GPS Tracking Freefall & Canopy Flight over Google Earth

[Muffy 0]

Who's tracking jumps with a GPS?

I know it's popular with wingsuits, but who else is jumping them? What are you using? What are you analyzing your tracks with? Are you posting your tracks somewhere?

Here are some recent GPS tracks of freefall & canopy flight plotted over Google Earth: http://www.playday.com/activity/skydive/MuffyJumps.kmz

I'm recording using a Garmin ForeTrex 101 (http://www.garmin.com/products/foretrex101/) and Paralog (www.paralog.net) does a very elegant job of downloading and processing the raw tracks.

[Muffy 0]

This is the first track we've recorded (with this gear) of a swoop by Thumper: http://www.playday.com/activity/skydive/Thumper_20060904_1431.kmz.

I know a lot of DZs don't have Internet access...we didn't this weekend...but if you increase the disk cache in Google Earth (say 2gb) ... and the RAM (say 512 mb - not sure if this really matters) and fill the cache by viewing the entire area surrounding the DZ before you go offline (this really matters) - you will actually be able to use Google Earth offline to see at least that area. Which is damn handy if you want see the tracks right after they are made at an offline DZ.

[phoenixlpr 0]

Wingsuit fliers, like me.

[Muffy 0]

Just in case there is someone out there that still doesn't know... Google Earth is free right... http://Earth.Google.com.

Attached are a couple of static images of the tracks look for those without the earth. It's lots more fun to see them in 3D though.

[DZ_EPHESUS_TR 0]

http://www.trackingderby.com/

is excellent.They give nice graphs and speed data.

I use foretrex 201 and their software.

[Butters 0]

Muffy, that is really cool. I would love to see some long tracking (wingsuit) jumps plotted like your images.

"That looks dangerous." Leopold Stotch

[LouDiamond 1]

Quote

I would love to see some long tracking (wingsuit) jumps plotted

Here are a few GPS jumps, to include a wingsuit jump at Raeford from 2 views courtesy of Paralog.

"It's just skydiving..additional drama is not required"
Some people dream about flying, I live my dream
SKYMONKEY PUBLISHING

[Butters 0]

Thank you for those images. (I am new and in my thread in the introduction forum I mentioned that I am very interested in tracking and wingsuits and they mentioned the wingsuit forum and your name.)

"That looks dangerous." Leopold Stotch

[Muffy 0]

Lou,

Do you have some KMZ files of those tracks on a web site somewhere?

[Muffy 0]

I like the competitive idea behind tracking derby, and they do have nice some color and icons on what it sends out to Google. Can you use it offline though?

>>graphs & speed data
Yea the Google Earth track Paralog outputs includes very detailed datapoints that will show you Altitude, Speed (vV, vH and v), pitch, turn rate. You can see all that in Google Earth in 3D - makes it real easy to study the numbers in context to where you were physically in the jump.

If you didn't notice those details before, jump back up to the beginning of this thread and click the hyperlink to the KML file, when Google Earth displays the tracks, look at the list of jumps that appears in the Places list (left side of screen), expand one of the jumps (Jump 41 is pretty clean), click to turn on the Datapoints folder and/or expand that node to see individual points. I attached an image of that but you really should see it through Google Earth - so much more interactive.

[precision 0]

Here is a reserve canopy test flight with brakes set from about 4k over Dunlap, TN.

Canopy was a Raven 1 loaded at 1:1
Rate of descent was less than 6 ft/sec
Jumper was Beezy Shaw

George Galloway

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

Here is a reserve canopy test flight with brakes set from about 4k over Dunlap, TN.

Canopy was a Raven 1 loaded at 1:1
Rate of descent was less than 6 ft/sec
Jumper was Beezy Shaw

George Galloway

George,

What program opens that file?

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[phoenixlpr 0]

kml and kmz can be opened with Google Earth

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

kml and kmz can be opened with Google Earth

Thanks.

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[LouDiamond 1]

Quote

Lou,

Do you have some KMZ files of those tracks on a web site somewhere?

I don't have any of my GPS data saved as kzm at the moment. But you can check out this PARALOG LOGBOOK that has links to several jumps via google earth as well as all the data from the flight.

"It's just skydiving..additional drama is not required"
Some people dream about flying, I live my dream
SKYMONKEY PUBLISHING

[Muffy 0]

Neat - thanks.

What kind of plane/ GPS? What software did you use to plot it?

Something funky about the way dropzone.com hosts the attachment - Google Earth (beta 4) complained about not being able to read the file initially - but when I saved it locally it opened just fine.

[precision 0]

Quote

What kind of plane/ GPS? What software did you use to plot it?

The flight tracking was logged using a Flytec 5030 and then overlaid onto Google Earth via a function in the Flytec software.

This unit is extremely sensitive, and in addition to GPS tracking data, it also has a direct input pitot system to measure indcated (and compute true) airspeed.

The sections of the flight where the data is jumpy was due to movement inside the C-185 prior to exit, where the 5030 couldn't "see" out the window of the airplane as Beezy was getting ready to climb out.

George Galloway

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

where the 5030 couldn't "see" out the window of the airplane as Beezy was getting ready to climb out.

Tell Beezy to be more careful.

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[bob.dino 1]

Quote

Something funky about the way dropzone.com hosts the attachment - Google Earth (beta 4) complained about not being able to read the file initially - but when I saved it locally it opened just fine.

The dropzone.com server probably isn't providing the correct MIME type with the file. Not all that surprising.