SethInMI

I have a Tri 190 in a J3. With a PD 176 reserve no less. Its a little tight, but I have about 50 jumps on it, and I can pack it now with no trouble. It was a challenge when I started, as the Tri was brand new. If you go to Aerodyne's web site, you will find they have pack volumes for the 190 Tri and 168 Pilot as almost the same (420 for the Tri, 416 for the 168 Pilot, a difference of 1%. Since they are from the same manufacturer, I would think they can be compared without the usual caveat). The 2-3 times I have paid for packjobs, I have watched the packers slide it into the bag easy as pie (or at least thats how they make it look). [edit: I see the rigger who recommended this combo to me has already posted several times in this thread. I could have saved the trouble of typing this out! Oh well...That's what I get for not reading the whole thing :)] Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Your post made me laugh, because I did the same thing once in my student progression. Drove 45 min to the DZ, got out of the car, walked into one door in the building and walked out the other, back in the car, and back home. I was going to do a 10 sec delay in the S/L progression, and the thought of "what could go wrong" was a bit too much. In addition to the suggestion to go and hang out w/o jumping, I would say talk an instructor about your fear. If you do go back to jump, you could agree to call him/her and have them expect you. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

I had the same "flare too late" problem. If I didn't stand up my landing, it was because it was a butt slide. I think it all stemmed from my FJC when we watched a vid of someone flaring at about 30' or so and then dropping straight down onto his/her tailbone. That scared me into always flaring at the absolute last second (or 1 second too late), and having too quick a toggle stroke. I cured myself of this by starting to flare higher and more gently. Several times I did flare too high (not 30', more like 5-10'), but when you do flare a little too high, it is not the end of the world, just don't let up on the toggles and prepare to PLF. Almost everytime I flared high I was able to stand it up. The few times I flared high and did not stand it up it was because my toggle stroke was not even. When you flare high, you end up having to sit in deep brakes for a few seconds, and a slight uneven flare will eventually cause you to turn and dive to one side and end up dumping you on your side. I fixed this uneven flare problem by practicing flying in deep brakes at altitude, intentionally starting turns by moving a toggle slightly and then stopping the turn by applying opposite toggle. This practice made landing in deep brakes (from a high flare) much easier. From one buttsliding noob to another, I hope that helps! Seth I jump a Tri at about 1:1 WL. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Yuri, That is some nice math. Thank you for sharing. A good mathmatical reminder to pick up my legs when trying to get back, esp when flying into the wind when I need both max glide ratio and max airspeed. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Choose which part to read and go with it. It seems to me that word Master I put in bold in the Sunpath email should read Senior. Otherwise that text line just restates the line above it, making no sense. If indeed that word was supposed to be Senior it was it was a bad misstatement by the Sunpath author. Just from reading the rest of the email it seems like that is what he is trying to say. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

IIRC, the horizontal car is moving when the vertical car is dropped. I don't know what terminal for a car is, and that is most important as the car would probably spend the majority of 4k fall at terminal. Didnt someone push a car out of a Skyvan at Eloy some time ago? Is there video? I thought the whole thing was odd. Near as I can tell the message suposed to be: "Lexus is run by nerds, so your car will be chock full of aerospace level technology" It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Searching is your friend. This has been covered many times. Basically you start with a pro pack, but flip it over before laying it down, then roll it up and bag it. Here is a link from Icarus, who are proponents of the technique. Icarus Packing Pics IBhugeprosconsdebate It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

My manual Subaru STi could give your a run for your money. We both have three LSDs. I like them both. Until it died a few months ago, I had an old Ford wagon with auto, and I have the Subaru w/manual. With a 6spd, shifting can get to be annoying, so an auto is a nice change of pace. I like the ideas of the new "best of both" transmissions, DSGs and CVTs. Hopefully my next car will have one of those. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

I don't think the season has ended yet in MI. I just did two jumps last Sunday in Fremont, and I know Skydive Plainwell was going to have a plane up this Sunday. The weather tomorrow does look to be ugly, so I don't know if that will work out, but I would call around to see who is open. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Thanks for the reply, beezy. I wish the name for this packing method was less bizzare; I look at as basically just a rolled-up pro-pack. I will try to pull the attachment point out some more, but I just think the distance from the attachment point to the dbag is a bit too short when the PC is fully cocked. Even when I put a knot in my bridle, the kill line mark has a habit of sliding out of the window. If I get ambitious, I will try to post a pic of how it looks right before I bag it. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

for my psycho packed canopy. Will someone tell me who to get in touch with to find one? I have a 190 and it is hard to keep the PC fully cocked. Thanks, Seth Grammar/spelling nazi note: If I said I want a bridal extension, I would mean I want my wedding gown to be longer. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Cafepress is huge. 671 claimed skydiving designs, although some are in the category are not, and many others are variations on the same themes, but you still have alot of options. Here are two I liked after looking through about 1/2 the samples. Remember, you can't wear the 2nd design if you jump a pullout. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Way back in 2002, the DZ where I was a student had student gear with round reserves and FXC AADs, as did the larger rental gear. It was probably my 30th jump before I jumped a square reserve with a Cypres. I still remember the 1st jump class training: "If you have an AAD fire two out, the round will win. Wait till the main dives, then pull the silver handle (SOS gear) and don't flare the reserve on landing" I saw one round reserve ride under student gear when an FXC misfired on a backloop at 8-10k up. There are probably other small DZs with old gear out there, that one shutdown earlier this year, still with the same student gear. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

I will be near Perris for Christmas (palm springs), so I thought I would try to make a few jumps there at the time. I sent an email with some questions, but have not heard back. So before I hassle them somemore, I thought I would try out DZ.com. Don't fail me people!

I would be transferring the data from the GPS to my computer and saving the data there, so the amount of memory in the GPS is not a big concern. I know that there are excellent barometric loggers, but I would like to have something for logging XY and Z data, for Google Earth purposes, for tracking jumps, and just for the hell of being able to see my canopy flight in 3D. I have an Explorist 210. I guess the heart of my question goes to the track log difference between Magellan and Garmin, that is, Magellan only appears to support "automatic" tracking, while Garmin can log on an interval (1 per second, etc). Is this anything to worry about? How about mounting, I assume I would attach it to my chest strap or have a pocket sewn somewhere on my jumpsuit for it. I know people use the Etrex series, they look to be about the same size as the Explorist. Thanks, Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

I got a Magellan Explorist as a gift. I would like to use it for general outdoor navigation and logging jump tracks. I haven't opened it yet, b/c I want to make sure it is suitable for skydive logging. I read the online manual, and found the logging feature is "automatic", it logs a point when a "significant" change in speed or position has occured. I am not too happy about this. A search of DZ.com does not reveal any references to the Explorist, so I wonder if I should just return it and buy a Garmin. Anyone with Explorist experience? Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

My progression was static line; I am at a small Cessna DZ and that is all they offered. I will toss my 0.02 on several issues you are having: 1. Disposable income. You know that this is an expensive sport, in terms of training, gear and jumps, so if you can't handle giving the sport 2-4k over the next few years I would not pursue it. 2. Fear (incidents). I had alot of fear transitioning from SL to FF, I worried that I would get unstable and deploy unstable, end up with a horseshoe or a wrap and go in. My first terminal jump went fine, and it was the best jump I ever had. I ended up being pround of the fact that I did everything "myself", as my first few freefall jumps were solos, and my first jumps with instructors were not "Im here to help you save your life" but "Im here so you can get RW practice". 3. Progression issues: It took me a long time to get through training, 3 years and 35 jumps to A license. It was worth it to me. I told myself when I started what the completion cost would be and I commited to finishing the program (getting licensed) regardless of time or financial costs, and then I figured I would decide if the sport was right for me, before I took the plunge and bought gear. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Well, I carried the J3 on, and it was a little tight getting through the opening to the bin, but once inside it was fine. TSA hand-searched everyone's carryons at the gate for one of my flights. I was worried about having to argue about not opening the container, but one of the hand searchers was the same person who swabbed the container at the checkpoint, so it was not a problem, which would only happen at a smaller airport like GRR. The checkpoint staff was great: "Is that a parachute?" "I finally got to see one" "Get the supervisor". . . swab swab and done. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Does a Javelin J3 fit in the overhead bins on a CRJ (Canadair Regional Jet)? The bins are pretty small, but I think it will fit. I would like confirmation though, cause if it does not, then it gets gate checked and chucked in the cargo hold... Thanks, Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

That is hi-fricken-larious Eule!

You are now on the right track. However, the equation you have is the net force on the system, which determines how fast it will decelerate. If there is no deceleration, like under a fully open canopy, then m*g - C*v^2 = 0. But at that point there is still m*g force on the risers. The correct equation is: Riser Force = Drag Force on canopy (initially low, spikes up then settles on value = m*g) Think of it this way, the canopy weighs a lot less than a skydiver, so almost all the force exerted on the canopy as it opens travels down the risers and exerts itself on the suspended load. To be very precise, in the system equation m*g = Cv^2 , C is the sum of drag on the canopy and the skydiver. Initially all drag is skydiver, but very quickly canopy drag becomes dominant. Seth Regarding your comment for Figure 2, with the same suspended weight, a longer opening will have lower peak forces. I am talking about different weights. It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

980: you are correct, I see that article as further validation of the model I created, and what everyone is telling phoenix. phoenix: The spreadsheet I created matches well with the data measured in the article you posted. For example, the data in "Figure 2" shows shock loads of 4k-5k Newtons for a 200lb skydiver deploying at 110 mph. Using that data and a 3 sec opening time in my spreadsheet, you get 4.5k Newtons (1000 lbs) for peak loads. The article just shows that model I am using is valid. And the model shows that increasing suspended weight increases peak shock. There is a reason the model matches the measured data, and that is it is based on basic physics, Fd=Cv^2 and F=ma. Thanks for posting the link! Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Phoenix: I will try once more to convince you, by trying something that is commonly done in engineering when testing a formula: try the extreme case to see if that makes sense. Here I ran a 15k lb load from 160mph, simulating the cargo deployment blowup that was mentioned earlier. The kink in the load graph is where the chute finishes deploying. If you deploy a 15k lb skydiver shaped load at 160mph, it would start to accelerate, then slow as the chute opened. The new terminal velocity for such a load would be ~80 mph, which is one reason you would need more than one chute to stop the load. The other reason is the peak load forces for this opening are >50k lbs, even though peak g forces are only about 1 g. At 50k lbs the parachute will blow up. You can modify the opening time a bit, but the fact remains, higher suspended loads cause higher loading forces on the chute during opening. Other than getting a trusted parachute designer to personally explain things to you, I don't know what else to say. Seth It's flare not flair, brakes not breaks, bridle not bridal, "could NOT care less" not "could care less".

Phoenix: It is true I don't have a good way to model opening time, and that will affect the calculations. However, if increasing suspended weight makes the parachute open faster, as I think it would, then this would only increase the peak forces on the heavier jumper. I think you are only seeing what you want to see. Sparky: I did take way too much time to build that spreadsheet. I am glad I got something out of it that seemed to make sense, but I wish it didn't take me so long.