Poll: Best opening canopy for wing suiting

[Freeflaw 0]

Because arm length is a constant and spectra doesn't shrink over the life of a line set

[phoenixlpr 0]

Cobalt

Diamonds are forever

[daytripper419 0]

I jump a storm exclusively for wingsuiting period. In my humble opinion they are the best all around canopy for anything and they are the best for wingsuiting. They were designed for what we need for wingsuiting. Plus you can swoop the shit out of them if your into that sort of thing

[Ksandr 0]

I think Skylark Skipper is the best choice in price/quality/comfort. It works great even in bad body position.

One moment here - I'm not sure you can do droptest in your country and not sure you'll sell it fast like PD.

[NowAndLater 0]

Another vote for the Storm. Not a lot of WS flights on it but haven't had one twist or hard opening yet. Now in the process to move down and will be getting a storm again.

Opinion is the medium between knowledge and ignorance.

[lego 0]

Sabre1 is the best - quick and on-heading.

Pilot opens slow, you can unzip your armwings while it opens, and you have plenty of time to screw up the opening (i.e. get off-heading).

Spectre opens on-heading, a bit on slow side. but it flies like a rock.

Storm opens a bit too slow, but on-heading if you manage to be symmetrical under the canopy while it opens - it's very responsive to harness input compared to other canopes (in this list) of same size.

Sabre2 opening is slow and heading is unpredictable.

Pulse - can't remember the openings, I remember it sucks at flaring.

lego

[hjumper33 0]

lego

Pulse - can't remember the openings, I remember it sucks at flaring.

haha, my experience is identical!

[lurch 0]

Hey Chuck thanks for that relevant detail. That may be a really useful thing to think about when choosing my next wingsuit canopy, myself. I've got a ticket for a half price Icarus so I may be changing from my customary Sabres soon.

My vote goes to old Sabres because with the right tweaks I was able to achieve 100% reliability with it, zero line twists, ever again...

But, just recently I had my first actual mal in ages... almost certainly my own error, sloppy packing, probably didn't seat the toggles properly, and I had a double brake fire. The resulting deployment was -BRUTAL- even by my standards, fallrate at the time was probably in the high-40's low-50's, (I usually deliberately build up a bit of down speed in my old Apache Reb racing suit prior to the throw) and I was DAMN glad I wasn't going any faster at the time. That was a skull-rattling slam of an opening and if it'd been only a one-sided fire it'd almost certainly have ruined that long standing record of twistless jumps. Might have even had to chop it if the events following had gone the way I'd expect them to. But since both toggles fired at once I got a nice, on-heading opening.
-B

Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

[SkymonkeyONE 4]

phoenixlpr

Cobalt

Diamonds are forever

I hope people don't scoff at this. I made over 1000 WS jumps under tiny Cobalts (85's and 75's). I loved those canopies. I actually have a nearly-new 85 (~100 jumps) on risers in a bag in my gear closet if anyone would like to buy it.

Chuck