Violent linetwist

[thegman 0]

It was saterday evening.One load before sunset load.I was doing a coach jump with a friend.Everything was going great .We were doing a little sit flying action.Some docking drills and what have you.Backtrack at 5k.Went on y belly and tracked a few more seconds.3500 ft wave and pitch whoosh bif bap whish boom oh f*#k AAGGHHH.The most violent line twist/hard opening Iv'e ever experienced.The risers had my neck pinned down as I reached up to grab the risers to undo the twist bip.The line twist undi itself and nearly tok a couple of fingers off.It ripped oe of my figernails off of my right hand and it tore my audible off off the external audible port on my helmet.(I lost my protractdammit)The funny thing is I usually have very soft gentle openings on my canopy.I have hornet 190 loaded at about 1.2 Iam sure that it wasnt bad body position or anything like that.I'm kind of baffled as to the cause of this incident.Anyone have any simlar experience or ideas as to what could cause such a violent unprovoked line twist?

http://www.freefallmaniacs.net

[Gravitymaster 0]

Couple of thoughts come to mind.

If you are absolutely sure your body position was flat and stable, you weren't in a track and you had given yourself sufficient time to decelerate before deployment. Then I would suspect packing may be the cause.

First I would evaluate the length of your lines between your D-bag and risers. If it is too short, it is possible the lines on the short side are getting underneath the reserve container tray and catching on it when you deploy. This can cause the d-bag to spin as it comes out of your container, inducing line twists.

The second thought is, are you keeping your lines perfectly straight as you stow them in the rubber bands? Are you making sure the rubber bands are in good shape and they grip the lines tightly. This can cause hard openings and line twists.

The third thought that comes to mind is how much space you are leaving in the stow loops? You should be able to get no more than 2 or 3 fingers in the loops. What type of rubber bands you are using. My personal experience is the larger bands, double looped work best for me.

Lastly, I would evaluate my packing. Are you getting everything sorted out and packed symetrically? Do you roll the nose? If so, is that symetrical. How about the tail? Are you rolling it tightly?

If you continue to have line twists and/or hard openings, I would have a rigger watch you pack and invite him to offer suggestions on ways you can improve your openings. A couple of beers ought to do it.

[thegman 0]

Thanx for the input.

http://www.freefallmaniacs.net

[PhillyKev 0]

Exact description of what happened to me at Rantoul (line twists not quite as bad though). Saw stars from the opening though. I was psycho packing and believe I may have pushed the slider down the lines while rolling it. Make sure the slider is tight up against the stops.

[dterrick 0]

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We were doing a little sit flying action

...yup, been there and done that, same result under a Raven II. I think you had line dump and/or asymetrical body position at slightly superterminal.

We have one Hornet that flies (Dan's not that current but has a fair number of jumps) our DZ. He had LT problems last outing that was traced to poor body position causing the bag to spin and/or an uneven inflation (Master Rigger's words).

My Raven issue turned out to be line dump. I have microlines but the D bag was rigged with med. elestics that I double stowed. Slam, slam, slam. Then I tried the black ones double stowed. Nice, nice, SLAM.

A whole bunch of other rigging and packing tricks later we finally went for the obvious... teeny tiny elastics with ONE stow. Yes, PITA to pack, but I will never double stow microlines again.

...More details if you'd like but I think you might have had a one-off hard opening not soon to be repeated./

Blue Skies

Dave

Life is very short and there's no time for fussing and fighting my friend (Lennon/McCartney)

[freeflir29 0]

Unless you have video I can assure you that you'll never be POSITIVE it wasn't body position. I had an ALMOST ugly situation earlier this year. Dump...snivel snivel ..take of in a spin to the left!!! My cat like reflexes saved it. I was sure I had dumped stable...but upon review of my video it turned out I had dropped my right shoulder just before or just after I let go of the PC. The next thing you see is my now UNEVEN (By several inches) risers in perfect frame. What can I say....it was the 4th jump on a Monday after a loooong weekend. I was tired and got lazy. If it hadn't been on video I would never have known what caused what started as a nice deployment to turn into a "Spinnetto"

[dida 0]

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My personal experience is the larger bands, double looped work best for me.

i've been told by riggers and packers alike to NEVER double loop the bands which go through the grommets...severely increases your risk of baglock. likewise, ALWAYS double loop your outside stows. if the stows through the grommets aren't tight enough, use smaller bands (i've also been told to use smaller bands on ALL my stows...but i haven't tried this yet to see what a difference it would make).

spiral out...keep going...

[jraf 0]

Dido! I went through excrutiating pains of packing lessons. I mean Khan Hildebrand here in ZHills along with Steve, Kathy, Judy and Pip Redvers made sure I know how to pack. It was pounded into my head NEVER to double stow the grommet bands.

jraf

Me Jungleman! Me have large Babalui.
Muff #3275

[Gravitymaster 0]

I would seriously doubt you were told not to double loop LARGE rubber bands on the grommet stows because LARGE rubber bands would not hold the lines in place without double looping them and that could cause line dump. You may have been told to use Tube Stows on the grommet stows or you may have been instructed to use SMALLER rubber bands and not to double loop them.

[skybytch 273]

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I would seriously doubt you were told not to double loop LARGE rubber bands on the grommet stows because LARGE rubber bands would not hold the lines in place without double looping them and that could cause line dump.

Depends on the lines. If you have dacron lines, then large rubber bands are the right choice.

[Gravitymaster 0]

Depends on the lines. If you have dacron lines, then large rubber bands are the right choice
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That might be true if you have dacron lines. However my advice was to someone who was jumping a Hornet which isn't available with dacron lines. It is only available with 825 spectra lines and I doubt many people jumping a Hornet have had the microlines changed to dacron.

[thegman 0]

Good point.Something to think about.Thanks

http://www.freefallmaniacs.net

[Spy38W 0]

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Depends on the lines. If you have dacron lines, then large rubber bands are the right choice
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That might be true if you have dacron lines. However my advice was to someone who was jumping a Hornet which isn't available with dacron lines. It is only available with 825 spectra lines and I doubt many people jumping a Hornet have had the microlines changed to dacron.

Shouldn't they change over to the smaller rubberbands so they don't have to double stow?

--
Hook high, flare on time

[freeflir29 0]

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Shouldn't they change over to the smaller rubberbands so they don't have to double stow?

That's EXACTLY what I do. I use two large bands on the locking stows. (Larger because of the cascades) Small bands on the rest.

[tigra 0]

By any chance were you wearing a sit suit?? If you are wearing any type of suit with wings, you really need to be more careful on deployment. The wing can catch air and cause the twist.

[thegman 0]

Nope, I was wearing a freefly suit.

http://www.freefallmaniacs.net

[Gravitymaster 0]

Quote

That might be true if you have dacron lines. However my advice was to someone who was jumping a Hornet which isn't available with dacron lines. It is only available with 825 spectra lines and I doubt many people jumping a Hornet have had the microlines changed to dacron.

Shouldn't they change over to the smaller rubberbands so they don't have to double stow?

[Cornholio 0]

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Shouldn't they change over to the smaller rubberbands so they don't have to double stow?

That's EXACTLY what I do. I use two large bands on the locking stows. (Larger because of the cascades) Small bands on the rest.

I tried using the smaller bands for my stows (other than the locking stows) and the lines just slip out of the stows when they are done once, but they are too tight when double stowed. I jump a PD Spectre, BTW with microline. I didn't even jump it, I cut them off and replaced with the normal bands, and double stowed all of them except for the locking stows. Works great for me.

Butthead: Whoa! Burritos for breakfast!
Beavis: Yeah! Yeah! Cool!
bellyflier on the dz.com hybrid record jump

[ifallout 0]

I was told the same thing.. never, never, never double loop the stows that run through a gromet. Personally i use the large stows on the gromets and small ones everywhere else. i also never double the last stow... but that is just me, i jump a sabre in a Javelin, never had a hard opening.

Bill

have fun, love life, be nice to the humans