exponential, the derivative of the y term goes to zero, the derivative of the x term equals one, and the constant term disappears. d/dx(e^xy + y = x -1) works out to ye^xy = 1. Is this what you're after?

I ccuonr. Hvweeor, fruilae to slepl the wdross in your mgaeesss ccloterry can and ulaulsy deos laed to mmmstccoouiiiann and mnnnddtriiueassg, elepiaslcy if the scubjet meattr is clemopx or thaniccel in nrtuae and yuor acnediue is not fliimaar wtih the luggaane sciiefpc to a gvein flied. It jsut edns up fnuttaisrrg oehtr plopee... I rest my case. S

I'm guessing that the one you grabbed either wasn't grounded very well or that it was a weak sister to some of the systems out there. I know first hand that the one we have at home will leave you with no wish to repeat the experience. And it's just one of the lower mid-range models. Now Roy, to answer your question, many of the fencers made these days are hooked up to 120VAC and are designed to energize many miles of fence even with "leaks" from vegetation laying on the wire. However, they're designed to be nonlethal. They run anywhere from 2-5.4kV, but the current pulse is in the microsecond range with approximately one second between pulses. With electricity, it's current that kills you, not the voltage. I would imagine that if you somehow fell over an energized fence and were rendered unconscious by a blow to the head that the prolonged shocks could do some damage, possibly to the point that it kills you, but otherwise it won't do much other than hurt. That said, I've seen a dog take one to the nose. Being the well-grounded critters that they are, it still doesn't kill them but the noise they make when it happens makes it appear that way (remember, this is from a unit designed for livestock and miles of fence). I imagine it hurts more than anything they've ever experienced. They have no comprehension of what's going on. Side note: because I happened to be standing near the dog when it got nailed, the dog figured I was the one that administered the shock (punishment?). As a result, any time I came near the animal, it went totally submissive, would lay down belly up with fear in its eyes, and would not get up. It would behave like I had soundly and viciously beaten it (and I had never hurt this animal). Quite frustrating actually. For more info, visit www.gallagherusa.com and look under energizers. They actually have models for pets (I imagine they're relatively low-powered). One more thing to consider: Is this dog in the city or suburbs? Your friend may have trouble with the neighbours if he sets up an electric perimeter fence. I believe by law an energized fence must be clearly and visibly marked as such if it is in a populated environment. I can see many concerned parents being upset with a fence they think would hurt their children. 'Cause you know even with the signs someone's just gotta try it out..."Hey hold my beer and watch this..." S

Does he have a locker? Run a bead of silicone around the edge of the door, make it look like a weld (regular ripples, etc), and spray paint it so he can't tell it's silicone. Guys tend to freak out when they think their locker's been welded shut. Does he have a favorite coffee cup? JB Weld it to a table (preferably a heavy steel one). With coffee in it. You know those cards you get in the mail to register for correspondence diploma courses? Sign him up for a dressmaking or wedding planner course. And have the return address be the work address. This is one of those gifts that just keps on giving - they'll be sending him stuff for months. If you really want to get nasty, get a subscription in his name to the worst porn magazines you can find and have it sent to the work address. The only thing there is you have to be careful how it's paid for. It's pretty easy to backtrace a credit card number. If you feel really spiteful, find out one of his phobias and use it to your advantage. For example, at one of the places I worked as an apprentice, one of the guys was a total asshole toward pretty much everyone, me included. I found out that he was deathly afraid of mice, and planted a couple of them in his toolbox just before he got there one morning. I made sure beforehand that everyone in the shop knew what was going to transpire that morning, and also made sure I was in another part of the shop when he came in. Well, he comes in, opens his toolbox, and the most god-awful screaming started. You would have thought he was being attacked with an axe or something. It was pretty funny. This macho tough guy with an attitude turned into a screaming little girl and wouldn't go near hos toolbox until someone removed the mice. He never found out it was me, and the best part is we became really good friends shortly thereafter. I could go on and on. A word of warning - either don't tell ANYONE you're doing these things, or make sure EVERYONE's in on it. If no one knows, no one can squeal, but if everyone knows and thinks he deserves it, you're usually pretty safe too. Use your imagination and don't get caught!!!!

Yes, the speedlite is an external flash. For full metering functionality, you'll need the EX series flashes (or aftermarket equivalent if they exist). The Canon site is a good place to find more info...