Best Glide Ratio

[TomAiello 26]

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V2s are speed demons, Mach1s give you a huge wing and lots of glide. A question might be, are you looking for distance or time???

I'm confused. When you say "lots of glide" isn't that the same thing as "lots of distance"? Or when you say "lots of glide" do you mean "lots of time"?

-- Tom Aiello

Tom@SnakeRiverBASE.com
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[jakee 1,500]

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Also agree the Blade, V2, and Mach1 are at the top. Will also be interesting to see how the Ghost performs.

The Ghost isn't intended to outperform the V2 in maxed out speed or glide ratio.

A couple of the photo's UC put up in the Stupino thread show it leading a pretty damn fast looking flock of Vampires though.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[outrager 6]

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V2s are speed demons, Mach1s give you a huge wing and lots of glide. A question might be, are you looking for distance or time???

Not exactly correct. It should be "V2s are speed and glide demons, M1 gives you a huge wing and is easy to fly at low vertical and horizontal speeds". Nothing can currently match V2 for glide, period.

See perfomance in numbers and discussion in Stupino thread.

bsbd!

Yuri.

[saly 0]

This is all the exciting part of wingsuit flying. We are at the infant stage of the growth and experience curves of the discipline, with plenty of new developments to come.

When I started jumping formation skydiving was the in thing. Arguments went over big loose Jerry Bird 70/80's type jumps suits to super slick F111 suits, booties, the box position to the mantis position etc. 15 points in time on a four way was world class that’s now doubled. So who was right or wrong in those developmental arguments in formation skydiving? Formation Skydiving has now matured with few major advances recently where we as wingsuit pilots have a voyage of discovery ahead of us.

With wingsuits we have the base line firmly established now with equipment and procedures, in other words a mouse trap. We are confined with in the wingsuit designs by the size, shape proportions of our bodies and the physics of the elements and gravity.

On the one side we have the theorists and maths folks and the other side the practical folk who just want to fly. All with the objective of mastering flight and getting the max out of their suits, having a heap of fun in the process. I am surprised the big aerospace companies have not started studying us because we have airframes that can morph, changing the "aircraft" flight characteristics significantly in operation. This dynamic is our greatest attribute in flying our suits in the environment (i.e. flocking, base, speed, distance) of our choice. (Note to self:- Contact aerospace company to pay for my jumps so they can study me)

Refinement and maturity will come with the designs being fined tuned with technological advancements, better materials will over come inefficiencies with current materials and flight experience will enhance training and coaching methods.

So the question is, can we make a better mouse trap? I doubt it, but we can use it better.

---------------------------------------------
If you don't have wings you will never fly

[Heffro1 0]

Not exactly correct. It should be "V2s are speed and glide demons, M1 gives you a huge wing and is easy to fly at low vertical and horizontal speeds". Nothing can currently match V2 for glide, period.


I'm sorry my friend but this is not true. A mach 1 does fly a farther distance I can say this by having the experiance of flying both suits. The suit was designed to keep up with any suit while on its back

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Tony Suits
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[jakee 1,500]

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I am surprised the big aerospace companies have not started studying us because we have airframes that can morph, changing the "aircraft" flight characteristics significantly in operation.

That might be a just little bit arrogant Take a look at your avatar and you'll see what the aerospace world can study. Those things do it much, much, much better than we could ever dream of

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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A few people complained about not being able to flock easily in a V2.

What is the characteristic of the V2 that makes flocking in the suit a pain? Kris.

It depends, if you are a lightweight the Vampire can be flown slowly a little bit easier. But the suit was never designed to hang back and float it was designed to fly from lift generated by speed. To fly slow you need to increase the camber or the armwing, the more you are loading it the more camber is needed. This can add strain and instability.

But if you flock where everyone is in Vampires then you get the picture.

[kallend 2,027]

I don't know why people are avoiding the question, which was quite well stated. It's nothing to do with "best".

I will re-state it to make it even easier:

If YOU were to enter a contest for greatest horizontal distance flown from some standard exit altitude, and YOU could choose any suit currently available, which suit would YOU choose?

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[VectorBoy 0]

Even I have trouble floating slowly in a V2 if its a flock that just doesn't go anywhere.

The V2 will strain you if you are in a max flight for sure. There is a relatively easier static position thats efficient and gives much better glide than most suits without max flight muscle burn out but nothing burns me out more than contorting my upper body to exagerate the camber to fly more slowly than my body in that suit will fly at........and for me flying slowly isn't fun.

[VectorBoy 0]

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, which suit would YOU choose?

Have chosen= the V2.

[KrisFlyZ 0]

It is definately one of the V2, RM and the Trigger. Not trying to avoid the question. I have not flown the RM or the Trigger yet.

If it has to be one suit and right now, I choose the V2.

Kris.

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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Even I have trouble floating slowly in a V2 if its a flock that just doesn't go anywhere.

The V2 will strain you if you are in a max flight for sure. There is a relatively easier static position thats efficient and gives much better glide than most suits without max flight muscle burn out but nothing burns me out more than contorting my upper body to exagerate the camber to fly more slowly than my body in that suit will fly at........and for me flying slowly isn't fun.

I know...I don't fly in flocks where I have to bend my legs very much. Most of my flights are solos and the few flocks I get to do at headcorn, we fly at a nice pace.

Now that Pierre has his S6..the flights will be even more comfortable.

Kris.

[NSEMN8R 0]

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I have not flown the RM or the Trigger yet.

I have a Rigor Mortis and a Mach1. If I had to guess, I'd say I would go farther in the RM. I think I get slower fall rates in the M1, but the RM seems to go faster. I don't have any numbers to back any of that up, it's just what it seems like. And of course even if I did have numbers to back it up, it would only reflect the way I fly these suits.

They're both pretty bad ass wingsuits and I wouldn't trade either one.


edit to add

Oh yeah, Kris, I think your RM showed up today. I'll bring it with me on Friday.

[pierre3636 0]

same old arguments over and over - YAWN

~ time is ~ time was ~ times past ~

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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edit to add

Oh yeah, Kris, I think your RM showed up today. I'll bring it with me on Friday.

Cheers dude Nick told me he shipped it, Under 5 weeks as promised. I won't be able to fly it until next month though .

Tony...which suit are you planning to jump from the cliffs?

Kris

[NSEMN8R 0]

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Cheers dude Nick told me he shipped it, Under 5 weeks as promised. I won't be able to fly it until next month though .

Tony...which suit are you planning to jump from the cliffs?

Kris

I'm bringing the RM. I bought it just for this trip because I wasn't comfortable base jumping my M1 or my Eagle.

[Kunstrasen 0]

This is turning in circles again....
Obviously a lot people will have doubts if somebody working @ xyz claims the own suit as best.

Basically a BM guy should test the M1 vs V2, a PF guy should test Blade vs M1 and the tonyguys should test Blade vs V2. What I want to say is that so far most of the reviews are biased (which is quite normal). Therefor the competition idea was/is a good idea. But even here the discussion starts again as seen above

Anyhow good entertainment....

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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Anyhow good entertainment....

That what the original poster wanted.

Kris.

[Heffro1 0]

If you are going to take advice from anyone, take it from someone who has flown each of the suits in question, extensively. Many people speculate what they think and/or have heard. The true fact is suit "A" might make body type "A" go faster forward, (more distance) and the same suit 'A' on a different body type "B" might come in second to a different suit "B" on the different body type "B". Unfortunately the only way to know is to jump each suit several times, in similar conditions, then you should know. I say unfortunately because there are alot of high performance suits now, and availability of demos are limited.

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Tony Suits
[url "http:/

[TomAiello 26]

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...the only way to know is to jump each suit several times, in similar conditions...

I'd add: "...with some kind of objective measurement system."

I had a friend who used to like to do a gainer on wingsuit BASE exits. He was convinced that it made him fly "faster" and "sooner" because he felt more speed pulling out of the rotation than he did on a flat wingsuit exit. While he did base this opinion on experience, he didn't use any objective measurements to form it (or investigate or support it), and was likely incorrect in his assumption, because he based it solely on subjective data, with no objective measurements.

-- Tom Aiello

Tom@SnakeRiverBASE.com
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[yuri_base 1]

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I had a friend who used to like to do a gainer on wingsuit BASE exits. He was convinced that it made him fly "faster" and "sooner" [...] was likely incorrect in his assumption

He might be right. Starting to fly is very sensitive to pitch angle after exit and how it changes with time. If he is able to nail the most effective angles doing gainers, he will start flying faster.

Consider different pitch angles after exit.

a) Totally flat with horizon = 90 degree AoA, which results in no lift, only drag. Since the speed in the first 2-4 seconds is almost completely vertical, by definition, the only force that pushes you forward is the lift (the component of total aerodynamic force perpendicular to velocity). So flat = falling like brick. The forward speed builds up very slowly this way.

b) Transitioning to almost headdown in the first second. With low AoA, you're close to your max L/D. However, the lift coefficient at small AoA is not that great as at higher angles. You start flying reasonably fast, but it could be better. On the positive side, because you don't dissipate too much energy due to low drag, you have much flatter and speedier planeout and overall will fly the longest distance.

c) Somewhere in the middle, ~45 degrees. The lift coefficient is the highest. You start flying very fast initially. On the other hand, drag is also high and you dissipate too much energy. Planeout is weak if at all, the overall distance will suffer. It's also possible to get stuck at 45 degree AoA and get ~1.0 glide ratio.

How consistently one can hit, say, 45 degree pitch? With "flat & stable" exit, you need to quickly rotate to 45 degrees down, stop there and then slowly rotate in the opposite direction to maintain 45 degree AoA. One time you'll stop at 30 degrees, another at 70 degrees, etc. Hard to be precise. But if he is consistent with rotational speed of his gainers, he can arrive at 45 degrees more consistently and precisely. Basically, he found what works best for him.

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iOS only: L/D Magic
Windows only: WS Studio

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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...the only way to know is to jump each suit several times, in similar conditions...

I'd add: "...with some kind of objective measurement system."

because he based it solely on subjective data, with no objective measurements.

Wingsuit BASE can be a proper mind twister.

On good exits, it looks and feels like flight starts very soon. It did make me feel a bit like superman.

I posted a video and pics of one of my exits from Kjerag #6 last year. Looking at the video later in the year, I realized that at 11.5 secs the overall angle achieved is more than 52 degrees. That is not even 1:1 average glide ratio, not to be confused with L/D, assuming height of 960m and distance to lighthouse of 750m.

Kris.

[The111 1]

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average glide ratio, not to be confused with L/D

???

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[KrisFlyZ 0]

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average glide ratio, not to be confused with L/D

???

For example, to fly from Smellveggan(940m altitude and 1600m to landing area) and open over land, one would need an average glide ratio of 1600/800 = 2(assuming a 140m opening altitude). Or, one would need a 2.4 L/D 1600/660 assuming a 140m opening altitude and 140m to get the flight started.

When flying from the airplane, due to the starting speed if we ignore the first 10-15secs, the number we get is L/D(steady state glide ratio).

On a BASE jump if we include the exit and calculate distance travelled/height, I am calling it Average Glide Ratio.

Kris.

[islandboyflyrz 0]

I have a v2 & i can fly about 3 to 4 miles on that from 13,500 & pulling @ 3500 ! the v2 is a speed & distance Monster . i pick V2 !