teason

At the DZ I grew up at, it was mandatory for the FJC Inst. to drop all the FJs. Although I have worked at some DZs where the work is divided up, when I did 40-60 first jumpers, I dispatched them all (although usually from a 206). The most dispathching I did in a day was 85 IADs from a 182 at a satellite school in T-Bay. I have had lots of other days where I dropped 60-70 from the 206. Also, if you teach alot of large classes, you can develop a style that plays of the strength of having a large number of people. You also have support staff assist the FJCI with climbouts, arches and reserve procedures to speed up the process. If the instructor was left to do it all, he'd be pretty burnt and probably pissed off by the end of the day. I've actually taught sections of the FJC so my instructor could go do a jump with his buddys. Fairness is a 2 way street, if you give a little, you get a little, everybody is happy and you get a very positive work environment. (then again, I'm a DZO who'll pack gear, put it in the container and then tell a packer to close it so he can get credit for the entire pack job) At our DZ, the FJCI gets first dibs on the students for two reasons: 1.) He spent the time on the ground with them, unable to do anything else all day and 2.) the students just do better when they go with their FJCI. If the FJCI doesn't drop them all, that is his choice at our DZ. Often, if the FJCI doesn't drop them all it is because he opted to leave early. If I had a DZ where the FJCI didn't have the option to drop all the FJCI (like if we had a large pool of instructors) then yes, you're right, the pay schedule would be adjusted as you said. The underlying belief I have is fair pay for the work done. If I didn't give fair pay I'd have poor instruction if I had any at all! As it is, all my JMs and FJCIs can handle 30+IADs without breaking a sweat. They've had to because I have an extremely small instructor pool and I try my best to make them feel appreciated. Wage demands vary like in any business. What determines pay is the supply of customers, supply of instructors and conditions/benefits of the work environment. It's the reason why construction workers get paid almost twice as much in Fort McMurray than in Edmonton. Supply, demand and work environment. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

A few skydivers around DeLand have lost their homes I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

A fair question if work load increased proportionately with the number of students. An Instructor should receive a fair wage for time spent. 6-8 hours of work training 30 jumpers (and that is how it was back in the day and still is at some smaller DZs), the instructor should be compensated for travel to the DZ, and work done. $150 plus another $150 for dispatching is $300. As it would take about 9-10 hours to do, you can see that $30+ an hour is quite fair. (I used to get $150 for classes up to 50-60 in the early 90s!) Now, if you have a heavy Tandem operation and very few are doing the FJC, $10 a head for teaching and dropping would be unfair to the instructor. That is the reason the price per student has been raised to allow teaching a class to still carry a fair monetary value. Another way to look at it is like this. If you wanted 1000 brochures made, it would cost you, say, 10c a brochure. Now imagine you wanted 200 brochures made! Obviously the printing company would have to raise the rates to cover the costs of setting up, running the machines and printing material. It may now cost 50c a brochure. That is what has happened in the past few years, the number of FJC students DZs are asking instructors to teach has gone down and the instructor must now be paid a higher wage per head. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

It's not out of the range of deployment times and is not exclusive to the Racer. The Racer, however, has documented consistancy on that 2 sec. range and that is the basis for their claim and the reason for the OPs question. The deployment of a canopy is extremely complex and can be affected by so many variables that understanding them will take a great deal of study and research. Understanding the relationship between all the variables is what will lead us to better equipment and better design. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Very interesting Gary. Although I only skimmed through it, I did note at least one thing in there that I have an alternate view on. The observation about other extreme sport being competition. I agree that a single DZ in an area is not a monopoly but rather a monopolistic business, competing with rock climbing, hang gliding etc. when it comes to attracting core participants. What I would add is that in the first time market, they are not entirely competition. We have had agreements with rock climbing and hang gliding business to promote their business to our first timers while they promote our business to their students. Working with these businesses is a unique opportunity to market to the skydiving psycho graphic, the same people who try hanggliding are the same type of people who try skydiving. We have gone so far as to rent some of our hanger space to a Hang gliding school. We have had their students spontaneously try a tandem hang glide and they've had many of our students and even regulars try Hang gliding while waiting for or just after their load. We've also picked up at least 1 Hang glider pilot as a regular jumper. We have also been able to incorporate some of their safety systems in our training such as the "Robertson Charts of Reliability" Just some food for thought. Tim I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Well, I've already acknowledged that the video I saw is not on the site and my claim that the video exists will remain a claim until it appears on the website. (or you could go next door and ask John or Nancy for copy) Now, back to what you claimed earlier. You claimed that and implied dangerous reserve deployment Now, Jumpshack still gets the reserve open in 2 sec. Why? They say the reserve is packed as per manual and certainly the slider is up. So why? Why do they get it out in 2 secs? By the way, opening time does not, as you claim, "depend entirely on the design and packjob of that canopy" Pilotchute and freeBag design and descent velocity also play a role by affecting snatch and relative force on the slider. Remember, the greater the drag on the PC, the greater the snatch force. Snatch force has an effect on opening! as well as the canopy's velocity on inflation! I'll boil it down some more: The drag that the RPC has slows the velocity of the freebag(and the canopy inside).The canopy therefore has a slower velocity. When the canopy leaves the bag (the higher the drag, the more dynamic the release), it must be accelerated by the load (snatch force!). That means what happens after the canopy leaves the bag is influenced by container design! There is a seminar at the PIA called "The Anatomy of a Parachute Opening" Also Nancy promised to get you some videos of Racer deployments. She's done about 40 herself and they're all consistently in the 2 sec range and they've been doing these cutaways for years and years as you know. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

At small DZs, there is not alot of call for gear at the extreme ends of the spectrum. Small DZs tend to have one size fits all gear. It's funny, back in the early 90s, putting a 288 on a 100lbs girl was common. Gear was wide (even sport gear) and my brand new state-of-the-art Sabre 170 was being loaded to crazy degree! I weighed 190 out the door and I was over the manufacturer's recommended max loading!(at the time it was 187lbs!) Now that we load canopies 2.5 and beyond, we look at a low wing loading as crazy! The only thing that has changed is what we view as the extreme end of wing loading. But rest assured that people learned safely on the size canopy for years. Now, the other concern. Improperly sized gear. I see the wrong gear on people more now that there are different sized containers than the days when we tried one size fits all. There is a danger in putting extra large gear on small people and small main/reserves on large people. If you have one size fits all gear, it's probably adjusted before each jump. I've seen gear on a tiny 80lbs girl on J7 (large as large can be) and the harness adjusted so that when she exited unstable and had her canopy deploy when she was upside down the gear stayed on. Don't let anyone scare you about falling out the "hole" either. That gear is touching your butt, not half way up your back (small containers with big harness' have the biggest hole, not big containers with the harness adjusted small.) Now, I have not seen you or your body (no I'm not being creepy!) so if you have concerns, make sure you get a good gear check from the instructor/jump master before you board the aircraft. Finally, as for the gear slipping off the shoulders, when I land, I can slip student gear off me with out loosening anything....and I'm 5'11" and 200lbs. Of course, there is nothing better than properly fitting sport gear! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Bill, Just because the evidence doesn't support your belief, does not mean that the evidence is wrong. You have not had a reserve RSL deployment in the 2 sec. range that Jumpshack has (outside of the skyhook). As you have said, it is hard to get (I will assume a vector) opening under 3 sec when properly packed. I have spoken to Jumpshack who have told me that the Racer in the 2 sec. deployments have been packed according to the manual. So here is the crux. Either the Racer is faster or Jumpshack is lying. Are you going to tell me that Jumpshack is lying? Or that you don't know how they get such fast openings. Those are the only two options. You have to pick one. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

My Bad, The vid isn't on the site so I can't give you a link. My claim that there is a .97 to line stretch video cannot be proved right now, I'll concede that. But anecdotally, there is one that we timed with the vid editing software. If you don't believe it, that's ok. C'mon Bill, I expect far more from you on this! What keeps the slider up? Descent Velocity. The slider comes down when the spread of the canopy is strong enough to overcome the force of the air keeping the slider up. If the system is descending to slow to give enough spread to force the slider down, the system must accelerate. For example, the skyhook will get the canopy out of the bag while the body is moving relatively slow. If the system is descending fast, there is more force keeping the slider up than the spread of the canopy can over come. The system must slow down for the spread of the canopy to overcome the slider. There is an ideal range of descent velocity for deployment. Imagine a bell curve. If the canopy is deployed within that range (like the cutaway from an open canopy) you'll get a quick inflation. Anything outside that range will not complete deployment until the conditions are met. Take a look, the slider is up in all those videos. If Jumpshack wanted to make line stretch faster, they would use the smallest reserve they could find to make line stretch quicker. Making a claim that Jumpshack obviously fixed the results to misrepresent their product is liable. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Not true, activation to line stretch is .97 secs. The video is real, the deployment has been timed with a frame count (cutaway to line stretch) I don't have any vid to say what the Vector line stretch time is so I'll go by your more than ample knowledge of your product. Vector line stretch is 1.5 sec, with skyhook .5 sec. But believe the vid. The one I saw had .97 sec to line stretch. That is less than 1/2 a sec difference from the skyhook equiped rig. Geez, less than 1/2 a sec ain't much and I was agreeing with you! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

You're right Bill, in the video I just looked at, there wasn't even 1/2 second difference between the skyhook opening time and the Racer opening on their website. (And that was freezing the video and counting the frames). I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

The post was probably written with the layman in mind but yes, the results show coefficient of drag. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

It would be pretty bad form to slag the other manufacturers products by name publicly in an open forum. Nancy is a manufacturer, not an average jumper who can just blast opinions on the net. Nancy has shown professionalism by just saying that their PC had a higher Coefficient of drag than other PCs tested. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Sound like the recommendation of every Canadian inquiry I've ever read. Still no regs..... I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Yeah, just tell them you have a rigging question and they zip you straight over to the right person. By the way, don't go be the length someone else has on their bag even if it'ds the same size container. You never know if it's the right one or not. Different containers have different size stoes and I've seen mixing and matching before. I once had a container come in with a safety stoe 4 inches too long! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

A DZ without upjumpers is like a man without a penis. Useless! I'm always stunned when I hear the stories of DZOs chasing off Upjumpers (even when I go to other DZs, I've been made to feel like just a hunk of meat filling a slot). Maybe I just appreciate them more because I'm in such a small market. I see what happens to a DZ when there are very few Up jumpers around. If a DZO sleeps in, the operation keeps going. If the upjumpers sleep in, it grinds to a painful halt! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

This is the last place you want to find that type of info. You need to call Sunpath and you need to get a master Rigger to make it for you. Sunpath's # is 813 782 9242 You gotta get it from the horse's mouth! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

I've got 14 Flight concepts Mantas 11 Skymasters 2 Firebolts 3 Elite 425s 1 PD Sabre 5 Golden Rings! 4 Calling birds 3 french hens 2 turtle dove And a manta stuck in a tree! But personally, I use a Firebolt Hey Sid, How hard was that opening the other day anyway? I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

There are a few things to consider when thinking about Tandems and small DZs 1.) Tandems have created their own demand. - years ago people called the DZ to do a first jump no matter what it was, now, thanks to media exposure, they call to do a tandem. This means small DZs must offer them to maintain studnets. 2.) Tandems increase the requirements for instructors - Small DZs once relied on fun jumpers in the community for staff and support. Tandems have created to large a chasm between funjumper and instructor. The old small DZ model is breaking down. 3.) TIs expect more compensation - When you consider the age of someone who has put in the time to become a TI, you find many who require a higher wage for their time. If Tandems do not pay enough to fulfill their needs, they will work elsewhere or view tandems as "not worth the hassle". 4.) A career TI will go where the money is - A small DZ cannot support fulltime professional staff. That leaves the Parttime TI who usually has a fulltime job of his own and only comes on weekends. This type of jumper has low availability, concentrating the tandem demand and making burnout much more likely. I think that in the future, a new small DZ model must arise or else DZs will boil down to a few large DZs that can achieve economies of scale by concentrating demand, instructors and airpower. That means that many smaller markets will be underserviced with only small clubs or lowcost outhouse operations surviving. In Canada, where jump aircraft are highley regulated, it could mean the obliteration of skydiving in small markets altogether. Currently, there are areas in Canada where the nearest canadian DZ is 8-10 hours away and it may only get worse. In small markets it is a true catch 22. The market wants a product that doesn't work with the traditional small DZ model. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

You're right, there are many things that make up a good instructor. Instructors develop in two basic ways, style and technique. A good instructor will be well balanced in both. While techinique can be taught (get stable before drogue, demonstrate landing pattern, have student pull/steer etc.)style is developed as the TI matures as an instructor. Style developement is very dependent on personality and attitude. My reference was more that a small instructor pool limits your options in staffing and the prohibitive nature of the rating weins out some of the potentially good instructors before they have a chance to develop. Another thing I alluded to is the fact that even good instructors will not perform at their best when they get overworked and burnt out. I feel my own quality of instruction begins to diminish. I don't talk to them as much in the plane, I become robotic in my instruction and I have less "after jump" interaction as the day wears on and more tandems are geared and ready to go. Getting a rating does not a good instructor make. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

It's more the requirements of the manufacturers. CSPA just posted what their minimums are but manufacturers have their own. Also, CSPA doesn't issue the rating, that is still the perview of the manufacturer. Racer, Sigma and Strong all require a D as far as I know. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

Excellent point. Tandems allow for a demographic shift. I has allowed to maintain skydiving's appeal in the aging boomer market. Tandems have also provided skydiving with a product that has a greater appeal to the female market. Female participation is double than that of the IAD system. What I think that we as DZOs and instructors need to do is take advantage of the individuals who walk onto the DZ to make a tandem. DZs spend thousands on marketing that mostly reaches people who would never jump. Once we come face to face with people who would jump, we need to be ambassadors for the sport. We shouldn't be hauling meat, we should be introducing future skydivers to the sport. You're on the money with the importance of good TIs. The First jump course allowed for a bond between the student and instructor over the course of the day. Now a TI must bond with a student in a relatively short period of time. Combined with the pressure of a busy day when it's hot and humid and we are asking alot of our TIs. Because Tandems have higher requirements, the TI pool is too small in some markets to ensure the cream of the crop. It also puts more pressure on the few that are TIs. These are the challenges that the tandem market trend has placed on smaller markets. Customers now expect tandem service and the small DZ needs to find a way to make it work. I don't believe the answer is marketing to the general populace (although that is crucial for success) but rather focusing on retaining jumpers that are walking through the door with service, community representation and goal setting. As for Skyride ... Skyride does very little for promotion. They do not direct people to skydiving through advertising, they skim internet traffic that is already in existence, usually in existence because of the positive word of mouth coming from the local DZs. Also it takes something like 6-8 good experiences to counter the word of mouth from 1 bad experience (there's a stat about it somewhere). With Skride's reputation for bad experience, I don't see Skyride as helping the sport in any way. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

The situation at smaller DZs, especially those in small markets like Canada, would contradict some of what you posted. The folks that would get hooked also would do so on static line. The folks that just checked it off their list are what is increased by tandem and their retention is infinitesimal. In Manitoba, the years we had the highest participation and retention, we offered only IAD with gradual progression and offered absolutely no tandems. In the summer, we would have classes of 40-60 that could be trained and dispatched by 2 instructors. I once did 85 IADs in one day. It is simply not possible to move that many tandems with that small an instructor base. Air power was maximized, instructors were maximized and the operation was incredibly efficient. Tandems cost far more per student to do reducing the amount of profit per jumper. ($25-$35 less at our DZ with our plane other dzs may disagree) Our wing mounted camera that could get great pics and video on IADs doesn't have the same appeal. This means that extra sales are not being realized. Sending a 182 with a camera guy and a tandem can waste a slot, slows down the operation (could be doing 2 tandems on that load) and the camera guy needs to be paid. The video ends up costing more to the customer and the DZ makes less. There are now also less videos being sold/shown to friends. The vidoe guy also must be highly experienced for safety and quality of work. Staffing requirements have greatly increased. An instructor now needs 500 jumps minimum and a D license. That is why in the entire province of Manitoba, there are only 4 TMs to service 2 DZs. That means the poor TIs have to get burned out every year trying to fill the demand. This means a poorer quality of service to the student. The increased requirements also mean that jumpers have to do far more jumps before they can be instructors. Here is where we are losing jumpers! The life span of a jumper in Canada is usually 3 years. Because we have a 6 month season and mainly weekend jumping in Manitoba, a jumper at best will generally do 25-50 the first year, 100 the second and a 100 the third. That means a really gung-ho jumper in Canada has only 225-250 jumps before he starts to drift from the sport (based on 15 years of observation). There was a time when that would be the perfect number to make someone a JM or FJC instructor, given them new goals and retaining them a few more years but now, tandem JM is still a few years away. They end up leaving between the B and C license. Now other stuff you said I would absolutely agree with, especially in the US at larger DZs where the economies of scale can change the costs associated. In that case, the first jump process is simplified by not needing a radio controller, there are far fewer injuries with tandems than solos, they justify larger aircraft (IADs are a cluster fuck out of an otter!) But believe me when I tell you that in my neck of the woods, Tandems make us less efficient, reduce the pool of up jumpers (by making instructing more prohibitive), burn out the few that are TMs (I'm one of the four and I also do the rigging, answer the phones and run the DZ), and greatly reduce profits that can threaten the life of the DZ. And I have a feeling that small northern DZs even in the US may be feeling it too. Tandems truly are a double edged sword and the DZ owner must create new ways of operating to address the problems that Tandems bring. It is certainly time for DZOs to address the problems creatively because Tandems are here to stay. And if anyone knows how to solve all these problems, please let me know! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

The FXC 12000 has, like any AAD, limitations. First, activation is recomended a min of 1500' above the set altitude. That means 2500' if you have it set at 1000' I advise jumpers with FXC 12000s to activate higher incase of a burble or hard/missed pull. (3000'-3500' depending on how consistant their activation is.) Second, the unit will do what it's designed to do if maintained. That means it will fire when it measures a 64 fps decent through the set altitude and it can't tell the difference between freefall and a spiral. But as Brant said, not as big a concern with a large main canopy. We have student 260s with fxc 12000 and I haven't seen them fire in a spiral. Finally, the required factory service on the 12000 is every 2 years. The turn around time is 90 days so you may have to time it with southern invasions

Well, AFIAK, RWS doesn't own the patent for the magnetic covers, they are just paying to use it. Now here's the thing I don't get, you can't patent use! If you could, I could patent using water to wash with and make millions! The magnetic riser covers use regular magnets manufactured at a variety of places. They just put them into their yoke and covers. I'm sure they are paying Atair because it's cheaper than fighting a law suit even if Atair hasn't a hope of winning. A patent on Magnet use would be like a patent on velcro use or tucktab use (note that it is use and not design which would be an infringement) If RWS bought the patent, they're nuts! The other day I was in the Fossil Factory outlet in St. Augustine. They had wallets, cases and boxes which all used magnets a closure. It's been around for years. Ant patent lawyers out there? I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.