pilotdave

I always recommend 200 jumps. But nobody listens to me because an electronic logbook is almost as important as a gopro camera. So I recommend setting the breakoff and pull alarms 100 feet low. If they hear the beep and haven't already acted, they weren't altitude aware. Dave

Thank god for those legstraps... for keeping your shorts in place!

Never seen a shoe or blanket used, but those noodle pool toys seem to work well. Well, we used a blanket when the door of the caravan was removed for a weekend in october... but only in standard blanket style. Dave

We brought in a helicopter 2 weekends ago. After looking at the skids, we decided that hanging would not be allowed. This video proves we made the right choice! In our case it was hose clamps holding skid shoes to the bottoms of the skids. The pilot said that next time they can turn them around or take them off. Thanks for sharing. Dave

http://www.xfootage.com/index.htm. Dave

Here's pics from one jump a couple years ago... into the start of a motocross race. Dave

Because... parachutes are ultralights bra- of course, it is a "two occupant" vehicle. but that makes it an illegally operated light sport aircraft. (Tandem skydives and tandem PG flying both have FAA waivers/special certifications) Ummm, no. Base jumpers are not ultralights. If they were, all night base jumps in the US would violate the FARs. The FAA has no authority over base jumpers. But then again, why wouldn't skydivers also be considered ultralights? Night jumps would be illegal per FAR 103 and legal per FAR 105. The simple answer is that skydivers are not ultralights, they are skydivers. And base jumpers aren't covered by the FARs. Dave

What do tandem base jumps have to do with ultralights? Dave

Packing is another reason. It can be easier to learn to pack on a canopy where at least the center cell is a different color. Dave

13 jumps. 8 helicopter jumps on saturday, then an AFF, a 3-way for a student's 25th jump, and an RW video at sunset. Then a couple tandem videos on sunday before we got weathered out. Yes, I said 8 helicopter jumps. Bell JetRanger. It was awesome. Dave

I hate to argue semantics, but I just don't see this as a misfire. If I pulled low and was snivelling in cypres fire territory, I wouldn't want it to fire. But if it did, it sure wouldn't be a misfire. Whether we wanted it to fire or not doesn't define whether its a misfire or not. Just because nobody believed a working canopy could descend fast enough to make a cypres fire doesn't mean it shouldn't have fired. It absolutely should have because the advertised firing parameters were met. While it was wrong for airtec to advertise that it couldn't happen, it was Adrian's responsibility, as someone pushing the limits of what was possible, to decide for himself whether or not it was safe to use a cypres. I can think of a bigway organizer that doesn't use an AAD because he is aware that his normal jumping could likely have him in AAD firing range. And in this case I'm talking about pull altitude. But he realized that for himself, an AAD could be more likely to cause harm than save his life. A swooper pushing 70+ mph in a swoop better be thinking similarly. Dave

When an AAD fires in an aircraft that isn't descending within the firing parameters, it's always a misfire. That includes a pressurized aircraft or a door opening inadvertently. There are plenty of documented cases of those happening with the vigil. I can think of at least one incident of a cypres firing during climbout, but it was a defective unit that did not pass the startup test. Adrian Nicholas' cypres did not misfire. He met the actual firing parameters in terms of descent rate and altitude. A misfire may occur when firing parameters are met based on pressure... but clearly AADs other than the vigil seem to do a much better job of detecting these erroneous speed/altitude calculations and prevent them from firing. I've also seen a vigil 1 misfire on a tandem (under a good canopy at 1500 feet flying straight)... which was never explained by AAD. Soon after it happened they came out with the warning about using vigils in warm temperatures. I'd never suggest the cypres or any other AAD is perfect. But I believe that the firing logic in the vigil does not do an adequate job of validating the raw data or the calculated parameters. What it does in a pressurized aircraft on the ground is an absolutely perfect example. It detects a sudden descent with no climb and fires. That's just scary. Dave

I can't believe that you still believe that. I can't believe after all the misfires that you still stand by this product and its design philosophy. I wonder what you'll say when the Vigil 3 (or 4 or 5) comes out with arming and firing parameters more like the cypres. It's become very clear that arming below firing altitude is a very bad idea, and I'm willing to bet that AAD has realized that by now. That's pretty much the opposite of much of what you're saying. You can't forget it because it might just be trying to kill you... such as when the door opens by accident at 400 feet. Like you said, its important to read the AAD manual and understand its limitations and its idiosyncrasies. It's much easier to just forget about an AAD that tends to NOT fire when it gets confused than one that is likely to fire when it sees an errant pressure spike. Dave

Beat me too... I'm at 2070 and am still waiting for that first one. Hope I do as well as you!

I don't care about cheap jumps but I'd love to know where I can find the DZ with all these services!

My freaknsuits camera jacket has swoop cords. Dave

Here's what a biplane looks like. Imagine if the jumper cut away his main as it was configured in the first picture. MAYBE it would clear his reserve, but it's very likely it would release and immediately catch on the reserve. This particular jumper didn't follow USPA's guidelines... he shifted the main over into a side-by-side/downplane to clear it away from the reserve and cut away with no problem. Don't try this at home. Dave

Connecticut Parachutists, Inc. is bringing in a Bell 206 JetRanger helicopter on September 11th, 2010. The JetRanger holds up to 4 jumpers. We'll be exiting at around 5000 feet. The helicopter will arrive at about 9am and stay until nobody wants to jump it anymore. Dave

Just read rumored prices... $1400 for the 8-15... $11,000 for the 400mm. I think I'll pass on both.

Here's the equation: Total Time = (# jumps x 55s) + (# jumps x 240s). It will generate the answer to within .002 seconds. Is that enough accuracy? Just kidding of course. There's really too many variables to come up with anything useful. What do you need it for? Jumper mass, wind speed, and aircraft airspeed aren't really needed. Body position (jump type) on the other hand would be critical unless the jumper only likes to do one thing. And same with canopy type, unless the jumper always uses the same canopy. Dave

Skyride is about making a profit by any means necessary. The DZ is about jumping. Two different businesses... owned by the same scum. Dave

Other DZs could afford to lower their prices if their owners profited by lying, cheating, and stealing too. Dave

Well, you proved me wrong. I had to pull out my PC1000 and try it. Sure enough, it worked. With Vegas, capturing via USB was no problem at all. It gave me a warning afterward that dropped frames were detected, but the video plays back just fine... same as a firewire capture. Guess there are about 1000 threads on this site that need to be updated... Dave

Your answers I'm SURE are always 100% technically correct... but often way off the point. Do you know of a way to capture video from an HC62 with USB that will match the quality of a capture with firewire? And don't go pointing me to some $20,000 device they use in studios or something. You're hung up on the word "uncompressed" and nobody else is. We get it... that AVI file we create when we capture from MiniDV cameras is compressed. That's got nothing to do with the guy's question. He wants to know why his videos are more compressed than they need to be. Obviously it's because he's capturing with USB, not firewire. Simple answers... we're simple people. Dave

I'm no wind tunnel expert (though I once operated a mach 2 wind tunnel), but I doubt any research wind tunnels are ever made to purposely have turbulent air. Turbulence is just variation in wind velocity. Wind tunnels are designed to minimize this. Purposely creating turbulent air will just make it harder to make accurate measurements. On the other hand, some wind tunnels will use vortex generators on the walls to create a turbulent boundary layer, preventing flow separation where the tunnel expands (behind the test section). But just before the test section, flow straightening devices and netting are used, along with a sudden contracting section, to minimize turbulence in the flow inside the test section. Real freefall happens through "steady" air. Sure, there's turbulence, but the variation in wind velocity is very small compared to the speed of the object falling through the air. To simulate that in a wind tunnel that does 65 mph, you'd need very tiny variation in wind velocity. So in other words, I think you'd best simulate freefall by smoothing the flow as much as possible. Dave