hjumper33

But you imply that its the suit doing that. I think if you threw jarno in a funk, hed do just fine. Hell if you put him in a classic hed probably fly the same way. Theres some nice video of some head down carving in a tunnel in a funk out there.

haha, my experience is identical!

...Have you seen a funk, or anyone fly one. Let me know what I cant do in a funk that people can do in a carve. Id be interested to know what your definition of "not even close" is.

yah I agree, these systems have been implemented on 100s if not 1000s of suits without any known issues. Whys everyone freaking out now?

Both were being flown by pilots at the redbull races. Hope to have a epicene 150 by the end of the month to go in place of my sabre1 120. I think both canopies will be quite similar. The question is will squirrel once again be able to deliver in 4 weeks.

Sorry, happiness guaranteed unless you own a sausage shaped lassie, Matt hates those, I'm sure that was the issue ;)

Or when your "car" is backordered, you can buy a comprable model, some might even say superior, get all the tracking updates, a receipt of payment, amazing quality, and a virtual happiness guarantee... all in about 4 weeks, but no fins.

Its always nice to see a post from a manufacterer that answers the questions at hand, attempts to provide answers/resolution, and does not have a defensive tone. Once again showing, as many other people have said, even if squirrel suits were just AS good as other suits and not, in my own opinion, superior, the customer service would be enough to sway me from other companies. (~4 weeks for a new suit at any time isnt bad either) I think I have flown every single model of squirrel suit ever put into production, and a fair few prototypes, and ive never had an issue with the handles ever. I ive done every acro maneuver I can imagine in my funk, and even some unintentional ones I probably couldnt repeat if I tried, definitely spent more time on my back than my front in that suit, and handles have never moved on me. As far as using the RAD with the funk, I havent base jumped the suit so I havent really worried about it, but one of the things I have done just for fun lately is pitch, and then when I go back into flight, pop my thumbs out of the loops so when the canopy starts to open, I can reach up and fully use the potential of the RAD.

Raptor = R bird Super mach one = S bird XS = x bird Intro = I bird

It was amazing with the smoke. All the competitors were standing out and watching the other heats. I never really saw how wingsuit flying could turn into a type of mainstream event, now I can

Yah I agree that the zippers arent ideal. I dont think theres a lot of force being applied to those zippers at almost any time, and it there is, I want my little crappy plastic S beaners to break for sure. Same theory as why I will never jump those metal go pro mounts. I want something to be able to knock it off. For me, I jump my wingsuits way more in the BASE setting, and skydiving is only practice. Until the funk brought me back to the fun of skydiving a wingsuit, I only did probably 20 skydives a year. My aura for example has 2 skydives and 60ish base jumps, and I dont think Ill likely ever skydive it again. The funk is a much more skydive specific suit, so I can see the desire for a better system. I personally have never had any problem with the handles getting sucked in, or even moving around, but thats with 2 soft handles and a javelin that works quite well with the suits it seems. I have had one cutaway in the suit that was definitely due to a bad bridle/pilot chute combo, and my handles were right where I wanted. PS matt ill post a picture of the caribeaners I use when I get home. I like them quite a lot and have them on all my suits now.

Just skimmed through the thread so dont know if anyone has mentioned these point. Ive found that hard reserve handles feel like they are most likely to get sucked in on this type of zipper system. I personally would only use two soft handles. I have found another nice way to keep the zips really close together which seems to work quite well. Get size 0 s carabiners (available at REI and even Home Depot) and use them to clip the ends of the zippers together. I actually clip one through where the actual pull attaches to the zipper to make it even tighter.

Having a tethered balloon on a 7000ft rope/wire might be a little difficult, and if wing conditions change they would move as well. I wouldnt want to be low on a gait after a bad exit and not be able to tell where the attachment is too. They were planning on using GPS located drones holding the flags, but I dont think they worked quite as well as planned, but I can see those being used in the future.

Skyvan as not ideal yes, but I think its the best they could do for the first event. We did get 4 people exiting simultaneously, but it was tricky. There was a elastic gait that was in place and then released for the start, similar to motorcross. The course was 4 gaits with gps receiver set up in a slalom format. The glide to the first two gaits id say was just under 2:1, and then a long flat glide to gait three where you had to balance glide/dive to still hit the gait at the right height, but also not have to flare and kill your speed. The coolest part of the race was that the 3-4 gait was very steep so you basically come around the 3rd at close to max glide with a steep carving dive to the finish. Im sure more videos will get released soon of the event, but it was truly amazing to be a part of. As far as the competition goes, there were 52 competitors. Day one was practice, day two cut down to 32 people for the actual competition. Each race was then 4 competitors with the top 2 advancing to the next round. Smoke was worn for one round, and looked amazing in both the air and from the ground, but was nixed due to the dryness of the area and concern for fire. This thing really could take off, and it was really fun to watch from the ground in real time as well.

Thanks, would have like to be a little higher but got burbled on exit during the 5-8 race and had no chance from the start. Ill take it seeing that I put exactly one jump on the suit prior to the race. I think the squirrel website has a little blurb saying they hope to have something out soon. Id expect before the end of the summer for sure. I flew a slightly slower floatier verysion that could be closer to production and it was quite nice.

They're fast and nice. Not sure the exact differences between them and the production colugo 2, but they're in the same size/speed class as a scorpion.

Thanks for posting this video, hopefully you dont get destroyed too much. If youre having this problem consistently, I would think that your exit might be a little on the asymmetric side. Do you happen to remember which suits you were flying in these?

Ok time for an actual review. Put my first couple of jumps on the funk today. Nothing to really comment on as far as construction, presentation, delivery. All amazing and from order to delivery (and this was a preorder) took about 4 weeks. To be completely honest, I was a little afraid before taking this suit out. Its been more than a few years since I had done any significant backflying or acro, focusing on primarily big floaty suits and proximity flying for the last 3+ years. this was the first suit id owned that didnt have grippers, and it was a little weird to not have something to hold on to. Pressurization was instant and I was shocked how much float the suit had. I transitioned to my back after about 20 seconds of just getting used to the controls. I assumed I would go my usual slightly head low and then stabilize out that I had been used to in my phantoms in the past. The suit was a little harder to transition then I anticipated due to the pressurization. I only flew it with the zippers completely closed, so ill have to play around with them as Im sure this will make a difference. When I flipped to my back, I was shocked how stable it was. I just sat there for about 45 seconds watching the other jumper I was with and carving back and forth. No weird body positions, just open up the suit and let it fly. Did a few barrel rolls and started to play with big rotations of slowly transitioning from back to front while carving (Jarno badass camera style) and started to just get the hang of this by the end of the second jump, but still with a long way to go. I have a feeling this will be the suit that brings me back to skydiving and Im actually going out for my second day in a row for the first time in im not even sure how many years. Im not saying this is better worse or incredibly different than a havok carve, because ive never flown one, but this thing is sick.

Damnit Markus, your hybrid Finnish/Swiss intellect trumps us again. My head just exploded! Scotty ive only been taking one thing out of a butt lately, and it was your moms, but I made sure to keep putting it in, and then taking it out, and putting it in... but to be fair, as you said, I didnt "pull out". And the wingsuit forum is back bitches!!!

Haha to clarify, Scotty is a very good friend, we both fly squirrel, and he should still go fuck himself :)

Go fuck yourself scotty. In other news, funk will be here TOMORROW!!!!!

I did it for fun on a V2 just to see how it would go. I have had several jumps in the last year where Ive unzipped my leg wings and not my arm wings which is kind of weird. I do love technology :)

It'll still be available for those who want an enormous and barely controllable suit. Zing! Just kidding, both new suits look pretty sick. Well done pf.

Yah I dont think there are many of either out right now. Ive flown a havok a handful of times and it was a fantastic suit. Im hoping that the funk will be just as good, and thats definitely a compliment to the havok.

Ill should have mine the first week of june :)