riggerrob

79 ... 80 ... 81 ... what difference does it make? Both Biden and Trump are old men ... more than 2 decades older than me.

Amusing how just last week Trump was making disparaging remarks about Biden's age (80). Now Trump is the oldest man in the race at age 79. Mr. Pot may I introduce you to Mr. Kettle? Hah! Hah!

Yes. During an exchange program between Soviet and Alaska smoke-jumpers (early 1980s) the Alaska smoke-jumpers tried and liked the Soviet drogues, so contracted with Strong to manufacture similar drogues for US smoke-jumpers. Butler also built a few drogues for US gov't contracts. Fast forward to 1983 and both Ted Strong and Bill Booth were test-jumping prototype tandem rigs. Since tandems fall stable at 160 to 200 mph. they tore up a lot of mains. Consider that first generation tandems used the same canopies for main and reserve. Ted Strong attached a Russian-pattern drogue to his Dual Hawk tandem to tame opening speeds down to 100 mph. Since Strong's first-pattern tandem drogues fell too slowly for outside video-graphers to follow, his second pattern drogues were a bit smaller and fell at more like the 120 mph that is comfortable for solo jumpers. Strong also tried installing a drogue on a solo student Combination Tandem (piggyback harness/container). it fell stable at less than 100 mph. That worked well until a solo freefall student at Hinckley, Illinois was spinning violently when he scared the FXC 1200 attached to his main ripcord. During the ensuing deployment, the main twisted up with the drogue and never opened. End of that experiment. At one of the PIA Symposia, some wag suggested that if tandem had been invented 4 years earlier, USPA would never have approved AFF.

yes and the latest US Army At-11 static-line rig also has a sleeve to improve deployments from faster airplanes like C-17. The AT-11 canopy is also sort-of-square ... more like a cross parachute with the arms sewn together than the Russian pattern.

Where is the "Skydive 024" dropzone. Rules in that country may be radically different than the USA. It might be that 100 octane low-lead gasoline is becoming scarce in your country. Last week I was looking at an electric-powered Pipistrel trainer that works at a flying school in Campbell River, B.C. Canada. If I were you, I would start by talking with Pipistrels' engineers. Another source would be the engineers at Harbour Air (Vancouver, B.C. Canada) who test-flew an electric-powered DHC-2 Beaver a couple of years ago and are hoping to convert a fleet of Cessna 208 Caravans to electric power. Harbour Air's short scheduled flights best match the mission profile of jump-planes. Most of Harbour Air's scheduled flights from Vancouver, Nanaimo, Victoria, Seattle, etc. are last less than and hour. Their chief advantage is landing their floatplanes (Cessna 208 Caravans, DHC-2 Beavers, DHC-3 turbine Otters and DHC-6 Twin Otters) in the inner harbour, close to major businesses, tourist attractions, courts, provincial legislature, etc.

One rumour has it that the FAA issued that waiver ONCE. They later quietly admitted their error and will never issue another similar waiver.

Which BASE canopies have similar pack volume )560 cubic inches on the PIA chart) to an old Para-Flite Strato-Cloud Delta 240 canopy? I have an old skydiving piggyback container that currently has a Strato-Cloud Delta 240 main. I used to jump reefing-line Strato-Clouds and Cloud Lites back in the day. With my current weight (195 pounds) I would prefer a canopy in the 300 square foot range. How many BASE canopies - made of LPV fabric would fit?

We should get Terry Urban's opinion on this matter since he sat on the PIA Technical Committee when the Optimum was certified. Terry and I have discussed this a couple of times. The old FAA TSO standard was that all reserves had to structurally survive high-speed openings at 254 pounds. The second problem was descent rate with 254 pounds suspended. The smallest reserves have a steady (brakes still set at opening configuration) rate of descent too fast to meet the FAA standard, so Performance Designs asked the FAA for an exemption.

To remove the foam, you need to remove the binding tape from one edge and vacuum out the deteriorated foam. Then you need a master rigger to sew it back together. Best to get the same rigger to do the disassembly. It is a complex sewing task best left to riggers with many years of factory sewing experience.

This whole fiasco sounds like poor gun control. Some of those good-old boys from the National Rifle Association should coach the shooter on how to focus his front sight on the target and breath out slowly while he take sup the slack in the trigger. Sarcasm alert!

Wow! Another thing that Ron and I agree on. North American citizens are afraid that Third World political violence is coming to North America.

Not bright enough to duck when someone is shooting at him!

Drifting away from the British theme of this thread. Canada has 4 major federal political parties: Conservative, Liberal, New Democrats and Bloc Quebecouis. Conservatives are - as the name implies - resistant to change and only want to see slow change and only if it benefits big business. Mind you the federal Conservative party over-laps the center aisle of the House of Commons. Conservatives won fewer than half the seats during the last federal election, so got punted to become the "loyal opposition." Similarly, the federal Liberals over-lap the center aisle but are more open to change. Currently, Liberals have the most seats in parliament, but they still need NDP support - in a coalition - to hold power. The New Democrats are slightly to the left/socialist, but the only way the main stream parties can keep the NDP out of power is by adopting their most popular policies like socialized medicine. The Bloc Quebecouis vote for whatever federal policy will send the most money to Quebec. They really do not care what happens outside of Quebec.

Why is showing photo ID a fuss? The last half-dozen Canadian elections (municipal, provincial and federal) have all required me to show gov't issued photo ID at the polling station.

The story that I heard was that her boyfriend convinced her to get her breasts augmented. They were still swollen and painful, so she left her chest strap undone during the airplane ride. She forgot to connect her chest strap before exit.