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Thank you all for your input - very helpful!! The alti's since been jumped by both an instructor and myself - no problems, its working well. Will keep an eye on it, and try to learn to use my eyes too.

Cheers for that. I knew this, but forgot and simply replaced the information in my head - my bad and there you go. Goes to show you need to keep reading and rereading the material. I had a good look at the Cypress manual just there. I don't think it would have made a difference in this case - I'm just not experianced enough to estimate altitude with my eyes, and I still need plenty of canopy time to land safely. I think I would have done the same thing regardless. Just for info, I rent a rig - I've used the exact same on almost every jump since I started. It has a student Cypress, a yellow one with "student" printed on the button I own the altimeter, and have jumped it since I started skydiving in January. I've dropped it once

Went for a jump this morning and had a problem with my alti in freefall, a Galaxy II. Did a slow barrell roll at about 8000. Came out on my belly and checked my height as usual. The needle stopped moving at about 7000, then started bouncing between 6 and 7 for a short time. I tapped it, I shook it, it was still a bit erratic. I looked at the ground, figured I was a little bit higher than my usual deployments, but i thought "screw this, I don't know where I am", and I just deployed, didn't feel like taking any chances. I'm still using a student cypress, which activates around 2000ft, as I understand it, so i like to have my main over my head by at least 3000. I was concerned about opening higher than planned, as I exited behind a tandom & camera flyer. The Alti read around 4250 when I was open. Going by visual cues and the seeing the other guys deploying - it looked more or less right. Even so, I didn't trust it, and after doing my other checks, went straight for and stayed over good set up area for landing. Had one of my most accurate and best landings yet, so it appeared to be working fine, although I was trusting my own eyes alot more on this one. One of my instructors took the alti apart this morning - it seems to be working fine. The DZO told me he'll get one of the experianced boys to jump it tommorow. My instructors seemed happy with my actions - "if in doubt, deploy". Although they advised me to learn to use more visual cues - we have alot of mountains here. Do alti's often misbehave like that? Do you think I did the right thing? Is there anything else I shoud do?

Is there any risk of a student AAD firing following a low collapse?

Thanks all!! You've given me alot here to chat to my instructor.

Duh !! Right you are!! Just read my post again - got my upwinds and downwinds backwards. Clever. Dyslexic skydiving!

Decreasing rate of descent allows the wind to blow you back to the target for a longer time if your upwind. If your downwind or getting blown backward, THEN front risers will minimized speed backwards and get you down out of the wind faster. But there is no problem with doing landing approaches backwards. They all were on rounds. Of course you shouldn't be up in winds high enough that you RAM AIR is going backwards. So if I'm downwind its better to slow the decent and let the wind push me, that makes sense

Why not? Experiment with your canopy and all of it's controls as often as possible - that's how you learn. Just don't do it below your decision altitude. Oh for sure, I do as much as I can

Hi! I'm looking for Landing Strategys advice - particularly when you find yourself opening a good distance from the target. I've been thought how to know if I'm going to reach my target by observing the movement of the ground in front of my eyes. I've also been shown how to optimize my brakes to reach my target. Obviously, using this method, I'm saving altitude at the cost of speed. Now I've no intention of experimenting myself, but I was just wondering as a matter of interest, would there be any disadvantage of doing the opposite - using the front risers to increase speed at the cost of altitude?

Call em at the DZ. They should have the number of a guy who let bunks in a house for skydivers. Its cheap and well comfy - nice place to crash after a long day!

I've recently done an AFF and USPA A-Licence. We did some tunnel time the day before we started AFF. I don't think its strictly nessecary, but it gave me alot more confidence going into AFF. It also gives you a strong feeling for what real freefalling is like. You can try out the basic maneuvers like turns, forwards, backwards and even some fast and slowfall. You can even try some practice ripchord touches, which is brilliant. If your instructor is with you they can give you the same hand signals you will use during your freefall course. That thought me to react very quickly during the real AFF skydives. As for how many jumps a day - from my own experiance, I found that the AFF jumps left me absolutely knackered, its alot of stress on your body and mind - theres alot to learn. I found 3 was almost to much. See how you feel on the day, but don't expect to go mad, cause you'll get fatigued very quickly. Take it at your own pace so you can absorb what you've learned. If you find yourself hanging around the dropzone doing nothing, practice your exits, and also your body position for maneuvers. Get into position, close your eyes and hold it for 5 or 10 minutes. It teaches you muscle memory. What you do on the ground, you'll do in the air. I was stunned by how well that worked.