fred

I was thinking more along the lines of a transparent 7-segment display, probably 1-line by 3 characters long. I would also think that I'm probably looking for an LED display rather than LCD, for contrast purposes. I'd need to find an actual source, but I do believe that these are available for pretty cheap, then it's just a matter of modifying the circuits of a digitude to route the display elsewhere, and find a cozy way to route the wires to the goggles. Really, the expensive part is the digital altimeter. The hard part is figuring out how to mount it.

Maybe I'm taking this too far off topic, but does it matter how big the turn is? Will a 90° turn cause the canopy to dive less than a 180° turn? It probably depends on the canopy, but in general, is this true? Certainly a 720° turn cause the canopy to lose a lot of altitude, but is that the case on less extreme turns?

Of course, how many of those deaths were students or even A license jumpers? From what I recall from the report, most deaths were "experienced" jumpers making mistakes on a hook turn.

I feel like an idiot for asking this, but what do they mean by a figure 8? Do they mean turning and forward motion to fly that shape?

Linux is clearly a superior operating system to anything Microsoft has to offer.

Same here. Send me the code and I'd be happy to look at it.

Sometime when I have a lot of extra cash, I'm going to modify a Digitude (or something similar) to be a HUD altimeter. It shouldn't be too difficult a hack.

I'm sure the more experienced jumpers will chime in soon, but the quick and dirty answer is: You don't. The spaceball is dangerous to people on the ground, and takes a very experienced flyer to handle. As a beginning skydiver, you have plenty to work on without worrying about a 120MPH projectile in the air nearby. Learn to do RW, then learn to Freefly, and then you can think about playing with a spaceball.

How often do these occur in non-arid regions? I jump in Southwestern Michigan. We're usually pretty humid, and grass pretty much covers everything. Dust devils were never even brought up in my training. Are they even a concern in regions like these? How often do they occur in arid regions?

Can you explain this? Isn't it the licensing that matters? I guess I really don't know anything about pilots, but I don't understand why 'private' is such a naughty word for a jump pilot.

This deserves a response, unless it was a troll. A downplane is not survivable. I've never heard the advice to wait for it to "go away", and I don't think I'd want to. To me, downplane means cutaway immediately. However, the other 2-out situations (bi-plane and side-by-side), will be landable under most circumstances. Iirc, the suggestion is to leave the brakes stowed, and stear the dominant canopy with light rear riser input. Prepare to PLF, and don't flare. I'm still a newbie to this sport, so some of those details might be off a bit. But it's certainly not true that your only choice in a biplane is to cutaway.

Actually planning my landing pattern has been a matter of stress for me. At a strange dropzone, doing AFF after I'd started on SL at home. At home, I had all these visual cues and the landing pattern was easier. So, I'm up at about 2000' and I'm visualizing how fast I'm going, where I'm going to turn at 1000', 500', and 200'. I have an entire course plotted out in my mind. At about 1500, I realize that I'm way further along than I thought I would be for my 1000' turn. Instead of altering the rest of my plan, I did a sharp 360° turn to lose a couple hundred feet. Thank god my cypress didn't fire. In the end, I lost my couple hundred feet, and landed safely, with a long walk. So, not only did I make a "low" turn to put me in danger of a 2-out situation, I didn't even have the right plan to begin with.

My rigger doesn't believe that line dump has ever been a problem. He believes that while it's possible that it could happen, it would not, in fact, lead or contribute to hard openings. The time is just not there for it to make a difference. I don't know, and I'm very inexperienced, but my rigger makes a pretty convincing argument. Anybody daring enough to do 6-7 jumps without line stows to tell us the difference? I'd prefer a double-blind test. :)

or go to mIRC.com and download an irc client... install said client, add a server of "irc.chaoschat.com", and join the #dropzone channel.

You can use irc.chaoschat.com instead.

EU sets their clocks ahead a week earlier than the US.... Just found this out...

Some info: I'm not concerned about the long spot. I had the jump where it was all I could do to get back to the dz, and it was probably the closest I ever came to a short walk back. I'm having trouble with being 2000' in the air, and having time to get anywhere over the dz I want. I need to set up the 1000' run to go downwind, that 500' turn crosswind, and that 200' upwind approach. If my altimeter isn't accurate at those altitudes, how do I know when I'm at the right altitude? Maybe i'm far too afraid of turning too low. I don't know. Any advice?

I'm relatively new to the sport, still unlicensed, but I'm looking for advice on the approach. I'm not looking to land dead center in the peas no matter what, but I'd like any advice on learning how to land in the general area of where I'm aiming. While I was doing pretty well at my home dz (probably because of some handy landmarks for altitude and distance), I found that when I got to AZ, I just couldn't land close enough. The student landing area there is a pretty long hike, and I managed to land even further. Just barely "off" the LZ. Any advice on how to gain that altitude awareness and landing plan for that last 2000ft?

This makes me nervous. I would like to wait for the pros. Please don't try to "package me up" before they get there.

Ew. I've never thought about that. Thank god I have my own ball. It least it's my filth.

Thanks for all the compliments. I'm very flattered.

As somebody who's trying to figure out what gear to buy, I just want to say that reviews on Customer Service mean a lot to me. I'm glad to hear this about Sunrise, and I want to bring my service to somebody who cares a lot about their customers. Thanks for the input.

I've been curious about the same thing. Under a 280, I couldn't get those things to budge. Although, I was a bit scared of the maneuvre, anyhow. In the end, I decided to wait until I was more experienced.

This was true in Eloy, as well (at least, the one flight where I saw CReW get out). The plane made a pass at just under 10k for the dogs to leave, way outside the jump run. They were definately out first.

I can't tell you about most, but I can tell you about mine. Relaxing was my biggest issue. I'm generally a very stressed individual, and accelerating at 9.8 m/s^2 did nothing to make me more comfortable. This led to stability problems and turns throughout my SL and AFF training. The biggest thing that helped me was realizing that I had lots of time. I could sit there and get a good read off the altimeter, prepare to do the turn, do the turn *slowly*, and recover. Just because I was falling at 120MPH, doesn't mean I had to actually move that fast.