faulknerwn

I've got a Bev suit that I have had going on 20 years now. Had to replace booties but its still my main suit....

I have found both are well made, but if you need a custom fit Bev seems to work better without alterations. That being said, if you fall fast, you will want more drag, so having a tight exact fit is far less of an issue. I have seen well-made Tony suits, and I have seen Bev make a baggy suit for a 5'8 260 pound guy which made little olf me go low on exit on him so it worked really well! If you have a local dropzone, see which they recommend - having someone used to measuring for a particular brand and knowing exactly what they want for size makes a lot of difference. I will say - do NOT measure yourself. Get someone at the DZ who measures people regularly to measure you....

A friend of mine had one with his wingsuit and had some issues with hard openings. I jumped it a couple of times and quite liked how it flew and landed (opened pretty normal - I was not in a wingsuit.)

Sounds like fun! Interesting jump!

This reminds me of a story told to me probably 15 years ago by a friend. He was at a big dropzone doing big-way RW. A guy there rushed to do a tandem on a load. He jumped and opened at a normal altitude. He went and loosened up the students harness before doing a canopy check. When he looked up there was something wrong with it (broken lines, big tear? I forget but something that was not spinning but was not something you would want to land.) He was getting lower by this point and cutaway without his hand on the reserve handle thinking that the RSL would deploy the reserve. It either was never connected on the jump or had become disconnected and he ended up back in freefall with a loose student and fumbling for the reserve handle. Ended up having the AAD fire on him. Certainly you should always have your hand on your reserve handle because its possible your RSL/skyhook has gotten disconnected and you don't realize it.

I have probably 10 or so reserve rides on Tempo 120's. All flew perfectly straight and flew and landed nicely. Did they fly as fun as a main? Nope. Don't want my reserves to.

We had a rookie fire a student Mars on a Navigator 200, loaded around 1-1 . He did a 360 apparently around firing altitude. Ended up just trailing the pilot chute behind the rig but it can definitely be triggered.

Parachute Labs will also build a rig for any combination. I have known of swoopers with

On your shoe? Seems like that could be problematic for the people docking on you!

I have to agree with you. First job is to stop the freefall. In 25 years of the sport I have lost a lot of friends who cutaway but never pulled the reserve handle for whatever reason. Far more people in my jumping career have gone in with too little out rather than too much.

You have to consider burbles as well - I have witnessed pilot chutes hesitating in the instructors burble (it was on video too!) and them backing away can help the pilot chute hit clean air.

I have never heard of the protocol of one instructor leaving before pull time. But I would definitely agree - reserve side keeps them stable - using 2 hands if needed, and the main guy holds on with one hand usually while making sure the pilot chute comes out. It would be hard for the main to ensure stability and a pull for a rock-and-roll student.

I went there for the first time when I was 12 years old and loved it! I was tiny and flew to the ceiling and it rocked :-) Went there again when I was 23 and had just started skydiving. My velcro suit flew open and I accidently flashed a good crowd of visitors watching :-) Its definitely old and definitely has slow wind speed. Works great for little kids though!

Well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAw-fWkATLw reserve line twists - especially on highly loaded reserves - are not always so easy to deal with. A quick youtube search showed lots of videos of sketchy stuff. I remember seeing one on a spinning Optimum with lots of line twists that the guy barely got out of before the ground. Beyond that, I would bet that 2/3 of rigs being actively jumped in the field were made before their respective manufacturers even offered a MARD. Not everyone can afford brand new gear and good gear can easily last for 20 years or more. I jump Racers which open pretty much as fast as MARDS - they open quick. I have had 20+ malfunctions over the years - the lowest I was ever open under a reserve was 1500 feet and that was 20 years ago when standard pull altitude was 2000 feet. My last few I was under reserve by 2500-3000 feet. But I have also never been one to fight malfunctions. If I have spinning line twists I chop - I don't waste time trying to fix it - when in doubt whip it out. I think too many people waste too much time screwing around trying to fix an unfixable problem. Get a rig with handles that are easy to grab and that don't rotate behind your back or fold under so that you have problems finding them. Practice your emergency procedures all the time.. Don't hesitate. If you are cutting away low enough that you need a MARD to save your life you have seriously screwed up. Reserves are designed to open in 300 feet. If you are cutting away at 3-500 feet WTF? I do think that RSL's and MARDs are good things for people. Do most people think that they need to get rid of their perfectly functional rigs to spend $3000 on a new one just to get a MARD? I would bet that most people who are buying a new rig from a manufacturer that offers a MARD - probably get it. And I do think they are a good thing as long as people don't think "I have a MARD - I can fight this a little longer." MARD's can come disconnected. They don't always function perfectly. Riggers sometimes screw them up. The more complicated the system the more likely someone is to screw it up. I suspect in 20 years as the current crop of gear gets retired and replaced with gear that was produced after the age of MARDs - that most gear will have them.

I wrote an iphone App that people can download and put in their rigs and repack dates where it pops up alerts when they are coming due. I have no idea whether I will ever even publish this - it is mostly for my own use and my own knowledge in learning to code :-) I wrote a spot calculator app too I am working the bugs out on still which could be handy. I might see if I can get my hands on an android device to see that logbook.

I want to get at least the "big" pilot gear. I don't intend to try and track down every bizarre combo, but just listing Softie/Butler/Strong and then at least a handful of the most common rounds seems useful.

Was definitely planning to save the names of new gear and have an option for user input. Just seemed like it would save a lot of time to avoid having to type in Javelin and such every time if I could just choose it. And if they pick rigging innovations to be able to just be able to choose between flexon/curv/talon etc seems easier than having to type it in every single time. Plus my goal is to have it save rigs by jumper name so that if I put in bob Jones as the user I can have it pop up his Javelin or his Mirage or whatever. Plus I think having it as choices will avoid lots of typos and having mispellings and such everywhere.

I am starting work to do an app for a riggers logbook, and I want to be able to have choices available for gear. I am trying to find a fairly comprehensive list of companies/gear to have as choices. While getting most of the modernish US gear is no problem (Vector I/II/III, Reflexes, modern reserves), I am wondering about getting some older names etc that might still be in service. Various Glidepath/Flight Concepts reserves, the assorted Raven varieties over the years. I don't care about getting every possible ancient gear - just stuff that might still be in service. This would include brands of pilot rigs/reserves that are still packed. Also any modern sport rigs/reserves from Europe that I am not all that familiar with. Is there a good list available somewhere?

Can you provide a link to an incident report or something about that Speed Bag Incident? I have been jumping Racers (with all sorts of reserve bags) for 25 years and have never heard of a Speed Bag contributing to a fatality. And I am a rigger, and I own 12ish Racers, and have had over 20 reserve rides on my Racers over the years (CRW, spinning ellipticals, other random things - none the container's fault), with varying types of bags. That saying I am not a huge fan of the speed bag but they don't scare me.

That's for sure with the old altitudes in the AFF course! I would feel uncomfortable with many of the new young jumpers pulling lower, but when I started we broke 4 ways at 3k and 8 ways at 3500 (have lots of logbook entries like that). And while I have not pulled that low on a regular basis in many years, pulling lower happens periodically - AFF students pulled low, getting separation on a bigger way.. And if someone is older when this was common, and has an appropriate canopy, its not that big a deal for me. I am good with raising the minimum pull altitude to 2500k, I think it improves safety for sure and most kids are pulling way above that by now. And if i am ever on a jump where I think I might be opening on the lower end of things, I jump one of my rigs with a faster opening canopy. When I am wearing my giant camera helmet pulling high after a tandem, I wear my 1500 ft sniveler. But I would never choose that canopy on a 20 way. And I mostly jump Triathlons which are very predictable openings.

You might also try checking out a smaller dropzone. Most Cessna dropzones I have found are extremely welcoming to newcomers. They are more family filled and happy to jump with anyone. You may only get to 9500, but they are generally much more willing to interact with visiting or newer jumpers.

Your link did not work for me but this one did: http://nlf.no/sites/default/files/fallskjerm/dokument/vedlegg_1_600_juli_2013_elev_grunnkurs_line_og_aff_1.pdf But I don't know how google translate works on a pdf!

I have seen multiple left-sided BOC's for people with various arm issues. Go for it - just practice a lot to re-learn muscle memory!

AFF may or may not help but definitely keep at it! I was a pretty lousy beginner but now have world records, instructor ratings, and over 10,000 jumps. You can see my student logbook here: http://crwdog.servebeer.com/CRWdog/HowCRW.html

Skydive Temple has been getting drizzly rain for a couple days but no real issues at all. Skydive South texas has definitely had some flooding in the hanger from what I hear but I don't know more. Spaceland has a flooded landing area but it hadn't gotten in the building as of this morning..