pilotdave

I have had some weird behavior from my droid's alarm... but at least it always goes off. In theory, a dismiss/snooze popup should come up. Hitting dismiss should shut it off. You can also change the side button behavior to dismiss the alarm...but i find that dangerous so i make my side buttons snooze so i dont shut my alarm off by accident. If the popup doesn't come up, you should get a snooze notification. Tapping it should either disable the alarm or bring up the popup that lets you disable it. I knew I was going to have trouble with the alarm from my first time playing with a droid in the store... I use my phone as my alarm clock every day, so it was the first thing i tried in the store. The verizon employee took a long time to figure out how to shut the alarm off after i set it. Dave

My opinon is just different from yours. I think you're doing it backwards. The camera is an AMAZING tool for coaches. You said you wear a camera specifically to help your friends improve. Why not your students? If you're not ready to be a videographer, you're not ready to jump a camera. It's that simple. You're adding the camera when you're trying something new. You should be leaving the camera on the ground for those jumps and (if you're ready for a camera) adding it when you can put it to good use. Dave

What settings do you change on a cloudy day vs a sunny day? My settings are pretty much manual focus and wide angle on. I don't change anything based on lighting conditions or lens choice. Dave

You said you'd be there monday. You weren't there so I threw it out. Was that wrong?? Just kidding, I have it. I'm being very careful with it... it's dryed out from lack of use and falling apart. I recommend storing it in a climate controlled, low oxygen environment until you start using it more often. Dave

Really? You couldn't imagine following USPA's recommendations because it would take a whole year? You've got a nice reason for wanting to jump a camera, but it's not such a nice reason to ignore recommendations. I haven't heard that nice a reason for jumping a camera early from anyone yet... which is why I'd fully support a camera flying BSR. I waited until I had 700 jumps to put on a camera. And that took me almost 8 years. I never thought about the disservice I was doing to my friends by waiting so long to video them.

Bet ya just loved the 206s! I still haven't figured out why door-open takeoffs were perfectly fine when EVERYONE was by the door but not ok with a caravan or otter. Dave

I started my weekend 2 days early, but... 26 jumps, much beer owed... and paid for. Spent thursday and friday doing CRW. Went from 2-ways thursday afternoon to a 9-way friday morning and 16-way by the evening. Didn't quite complete the 16-way but I docked 14th and almost got wrapped by a friend trying to dock next to me. Scary stuff but so much fun. Then back to normal jumping sat-mon... some AFFs, wingsuits, RW, a high pull, a hybrid, and a tandem video. Haven't jumped so much in a long time... and my arms are still sore from the CRW! Dave

I replied a while back. Basic argument was that the stilleto is a terrible choice if more time to make decisions is what you're looking for. Dave

You mean replies like the one below, describing your reason for choosing the Stilleto? You make your decisions based on your own limited experience. People with far more experience are suggesting that you've been drawing some incorrect conclusions. You choose to ignore them. That's fine... it's your choice. But I just hope you realize that these people are actually trying to keep you from getting hurt by educating you on why your ideas might be flawed. Dave

Went out of business 3-4 years ago or so. I don't know any details but if I remember correctly they had airplane issues that shut them down for a while before they closed down permanently. Dave

http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=16326;#16326 (May 15, 2001) I registered just to reply to a post about my website... or actually FTP server... which eventually became SkydivingMovies.com. In that thread someone referred to me as "pilotdave from rec.skydiving" so I knew what username I had to choose when I registered. "pilotdave" came from an email address I was using JUST for rec.skydiving to avoid getting spam in my real email. Dave

I agree. I think I can do a pretty good job of judging altitude by eye at my home DZ a lot of the time, it's easy to fool the eyes too. I remember one really clear day a couple years ago at another DZ where my 4-way team was training. I was the video guy. Now the entire team had visual and analog altimeters so the chance of me ending up low was... low. But I try to keep an eye on where I'm at, and I can't really look at my altimeter without screwing up the video for a little bit. Well on a really clear day, everything on the ground just looked so close. There was at least a few jumps where I was convinced we were LOW from looking at the ground behind the team. We were still at 7000 feet or something. On a hazy day, maybe the opposite will happen and we'll appear higher than we are. The thing is, most experienced skydivers can judge altitude pretty well under the right circumstances. I could do a better job if I could look around, out at the horizon, etc. But the truth is that we don't always have the chance to do that. If you're on an RW jump turning a million points, you can't stare off in the distance to judge altitude. Everyone on a 4-way team might be awesome judges of altitude by eye... but I swear some teams would go in turning points if all their audibles failed at once. Dave

Nope, not Keith. Don't happen to know who it is, but Keith didn't compete in CRW in 2008... he was doing 4-way video. I have no shortage of pics of him though! Dave

I use an audible and agree... but I think that it's important to develop good habits early on. Those that get audibles at 30 jumps and set them 500 feet high to warn them that breakoff is coming are not doing themselves any favors at all. Dave

I completely disagree about the function of a coach. Coaches teach. They teach parts of first jump courses and categories E-H. They also decide if the student met the criteria of the jump and can move to the next jump/category. Coaches don't normally break off... thats the student's job. The coach just watches. ISP Category G: The coach is a safety backup. You could argue that the coach isn't responsible, since it says right there not to rely on the coach. But that's like saying an AFF instructor isn't responsible for pulling a student because students are trained to pull for themselves. Coaches are just kind of allowed to suck. D-licensed jumpers are allowed to jump with students, but not allowed to perform the functions of a coach. Coaches are more than jump buddies. Ok, you did say glorified. I think the coach program is poorly implemented at a lot of dropzones. Maybe that's how you came to your opinion on it. But under the ISP, coaches take on a lot of responsibility and perform a valuable service to students... when implemented properly. Dave

Is that the minimum or is that reality? In my experience, coaches do gear up students, train them for their jumps, perform 3 gear checks for every jump, choose exit order, help teach spotting and ensure the student's spot is safe, offer hand signals, signal breakoff if needed, and talk students in on radio. While coach jumps are conducted under the supervision of an instructor, coaches have huge responsibility. Both in terms of keeping students safe and teaching them effectively so the students get their money's worth. I'd rather see someone with 100 jumps put on a huge camera with a VCR strapped to their chest than perform a half-assed coach jump. Dave

Not from me. I never understood that one. Who says there's a proper sequence? If the canopy opens, I'm not complaining.

Just for the record, I was kidding! I know they're all riggers too... how else are they going to make the next round of competition after a wrap?!

Now don't go confusing the issue with CRW rigs. They're in their own world! At the 2008 USPA nationals I noticed some of them seemed to be jumping a hybrid setup... pilot chute in a BOC, but pullout pin to open the container. Actually ripcord cable from the PC to the closing loop if I remember correctly. But look at the attached photo and decide if you want to take gear advice from those guys. Dave

I'm not too bothered by your canopy choice. You're not a student and you're not jumping anything that's stupid aggressive. But your reasoning for choosing that canopy is, in my opinion, really naive and ignorant. And I don't mean either of those in a bad way. Simply put, you're uninformed and trying to figure out what's best for you on your own without understanding what's really important. If you flew your stilleto side by side with your identical twin flying a sabre2 at the exact same size and wingloading, I don't think you'd see a whole lot of difference when it comes to angle of descent. Maybe the stilleto will glide a little shallower, but we're not talking about any significant difference. In fact, your identical triplet sister could be flying a spectre between you and your brother and it wouldn't be all that much steeper. Not enough to change the amount of time you'll spend under canopy by any significant amount. In fact, if you're worried about having time to make decisions, you chose an absolutely terrible canopy because it has a much higher likelihook of spiralling out of the sky on opening. Being more responsive, it'll give you less time to react when you need to and it'll be less forgiving when you screw up. Maybe I'm wrong, but if you had a complete conversation with PD about your reasoning for wanting a canopy with a shallow glide, I think they'd point you to a much more forgiving canopy. If you haven't done so already (or even if you have), sign up for a canopy course this summer. The Flight-1 canopy courses (available all over the country) teach techniques for getting back from a long spot. The whole idea there is to keep your canopy flying for as long as possible. You might find out that with 3/4 brakes, you could make a sabre2 fly 2-3 times as far as a stilleto in full flight. Dave

On a throwout rig, one way to get a horseshoe is when the container opens prematurely with the PC still in the pouch. That can't happen with a pullout. But there are other ways to get a horseshoe that are not eliminated. I'm not sure how much I like the idea of my PC inside my open container and my handle still in place compared to what i'd get with a BOC. Dave

People that use pullouts are more rare and more loyal than people that use racers. Now racers with pullouts... There may be nothing more rare in the entire sport.

That was the first thing I thought of when I read this. If you increase the area of the pilot without doing anything to the canopy, the wind will push the pilot farther forward, causing the centroid to move farther forward. Increasing the angle of attack. The opposite will happen (though in ordinary conditions I don't think it would make a noticeable difference), as it says in what you quoted above. When your canopy is flying through the air, a tailwind has no affect on how the canopy flies in relation to the air. Getting big with a tailwind or with a headwind will have the exact same effect. You will increase your drag, slowing you down. Your body will move back in relation to the canopy (usually very slightly) causing the canopy to steepen. We cannot use our bodies like sails. It doesn't make sense. Dave

We're always* flying into the RELATIVE wind. Getting big never helps. Hard to believe anyone is teaching a canopy course that can't grasp that concept. *ok, not ALWAYS... see attached.

I think it's funny that everyone is so afraid of getting their gear touched by anyone else. We all trust each other to know their gear is safe, but if they touch our own, it's the end of the world. What exactly do you think someone might do back there? I mean don't get me wrong, I don't need tandem students playing with my gear, but if a jumper with more experience than me decides there's something they feel the need to check out back there, I'm usually going to be ok with that. It's nice when they ask first, but in a loud jump plane things happen. This sport requires us to trust each other. When your pin falls out as you climb out, everyone else could pay the price. Every licensed skydiver SHOULD know how to give a gear check. You don't need to trust them all, but you should learn to trust some of em. Our gear is all about the same. Yours (not to anyone in particular) isn't special. Back on to the topic of this thread, its starting to look like we should be handing out gopros at first jump courses because everyone's going to have one soon enough. In my experience, most of the new jumpers using them don't even know the SIM has any recommendations for camera flying. I was just talking to an old timer with 2000+ jumps who's been in the sport forever. He told me he tried a gopro for a while just to get some inside video of his own jumps. He found it so distracting that he got rid of it. And yet everyone with 50 jumps doesn't get distracted at all. It's a miracle. Dave