BlindBrick

fair enough. I think I came across as harsher than I meant to be anyway. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Don't put words in my mouth. You asked a question and I responded. My response included a rebuttal for the most common comment you hear when you point out something like that ie. The DOJ only goes after the large businesses. And I mean large ones. If you aren't turning more than a couple of billion annually, you're usually not worth the DOJ's time. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

I've had a fair number of cutaways so that handle says "Not Again!". My reserve ripcord says "Double or nothing" -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

If so (am not saying they are, because I don't know) that's a violation of federal law, but good luck getting the DOJ interested in such small fry. But then again, as part of CPS they are technically a defense contractor which might make them a little jucier to a hungry prosecutor. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Pardon the pun, but Tulsa is well known for wagging the dog. About ten years ago, there was a serious scandal in the PD and within a few days, they had went and arrested several adult news stand clerks(not managers or owners) for selling Hustlers. By the time that blew over, the public had forgot all about the police scandal. Makes one wonder how they screwed the pooch this time. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Wow, I had totally forgotten this thread even existed. Looking at the date I last posted here, the next day I did in fact go to the dropzone, but any results I obtained were forgotten when I got the phonecall that my son had been in a wreck. He didn't make it and all I remember from the dropzone that day way sitting down after the sunset load discussing with my friends about how good of a day of jumping it had been when I got the phone call that they were air evac'ing my son. I will say that a month ago I had a CC course with Luigi Cani and it was his opinion that my brake lines were actually too long. Givne that, I don't think they are affecting recovery arc. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

300lbs. exit weight and 300lbs. body weight aren't the same. A possible solo rig for someone in the 300 lb. range would be a MC-4/5 military rig. So figure about 350lb. Exit weight. There are several off the shelf sport rigs that can handle jumpers that heavy. A short but by no means all inclusive list would be Racer, Mirage, and some Vectors. There is no need to strap someone into a military rig. And honestly, IMO as an owner of both a sport and military freefall rig, the miltiary rig is not a good idea for several reasons. 1. The military rig is unnecessarily heavy (due to military-specific mods) which excaberates the weight problem. A comparable sport rig will run somehwere between 25-35 lbs, ie around half the weight. 2. The rig uses a dual pin ripcord which is utterly different in both rigging/closing and pull procedures/location than the sport gear a jumper will eventually transition into. This requires an extensive bit of gear refamiliarization, and, IMO, comprimises safety for a number of jumps until the jumper becomes totally comfortable using the throw-out system. Ripcord jumpers are trained to hold onto the ripcord after deployment and this can lead to issues such as horseshoes or complications during emergency procedures because you only have one hand free since you revert to training in high-stress scenarios and you were trained to hold onto that ripcord. 3. The gear is not designed to be flown in a sporting type manner. This leads to issues such as the non-collapsible pilot chute coming over the nose in agressive manuvers or the quick-release legstrap hardware coming undone when some one grabs it wrong or when something snags the prominent and unprotected ejector lever. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

You're a little off. Mike can correct me if I'm wrong but my understanding after reading the FAR's, the FAA's websiute about experimentals and a call to the Little Rock FSDO is that the FAA does not issue experimental ratings to aircraft types, but to each individual aircraft, and that it is done on a FSDO by FSDO basis. Thus, there are some AN-2's with the range restriction, and others without it. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

550 lbs, might be stretching it. However, I've got a copy of Mirage's droptest data laying around in a box somewhere (just moved). The max tested weights are very high and that data should be sufficient to move it out of the realm of gross negligence for someone who is 300 lbs. Ultimately, it's a question of safety. ie Can the gear handle it? In '05, through a combination of inexpexerience and related bad decision-making, I personally discovered that the Mirage is able to withstand a 180 mph deployment with a weight of ~320 lbs without any damage to the harness (verified by a factory inspection). -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Sorry TK but I've got to call you on that. My Mirage is Cat B and therefore doesn't have a max weight, only a max speed. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

You and Aggie Dave are forgetting that type 8's are recommended for jumpers above a certain weight, regardless of skill level. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Wingsuiting, where even anvils fly! -MaxGrav "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

I've got some gripes about the Prodigy, but slow forward speed is not one of them. Chuck Blue says I haul ass in mine, and, FWIW, there's a group of jumpers at my home dz that swear I was overtaking a C-182. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

The way I understand his point is illustrated by the low emergency exit. If you have deployed your main a thousand times and then suddenly have a low emergency exit where you should deploy your reserve, there is a good chance that you are going to throw your main's pilot chute instead. Thansk for summing it up better than me. The example I can think of was I had a nasty spinner that I had to chop and I suspected that I was going to be ass over teakettle once I cutaway. It was a demo canopy so I'd opened higher than normal, and I repeatedly told myself I was going to use that extra altitude to take a few seconds after cutaway to get stable before I pulled silver. I chopped and as I was flung away I looked down at the reserve ripcord in my left hand, wondering how it had gotten there. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

I'm not explaining myself well, my bad. The issue I was trying totouch on is that we tend to have one way of doing something (our SOP). When we come to something unexpected we make a mental note of "oh, I need to do things a bit different". However, sometimes there's something else that changes in an already unusual situation and we forget our mental advisory and revert back to SOP. Training for the unusual sitations helps, but there'll come a time when even a well-trained person will find themselves in a situation that they haven't trained for. And this is the situation I'm talking about. What I'm advocating is devloping a way for us to be able to keep the altered diveplan in our minds regardless of whatever else is happening around us. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

I think this actually illustrates a hole in the overall skydiving instructional system. We work off the old "train as you fight, fight as you trained" mentality and then scratch our heads when something goes wrong because a kink was thrown into someone's plans causing them to revert to their training. I'm not saying we should abandon our philosophy because obviously there's a lot of times when there isn't the luxury of time to think things out. Just telling yourself not to do something isn't satisfactory because due to nature of the exceptional situation, you've probably already got a lot on your mind. We need to come up with a simple, workable technique that allows people to overide their training when the situation calls for it. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Yopu're numbers are only accurate if you are buying everything brand spanking new with virtually no discount. 10 grand is more than enough get you from zero experience to in the door with good used gear and suit. Then figure in another 2 grand for more jumps maybe three grand if you toss in a boogie or two. -MaxGrav and then another "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Isn't it ironic? -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Not that there's anything wrong with being a 180 kg fat bastard... -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Like Dave said, sometimes it isn't blatant disregard but rather a lack of options for big jumpers. A tthe time of my purchase, I went with the sport reserve that had the highest TSO weight at that time, still I overload my R-Max 288 by about 14% and while I don't freefly, I frequently see terminal belly speeds of 180+. I'm under no illusion that I'm not living in the red zone, but I've chosen to assume that risk until something better comes along. Anvilbrother, I wish you luck in persuading manufactuers to consider the bigger jumper. Economics is always the reason sighted, but in my experience a lot of manufactuers simply can't conceptualize heavy jumpers. In '06 I recieved a wingsuit that was too small just because the manufactuer could not believe a jumper that big would wingsuit. At last year's PIA symposium I had a talk with John Leblanc after his "Two paths" presentation. When I mentioned that PD didn't have hp canopies in sizes to support heavier jumpers on the high performance path he outlined, he pointed out the Silhouette and Spectre. When I pointed out that both of those canopies were components of PD's non-high performance path and that even those lines didn't have enough sizes to fully accomodate large jumpers, he simply reiterarted his point. He was earnest throughout our conversation, and it did not appear to me that he was simply trying to avoid the issue. Rather, it appeared to me that he simply couldn't comprehend truely large jumpers engaging in high performance activities That's what needs changed. If you can change that mindset among manufactuers, then the unavoidable fact of the expanding waistlineof the "average" american will eventually force the economics issue. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Amazon, can you opt to exit out of the speed gate early? My canopy was modded to snivel a long time to serve as a brake before full inflation. From experience, if I deploy at 180 (which is not a horribly fast belly speed for me), it takes approxiamtely 2000 ft to get full inflation. a 2500 ft pull altitude would be dicey. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Am I going to hell for wondering why in the fuck there's sound in a deaf chick video? -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

Depends on how big his inseam is. The adjustable Telesis and Vector student rigs I've seen will accomodate some pretty big/wide torsos. From personal experience, I've got a pretty long torso and our Telesis' fit fine until I crossed 290. 6'7 with short legs could be stretching it though. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

It doesn't have to be anywhere near that expensive. You can get a used Mirage, Used PD 300 or Navigator 300 and a R-Max 288 for a decent price. Pop in a used Cypres that is nearing the end of its lifespan and you'll be good to go. And since there's not a huge market for large used containers or used PD300's, I wouldn't be surprised if you could put this rig together for several hundred less than a comporable rig for a more average sized jumper. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."

The problem he is going to run into is most all sport harness containers TSO'd for a weight total of 250 LBS, Spaceland uses Mirage RTS's which are Cat B and thus do not have a placarded weight limit. Off the top of my head, Jump Shack, Precision Aero, Mirage and Strong all make sportgear that will get a 300 lbs+ exit weight jumper out the door. -Blind "If you end up in an alligator's jaws, naked, you probably did something to deserve it."