JohnSherman

Correct oil. If you have the cable out of the rig why not wipe it clean and apply a fresh coat of oil to the entire cable(s)? That is the military way and probably the best practice. A lite coat will do. I think of a lite coat of oil as I did in the Army when I cleaned my rifle. The loop is where the bad friction occurs and needs lubrication the most and it is usually located 6.5 inches from the end of the cable. However, it won't hurt to lube it all. John

Durometer is the term used to describe the hardness of the coating. Booth stuck his fingernail in it and declaired it to soft. I had it tested and found that the durometer varies for both within the same range. It has been is service now for maybe 20 years and other than a cracking problem from a former vendor many years (1996+/-) ago have had no problem. There is probably 20,000 units in service.

Yes Contact: [email protected] No they don't, I don't know why. But I do know we are the only ones using it as we have to have it custom made. Maybe ask one of them and see if they have even heard of it. If they have be ready for some of the best BS you hve ever heard. Wow! I hadn't heard that one. It's amazing what some people will say to sell a rig. The core wire of the Red coated cable is the same core wire as the yellow. The rigidity is the same.

The Yellow coated cable is coated in pure Nylon and requires lubrication on a monthly basis at minimum. I recommend weekly as stated in the Racer manual. We Skydive on a weekend basis and the end of the month could come in the middle of the week. The recommended lubricant is petroleum, silicone is acceptable but it hydrolyzes in Nylon in about a week requiring reapplication. If you don’t have any 3 in 1 oil handy just wipe the oil from your dipstick with your fingers and apply it to the last 7 or 8 inches of the cable. This is to make sure you lube the part of the cable which goes through the nylon locking loop. Test: This test should be part of the “Jumpmaster or Pin check” before boarding. Pull one or both of the cables out of the riser channel and run it between your fingers. If it “Squeaks” like freshly shampooed hair go back and oil it. There should be no resistance or “Squeak” from the cable. If you have a Red coated cable it is coated in pure FEPT Teflon and requires no maintenance or lubrication. A general word about 3 ring cables and housings: The black “goop” which you see on some of your cables is good. It is the residue from the cutting oil used in the housing manufacture. It is a lubricant albeit with high viscosity. Many people worry about dirt sticking to the cable because of the stickiness of the oil and try to remove it. This is misguided and not a problem. One military orginization wiped the cable clean every 90 days for several years before they got all of the cutting oil off of the cable and out of the housing. Then they began having cutaway problems. They now lubricate every 90 days. Test: With a cable and housing separate from a rig. Oil the cable until is drips with oil then drag it through the dirt and sand. Fill the housing with dirt and sand. Insert the cable and coil the housing to its minimum diameter. Pull the cable out and observe the effort. The worst thing you could have on your rig is a dry cable. The point of loading is the nylon loop. Loop tension effect is doubled with a dry cable. I know all of this because I have had a “No Cutaway” from a 3 ring. It occurred many years ago shortly after the Yellow cable was released to replace the clear cable. The Yellow cable was touted, by the supplier, in writing, as being Teflon impregnated and requiring no lubrication. This was not accurate. It had no Teflon was pure Nylon and it required lubrication as above. Because of this bad info we stopped lubricating new rigs. After my experience I tested some 30 rigs which were ready for shipment. Two of us did the test. One held the rig and one held the risers with tension. The one with the rig pulled the cable or should I say TRIED to pull the cable. None would release. We oiled each in turn and they all worked find. This experience led to a series of extensive test where we built a simulator for the configuration. From those test we learned the relationship between the cable, housing and oil and developed the procedures reported here. BTW: The only damage petroleum does to nylon is to stain it, which can be removed . There is no loss of integrity.

No more velcro. If you saw the red sport rig next to the hanging tandem it was a Classic Racer and it had magnets. You must do pennants for saying something good about a Racer which is usually spelled with a capital "R". Thanks Lee BTW: We have been doing it (magnets) for about a year and they work great.

Scares me. But if you know me you know that my first thought is "I want to test it".

That would also be my choice.Modern styling has gotten us into a lot of trouble. When I designed the 2K3 I found great difficulty in extracting the reserve bag. I cut the riser covers back as far as I could but it still wasn't enough. I knew the capability of the pilot chute so I had a target force to go for. I eventually made more modifications to the bag itself and to the top of the container to provide extraction, in all cases, equal to the Classic. This lession is why I am so vocal about this problem I have been there and done that. I still prefer the Classic.

My wife Nancy LaRiviere jumped until late in her pregnancy. She did this with the consult of Dr. Robert McPhearson (A Skydiver) RIP who explained that there is a gradient of several thousand feet in the womb. I forget how much as my son is now 24 and that was a while ago. This gradient is added to your altitude in the womb and reduces the atmosphere (O2) available to the baby. To off set this Nancy jumped with sublimental O2 during the term. Don't forget to use aviators O2 as it is dry and won't freeze at altitude.

I can't reply without telling a story. Jeannie Mc Combs RIP one of the great ladies of our sport said, "It is a Brest strap and it goes over not under". It is a girl thing. I prefer it high and reccommend it that way for a guy.

I heard the same thing. What I want to know is how they were hanging in the trees, were or are there any marks on them. Maybe the trees pulled the free bag out of the container. On the other hand they could have landed there as apparantly did the one in NJ. A third reason could be complete line strip and bag dump leaving the canopy in the tray as happened several years ago at the Nationals.

There is: The new CYPRES has this feature I am told. What makes you think it will solve, or for that matter, even help the problem? What evidence is there that more time would have allowed these reserves to open? Perhaps the manufacturers of these rigs should be required to publically post, or at least inform the public, of the results of their performance testing for this mode of failure. If they would post these results you would have the knowledge to properly set your new adjustable AAD. Until then you are just guessing. Not every rig has this problem just 8 of them so far.

Yes, it can. Just remove the Drogue bridle harness and use the drogue like a throw-out. We do it all the time. Oh, that only on a Racer Tandem. Not only that but the Firebolt 396 will glide with the best of them. Recient testing demonstrated a 5 to 1 glide ratio with a greater wing loading than the HG385 was tested with. Not only that you can direct bag static line it. See attached Polar Curve which defines the Glide Slope: [inline Polar_Curve_FB396_Solo_2013.jpg]

The only problem, other than those already mentioned, with the SOS (SINGLE Handle Operating System), is that is takes 2 hands to operate it. One for the initial pull and the other to grab the cable half way from the handle and finish the pull. The stroke is too long for your arm. This is inherrent in the design because of the required cable lengths. The configuration must allow for the release of the risers before the reserve is released. Some long armed folks can reach, in one stroke, on some rigs, but not all.

This is a fallacy: Twisted risers don’t trap the cables in the cloth riser channels if the yellow cable is properly lubricated or if you have a red cable. Hard housing don’t help. Proof: In a suspended harness lubricate your yellow cable and route it as normal but by pass the riser locking loops. Use a temporary cable for the riser loops. Load the harness with an extra person hanging on each side (3 bloke test) and twist it upto the 3 rings. Have the person in the harness pull the release cable. Now pull each of the individual riser cables and compare the difference. You may repeat the test with hard housings but you will not need to.

The BPA has adopted a standard test, attached. Additionally they have released a companion video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSvxHutNFTM Additionally, See:http://www.jumpshack.com/default.asp?CategoryID=TECH&PageID=Extraction_of_Rsv.&SortBy=DATE_D and http://www.jumpshack.com/default.asp?CategoryID=TECH&PageID=18pounds&SortBy=DATE_D The extraction force can not excede the capability of the pilot chute. In many cases still an unknown.

If you weigh about 240 pounds and are not over 6 feet tall it might be accurate.

Good story Robin but the math/physics don't work either. If he ejected at 8000 feet he would slow down immediately to an equalized velocity and have pleanty of time to deploy. If this is an official story they got it wrong. We don't go any faster today than we did yesterday! Remember "Style"

You know, some things do happen faster,but the overall result is more distance due to more speed. I find that to deploy a canopy in 300 feet at terminal you had better be able to do it in 200 feet at cutaway speeds. Apply that to what we are seeing. John

Same time longer distance/altitude due to speed.

You last paragraph is difficult to understand but, here is what I know: Canopies generally take the same amount of time to open at all speeds. Say they take 3 seconds after a cutaway they will generally take about 3 seconds at terminal. This is not exact just an observation. Speed does seem to speed up the opening a bit but not much. Perspective: At 20Fps after a cutaway you are accelerating away from the main. It takes about 1 second for the bridle to string out. Then the bag takes a load fop extraction. The bridle has used 1/3 of the allowed time for deployment. At 174FPS (terminal) that 16 feet deployes in a little over 10 feet using only a fraction of a second. Remember 3 seconds is the maximinum amount of time allowed for TSO testing. In reality that deployment is between 1 and 2 seconds. At 750 feet if things work as planed you will get about a 30 second canopy ride.

That would be a wonderful thing. We would not be here talking. The jumpers would be enjoying a 30 second canopy ride. If you are intimating that scenerio with the same outcome, I doubt it. However, if it did happen that way then the inflation speed of the canopy should be investigated as it would still be a TSO violation. This would be an easy thing to determine. Just jump them as a main to test.

You bet, I have been encouraging investigators to do a test. You really don't need a dummy, just tape the rig up and throw it out. This has been going on for about 20 years. Before AAD's they were reported as "low pull" on the reserve. As AAD's came into service we started seeing events as we do today. It was slow at first as the installed base grew. We will see even more as we go along if we don't fix it.

You have got that right and I have been bitchin about it from the begining. I have refused to give those people the thing they wanted because I new they comprimised safety. As a result of other manufacturers caving to those demands we find our selves in the situation we have today. This is a life saving business and no one should comprimise safety for any reason, especially just to make a rig look good. I don't agree about limitations. There shouldn't be any and if you get into the science you will find that the ones being violated don't really matter. This is a science. These thing can be calculated. That is designs which have been tested can be calculated. PIA didn't and hasn't accounted for reserve pilot chute performance in their standards. This must be done. In the mean time there may be pilot chutes out there which are sub-standard in drag capability. That could be part of the problem. I ask you how do we verify that the pilot chut on our rig will do the job? No one needs to die in this sport because of equipment failure. That must be our goal. Give no quarter and ask no quarter in this goal.

I am all for raising the altitude "if it will help". I see no proof that it will help. To the contrary my read is that it will not help. If we raise the altitude we will sit back and relax and it will be another 5 years and 10 more dead before we realize it did not work. Show me one iota of proof that these failures would not have been failures if they had had more altitude. So far the reasons and solutions for these incidents are based on video of on the ground performance all of which indicate complete failure without more dynamic pressure, which can only be increased with more speed. When you are at 750 feet and you AAD fires you are already going as fast as you are going to go. The same would be true at 1000 feet.

Clairification: Actually the 3 seconds is from "Pack Opening" per TS-135 TS-112 looks at the potential delay between AAD fire and pack opening. All the test I have seen show this as only miliseconds apart. Not an issue today while it may have been on some rigs in time past. I believe it has been cleaned up.