JaapSuter

Thanks Russel. I can't entirely envision the cut-away part, but I get the underlying idea. Has Tom done any test jumps where he barely mated the velcro on the toggle so it would blow, testing how well the keeper would hold? Mmm, I'm going to throw your description in a bowl. Then add the WLO's, stronger and thicker pins, some home-grown sewing and three pounds of sugar. Stir, mix, place in oven for twenty minutes, and we'll see what kind of crappy new invention I can come up with. That'll pass a windy weekend. Thanks, Jaap Suter

I'll embarrassingly admit that I wasn't entirely kidding. The line-overs that I've seen happen on large canopies resulted in a slow enough spin that they wouldn't scare me that much. Just to stress; this would be done on a skydive, pulling around 6k. Can you elaborate on why it is a bad idea? Obviously I'm breaking something that isn't broken and therefore increasing risk. However, I'm pretty sure that my 20 practices jumps with intentional LRM brake-releases and WLO releases prepared me for last weekends accidental release. I can see a line-over is a whole different game than the minor inconvenience a brake-release should be, but if I can experience it first in controlled test-environment, I'll be better prepared when it happens in BASE. That said, if somebody with more base jumps than I tells me it's an anti-nugget, that's a pretty good sign it's not a good idea.

That's exactly the kind of information I was hoping for. I guess that idea is off then. Thanks! I'm surprised. The brake-loop is stowed almost at the bottom of the pin, not in the middle. It just goes to show how much force an opening exerts on the brake-settings. Out of curiousity, does anybody agree that a WLO release can be just as fast and clean as a LRM release? Given that, isn't there a market for stronger pins?

And while we're talking about line-overs anyway; I've never had one. Does anybody see any problems with packing one intentionally on a skydive using a base canopy with WLO toggles? I suppose it could burn the topskin of my canopy, but other than that I don't see too many problems. Open plenty high. Be prepared for a spinning opening, potentially resulting in line-twist (which could make it impossible to use WLO), use the WLO, or worst case scenario use plan B, land safely, drink beer. Any advice for how to best pack a line-over? I've talked to one experienced jumper who tried really hard to pack intentional line-overs at the Perrine in the pre-tailgate days, but she never managed to do it.

I haven't. Can you explain how it works, how it differs from the WLO toggles and what's required to release the toggles? Speaking of WLO's, does anybody use them on slider down jumps? Judging from the five skydives I've done with my WLO toggles -releasing them every time- I wouldn't be surprised if one could release their WLOs just as fast as one could unstow a toggle and throw it away. An additional benefit is that the toggle remains on the riser, meaning there's only a clean line dissapearing, reducing the risk of entanglement. Although I'm not sure how much of a risk this actually is, I've been taught to throw the steering line away backwards and to the side. It would also reduce the amount of rigging required when switching from slider down to slider up. I'm talking about the Vertigo WLO toggles by the way, which I think are great. I haven't seen them from other manufacturers, but I have heard they require more steps to undo. Mmmm, I'll have to put some more thought into this. Any showstoppers I'm overlooking?

I jump Vertigo Syko toggles. I really like them so far. The lines come in from the side. This makes it impossible to confuse your steering lines and stow them crossed. I just put on my harness and tied the riser off to something. It turned out to be nearly impossible to do what I described above. It required too much force on the thumb. This leads me to believe that my toggle may have partially released before I reached up for it and that my rear-riser grab was just the last nudge to push it off. I'm not sure what would have caused this release. I check if my toggles are still properly stowed when dressing up my risers, right before the first fold in the container. Too little information and too much speculation I'm afraid. The bottom line is that if you use the LRM you need to be prepared to land on rear-risers.

I don't think I made it under the bridge (pending video) so at worst it would have made my landing a little trickier. Welcome to a sport that is on its way to mainstream. I've been looking into sharkfucking recently. I hear it's even more dangerous than BASE and still underground. I expect it'll take at least five years before MTV catches on. Who's with me?

I accidentally lost a toggle this weekend. I was doing a rear-floater. As I reached for my rear-risers to turn around my left thumb dissapeared into the big-grab toggle. When I pulled down to fly backwards the toggle came off. This happened quickly and it didn't register until I turned away, let go of my risers and tried grabbing my toggles. The left one was gone. I'll have to study where I'm grabbing my risers to avoid this in the future. I think I need to grab a little higher. Interesting to note that it was the big-grab-ness of the toggles that allowed this to happen. Every advantage can have a disadvantage.

I just drove 11 hours to Twin Falls, spend 30 hours there, and then drove 11 hours back. Driving is not the problem so I'll go further up north if I have to. That turns weekend trips into long-weekend or week trips though.

If you know anything about any cliffs in southern British Columbia, please send me a private message or an email. I'm not talking about the Rocky Mountains or anything east of Penticton. I'm talking mostly about the local Vancouver wall, the Sunshine coast, Vancouver Island, and the area north of Pemberton along highway 99. I'm planning some trips this summer to gather beta for my largely unexplored and unjumped backyard. I think the most knowledgable guy is in jail these days. Right now I'm mostly talking to local climbers to get information, but they look for different things in walls than we do for base. Any information people can give me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Jaap Suter

Hopefully somebody will indeed start a commercially operated BASE antenna somewhere, otherwise we'll be awarding BSE numbers in the year 2300.

Well said! That is how I read your post at first glance. Only on a second reading did it occur to me we should not forget the impact an accident has. In fact, I think that is my first and foremost responsibility in this sport; try not to get hurt, so that I will not hurt others. That I'm not so sure of, but your mileage may vary.

Is there any possibility you could upload this somewhere with the jumpers permission? Was this line-over cleared by the LRM and landed succesfully? And out of curiousity, was there any follow up speculation on the cause of the line-over besides just having bad luck? Maybe contributions from the winds or a hasty packjob? Thanks, Jaap

Great post, but I'm not sure how to interpret this: Should that be read as: "as long as everything goes right"? I'm pretty sure that most injuries and fatalities cause emotional damage to non participating family-members and friends.

The problems I see are: A bigger need for multiple brake settings. You might accidentally lose a toggle and have to land on rear-risers even when you don't have a line-over. Different flare and brake characteristics. Anything else I'm missing? I personally think these points are moot. You would still need different brake settings to deal with different altitudes and wind conditions (at least I do). Landing on rear risers without having a line over should be okay for most landing areas. If you can't land somewhere on rear risers, maybe you shouldn't jump there? Having different flare and brake characteristics is something easily learned on LRM-skydives and easier objects. Having said that, given your experience you would certainly be more qualified to comment on this.

Does anybody know of any documented line-overs on tailgated canopied that did not self-clear? All video I have seen of line-overs on tailgated canopies have been self clearing. In no way does this message or the resulting discussion diminish the usefulness of the LRM. I'm just curious.

Duh, I suck. First I ask: And then I say: Which answers my own question.

And to see what happens, pack your canopy as you would usually and then right before closing the container yank on the bridle connection point while somebody else holds down the outerboard cells for a bit. The result is generally messy enough to make you want to repack.

Can you elaborate on this? As long as the PCAer stands directly behind the jumper and doesn't move his hand around, the only result from holding on too long would be center-cell strip, correct? Can this indirectly lead to heading problems or am I overlooking some other factor? I'd rather have my PCAer hold on too long than too short on those jumps where PCA or staticline is justified. I'm personally a fan of holding on to the bridle instead of the PC, but I don't think that affects opening characteristics much. Thanks, Jaap Suter

Thanks Tom! Yes, we absolutely agree here. I totally agree, and would always recommend common sense, science, skydives and jumps from easier and legal objects to be a riggers guide. But there are different degrees of inventions, and some require more research then others. Imagine the scenario that somebody invents a new PC pouch for wingsuit purposes that will remove all worries about burbles and PC hesitations. This person rigs it up in his basement and uses it succesfully on thirty skydives. He even uses it on his local terminal antenna a couple of times. Unfortunately he lives in North America and his only chance of testing it from a terminal cliff is by visiting a national park. Preferably we can vouch for the quality of such an invention through a person's references and his explanation. I would imagine that even the newest rigger would at least have made some connections in the base community before using his sewing machine. What I would hate to see is a governing body that wants full legalized documentation of his invention and logs of his testing approach before he is allowed to take this thing off a cliff. Such a requirement would instantly slow down the evolution of gear which, especially in the area of wingsuiting, is still running at high velocity. From my discussions with ABP members I learned they have no desire to become or install such a governing body. They only want to gain access. Beyond that, common sense should be our guide the same way it works in the climbing scene. And as you explain yourself, if somebody wants to take a radically new invention off a cliff for its first test, it is no longer a base jump but really more of a stunt. It falls outside our domain. The same thing goes for somebody doing his first cliff jump without preparation, e.g. insufficient skydives and no jumps from more forgiving objects. It would fall outside our domain and we can only try and avoid these kind of incidents through education and dissemination of our history. Unfortunately, the NPS might not be so understanding when it comes to incidents related to use of improper gear or insufficient preparation. The climbing community has set precedents in our favour though. On several occasions ill-prepared climbers have needed costly rescue operations. Some of these groups were fined for recklesness and generally considered far from representative for the climbing community. One member of the ABP has mentioned that we have a lot more in common with the climbing community than with the USPA and FAA controlled sport of skydiving. I couldn't agree more. While our physical preparation might come from our skydives, the base community could learn a lot from the ethics and guidelines that climbers live by. The second we venture into the backcountry we need to realize that we have left the dropzone. We enter hostile territory that we share with nature as well as with other people who also want to enjoy its beauty. You mean British Columbia right? I was born in the Netherlands which is great too, but not nearly as good as where I live these days. I still need to pinch myself when I wake up every morning. I am very grateful I'm able to live here. Definitely drop me a note when you're visiting again. Although that goes for any visitor who reads this. It's always a pleasure to show off our beautiful city and its surroundings.

I've been getting a few PM's and emails about a Windows executable of Jason's virtual windtunnel. I mucked around with it for another two hours last night and managed to get Lapack and Blas out of the way. I'm now left with a dependency on libf2c which seems to be very Unix oriented (it requires headers the Win32 SDK doesn't supply). And then it was bedtime... I'll try some more tonight. After that I'm off to Twin Falls so it might become next week before I have something up and running. If and when that happens, I'll post a link to a download over here. Stay tuned.

After my helmet, I consider my Dainese Hip, Ass and Tailbone Protector my best investment in protection. I imagine other brands sell similar shorts. Mine is a left over from my snowboarding days, but it works great for base too. You don't notice you're wearing them at all. I prefer them over the longer protection pants because now I can add separate shin and knee protection on demand. Like you say, a PLF is often safer than a buttslide. Nonetheless, these shorts have saved my ass on several occasions. I realize I'm opening myself up for a lot of one-liners here, so the Splatula team has been warned. Cornische, here's your model number: 4879609 Edited for spelling.

I just received an email from an ABP member explaining that the ABP strives for a jumping model similar to what the climbing community uses. In short it means the ABP is about access only and not involved with gear. Among other things this has to do with liability issues that appear as soon as any sort of governing body starts regulating gear. Hopefully said person will join us here and elaborate on my post and correct me where I am wrong. Thanks, Jaap Suter

Being Devil's advocate here for a second, what will the ABP's stance be on gear choices for National Parks? I imagine it will be something like: "Jump base specific gear, skydiving gear is not allowed." However, what does that mean for the homebrew base manufacturer that has come up with a new invention he wants to try on a slider up jump? I hope we can come up with a peer reviewed common-sense system where existing ABP members can vouch for other people's skills. This would include the trust that such a new invention would have been taken from easier objects and for skydives first. What I'd really hate to see is a situation where a rigger has to take his rig for at least X skydives and at least Y jumps off the Potato bridge, that he needs to log all these jumps with ABP approval and that he needs to document a broad scale of weight- and strength-tests. Hopefully my previous posts in this thread managed to express my support for having local rules. However, Nick's point about being able to have an idea in the morning, do some rigging in the afternoon, and then test-jumping at night is a great thing in our sport. Gear improvements may have slowed down a little the last few years, the last thing we need is a bureaucratic obstacle for the few enthusiastic basement riggers remaining.

Amen!