Jiggs

Petra Page is a closed facebook group, many good pilots on there. Get the Petra, better all rounder than the Sofia and it is easier to fly with multiple canopy / wingsuit formations Yes, I have done several hundred XRW on the Petra. You don't need any mods The question is mostly about size and loading (and more importantly what you can safely use). I run my 67 (from 3 to 3.5) depending on group "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

77 has 300ish It similar is like brand new, but it has not be trashed like the 67 "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Suggest you post this on the Petra page not here, you would get way more info there than here. Re-reading that, do you not have either wing? "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

I have two Petras (different sizes). My 67 has something like 1000 jumps on it and is pretty clapped. It has had a very hard life, jumps on sand and very abrasive landing areas, it has patches and is a lovely grey colour (desert white). I can confirm that it definitely performing worse than when it was new. I can't get the same recovery I used to get it and it feels like it stops flying a little sooner. On the plus side it is even better for XRW The material itself does not show any signs of flaking I have also had 3 other sail canopies, two jvxs (79s that I owned at the same time) and an experimental wing that did not go into production, they were all built with different versions of sail. One only lasted 300-400 jumps before it was very clapped out. The first generation sail canopies were probably the longest lasting, it lasted more than 1k jumps with no real change in performance - but was ridiculous in size (and weight). The new sail is pretty awesome (all things considered). "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Hi, We have been using a set of G9s (or G9xs) for XRW and formation swooping for the last 3 years, mostly we have used it with 2ways, but on some bigger stuff we have four units connected. I seem to recall there is the option of getting up to ten people connected but it was just to much of a hassle. We both use G3 cookie helmets because of the microphones and cutting down on the wind noise. Mostly the work very well and provide us with clear communications in the aircraft, to exit, through the skydive and through our respective landings. We do however have less freefall noise than most people unless we are flying dynamic (much faster airspeed). This speed is a little less than a traditional flat skydive, it is very hard to hear when flying head down. I also use them on selected students when I am running canopy courses and want to jump / communicate with jumpers. They are absolutely fantastic for clear in air communication and make the skydives so much more fun. I get bored when we don’t use them for XRW We can communicate from a fairly long distance, the range is very good – I usually take a 7-8 second delay from the aircraft (think the vertical and horizontal separation) and we can still usually hear each other. The main problems that we have had with them are the following; • Sometimes it randomly goes to radio mode and instead of talking we are listening to a radio station. This does not tend to happen on the jumps, but in aircraft. It can a real pain when this happens on jump run though. • The units can be a real bastard to pair – particularly if you are adding in new units or removing others. Sometimes it works straight away other times no luck – even if it feels like you are doing the same thing. We always do this on the ground well before going on the jump – it is incredibly frustrating at times. • It is a small snag hazard, but far less than most cameras • It is one more thing that you can lose on openings • They should not be used by just anyone – think extra distractions, more gear to check I love using them, but we use them for something very specific – I don’t think that there is much use for regular skydiving. Once they are setup and working, it is gold. Battery life is pretty good as well "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Zero difference for canopy. What is different is your perception of the rollout point. You have a different visual picture, as your ground speed is different When you get more experienced, you will build up your sight picture in different conditions. Trust your turn mechanics (assuming you have a good one), your heights should not change (nor timing of turn). E.g. at the last world meet with mega headwinds there were some competitors turning over the gate and I vaguely remember someone going from the 2nd marker (e.g. behind the course) "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

It depends............ It's a bit about the person and what they are currently doing, as well where they want to get to and how many jumps they are going to do. Then we make a plan from there. Not to mention the biggest thing is how well they are doing on their current wing! For many people that ask 'what canopy I should I get next?', the answer is: 'a consistent turn mechanic'. From XF2 I would get many people to go for a katana, a few them directly to something more swoopy - (e.g. JFX) - it just depends on the individual and WL. If they are already around 2 and doing larger HP turns well, that opens it up more. If they have a WL of 1.4 the answer is not going to be 'get a small velocity'! "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Hi, Recovery cycle is a misnomer and you should not use in trying to explain performance of wings. It is a misleading generalisation that is more harmful than good. The concept you are trying to explain is the recovery arc, this differs by wing, size, loading, mechanic, roll speed, body position and amount of energy generated. The important thing for people to understand is how this combination of factors will lead to length and (for lack of a better term) strength of the recovery arc. This is why the combination of some wings, loading and mechanics are not the greatest for swooping. While I can alter the recovery arc of (via turn mechanic, etc) this may not be a good choice. This is best discussed with a coach around their particular canopy, turn mechanic, skill set, goals, etc. What you are hitting on in terms of progression is that crossover (danger!) area that covers getting some swoop performance from a less aggressive wing to asking a lot from a 'non swoopy' wing versus downsize/platform change to a more appropriate, swoop friendly wing (that may be above experience level / skill set). Now that is a very good discussion around a problem that has not been addressed and is possibly the gap in canopies "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Okay – cool. Running through your points, when you are learning a new mechanic and sight picture it can be difficult to visualise and understand what you are doing as well as the impact on placement (not to mention the actual mechanic). That is why coaching and getting good information at the start is so important (and an aid to longevity) Consistency is also important, you need to learn to accept your mistakes and accept when you have made a mistake in the turn. Accept the mistake (get the data from it and see what it does to your recovery and positioning). Then you will learn from that mistake. If you are always changing the turn because of the mistakes, you will never have consistency. E.g. adding more variables does not help you solve particular problems, much easier to isolate 1 at a time. Oh turns are not ‘generally’ different in comp (other than guaranteeing the gates); I just meant that the turn of most people who compete is a lot more aggressive with a very strong rollout (and smaller margin for error) as opposed to more casual DZ swooping. E.g way less carvey more snapping hard on the line Get more coaching – you will love it. Competing is awesome and you will learn heaps Ohh the progression is turn mechanic, heights, accuracy. If the step earlier is not consistent, the later will not be Don’t’ waste time doing a different turn (hell even a different direction) as you don’t have your primary nailed. It is kind of like working on freeflying, FS and CRW at the same time. You are not going to be good at any of them. Do one thing, do it consistently, do it well. After that you can muck around with other stuff "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Your original post was about turning the wrong way - this is a bigger red flag. Without coaching you are more likely to make mistakes and develop bad habits that will take longer to get rid of if you want to compete (Edit to add) - it also makes you less predictable and increases your risk (and the risk of others) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I don't agree with the height comments of other posters. Height is dependent on the mechanic (and time to complete), the wing, loading, density altitude, etc. As long as the wing has time to recover it may be fine. Also for comp turns tend to be sharper rather than carvey that people use in normal dz swooping FWIW a 450 on my 67 petra is from 1350. On my 82 leia it is 950. I think when I was doing 270s I had a velo90 and it was around 750 feet, maybe 800 on the 84 but I don't remember. IMO - Without seeing your recovery arc and turn mechanic no one could say what is appropriate. I think the more relevant thing is the time of the recovery arc at the end of rotation (back on gate picture). Otherwise we are just making generalisations "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Ding ding ding - winner! To the OP - if you can't figure out the right way to turn or how many rotations you are going to do, you are doing too much. Like your judgement, your placement and turn mechanics must be fairly crap / inconsistent Get some coaching – I would also question the utility/complexity of 450s versus the ease and placement of a 270 It’s hard to judge your level without seeing you fly, but if you are asking this – it is probably a pretty good bet. It’s great that you want to progress and do more, but one of the things that takes the most time to develop is judgement and building up a good sight picture. Would suggest that you focus on that with an appropriate coach to progress – doing your own thing tends to build in many bad habits that take even longer to address! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I have only seen one guy add an extra rotation (a full 360) on a training camp, he almost got kicked off the DZ when people realised that he did not realise that he did an extra rotation (and almost went in). SO on the plus side you are way up on him! That said, to his credit, he turned around his headspace, did the training and is now a respectable pilot. "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

At what altitude (and density alititude) was this recorded? This is not corrected for winds aloft? How was this recorded? Charless - while I don't have many jumps on my Leia (82) I would say that it is more 'floaty' than either my JVXs (79) or velo (84) of a similar size. It flies closer to my Petra than either of the two earlier wings. In full flight it is definitely more ground hungry than the earlier generation wings, but you can fly them slow and swoop them long. FWIW - I think in terms of steepness of trim it is Petra>Peregrine and probably Leia>VK "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

Hey, We have found the best thing is to set a benchmark of vertical speed as a starting point - for us we use 35mph vertical as that benchmark for the canopy side of things. It gives the ws a decent range. Using a benchmark also helps people to figure out if they are in the window to play with others. We originally tried to work out a list of what canopies would work but there are so many variables. We therefore just went with a this speed works well, do what you need to do to fly at this speed. Canopies have very different glide ratios (duh). Size for size, the petra is the steepest, followed by the peregrine, then the leia, velo and the JVX (can't comment on VK). E.g. me on a 67 petra at 2.9 outsunk my teammate on a 71 penguin (3.1) who outsunk ve79 (3.2) who outsunk JVX69 (3.4 or 3.6) On my 67 Petra I can load as low as 2.8 and still fly with a few people (that is my unleaded exit) Type, then size seems to be more important than absolute loading, you can chuck on a lot of weight and you dont get so much gains in vertical descent. (I have flown with up to 32kgs on a 69 @3.8 - I wear 6kgs on my petra @ 3.1 for a higher descent speed). The gains from more weight you see more in the forward speed. When we were doing bigger mixed formations, I would drop my lead and others would lead up. Basically if it is larger or a less ground hungry type, you are going to need to add some more loading (which will only make up for a marginal difference). Body position and leaning on fronts also helps Less drag is also appreciated by the WS pilots FWIW - Woody's Aura is slightly more than 50% of the size of my canopy. - I don't think it means anything "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

More lead will do bugger all for the vertical descent, it will make you slightly faster forward. From past experience, even chucking on heaps of lead does not gain you that much on the vertical side of things. The things that I am seeing 1. You guys don't have enough a range to fly together well. You are more of a flypast stage. As your ws learns to fly the suit better will help with range, e.g. looks like he is flying at his max lift which is faster than your forward so your best outcome is an overshoot (or collision at worst) 2. You are changing the heading frequently when you look around or move your arms. You need to focus more on being base and not shimmying around. This is much easier to do with the new wings as they are far more responsive to weightshift. Fly a heading and stick to it, makes it easy for the ws 3. You can try and alter your body position so that you are not flying as flat – not sure that this will make enough difference for you. Only tend to use this for v small changes 4. Keep the approach to the same quadrant, don’t let ws get creative and try and close from the horizontal Some other comments; You should definitely just focus on flying together rather than grips. This will help the WS develop their range as well. You need to work on this before you can progress. It will take time, it will happen, no need to rush it – more important to learn fundamentals and have good process and skill set rather than just: "we touched"! IMO 79 is kind of big Don’t fuck up "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus

"I do occasionally jump with lead, but it makes me feel fat, ha-ha" Harden up! Nothing like 32 kgs of lead under a 69 canopy to make it go fast "Don't blame malice for what stupidity can explain." "In our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart and in our despair, against our will comes wisdom" - Aeschylus