JaapSuter

Can't wait to come visit...

Bored? , holds breath

Damn dude, impressive... Glad to hear you're okay. See you at BD, right?

Mmm, let me think... 1. Risk management 2. High stress situations 3. Gear knowledge required 4. Non-participants wondering why we do it 5. Exploring new boundaries of where we can go and what we can do I am incredibly excited about this merge. Climbing gives me what I once hoped skydiving could. Bringing some climbing spirit back into skydiving would be a good thing. Congratulations to the Dropzone and Rockclimbing management!

Actually, it's over 900 on the canopy and close to 400 on the lineset. Last time that canopy was jumped, over five months ago by me, it was flying really well. Since then, it's been in a little box, packaged up and stored in a dry place. I can't explain the fluttering, but I do recall talking to my rigger about a new lineset. I won't need it anymore though; these days canopies that small scare me. Anybody want to buy a Sabre 170? Flutters great! I'll be back... soon.

Avenfoto is da man. Thanks!

Hey, Are there any artistic BASE jumpers that can help me design a logo for a BASE related website? I also need some guidance on finetuning a CSS file to fit the current skin with the logo. Can't offer money, but consider it a favour to the BASE community. Email me if you have questions or would like to help out. Thanks, Jaap

Hey, I'm looking for an artist to help me design a simple skydiving/base related logo for a yet-to-be-published website. Site is not personal nor for profit. Let's just say it's a community website. Can't offer money. Can offer credit and eternal fame. You'd be doing it because you enjoy being an artist, and like to contribute to the skydiving and base community at large. If you have a portfolio or web-samples somewhere and would like to help out, please drop me an email and I will elaborate. Emails from non-artists or those without a portfolio will be ignored. Sorry, no time. Thanks, Jaap Suter

They're on their way since last week. Send a PM to Russel if you want the full story. Indirectly though, you're welcome to blame Abbie. And yeah, I'm lazy too. Anyway, I got some pictures people, thanks!

Hi, I'm looking for a high resolution photo of the Perrine bridge, portrait layout, no jumpers or other people on it; preferably 4 megapixels or higher. Willing to pay money. Please send me an email if you can help me. Thanks, Jaap Suter

Just wanted to point out that I used such a PC at the Perrine, and it didn't inflate until 4 seconds after my pitch. That may have been combined with a sloppy-throw (although witnesses say my throw was fine) and a poor PC packing technique (although this is the technique that Vertigo taught at one point), but there is certainly not sufficient data to support the notion that such PCs will always inflate on time once airspeed is built up.

Well that certainly explains this incident. I distinctively remember asking Tom and Tedd about the pilotchute fabric when I received my gear and we all agreed it felt sticky and too thick. Tom Aiello pointed this out in this post. I do not blame Vertigo or Apex for this. This is an experimental sport where the only person responsible for the jumpability of their gear is the jumper himself. I took a risk when I decided to use that PC anyway. It is up to me to deal with the consequences. I am very happy that this notice has been brought forward. I've always had a nagging feeling that there was more to my incident than the Dead Jaap Pack and this certainly confirms this. Do not use these pilotchutes! The post above says the pilot chute inflates normally once a little airspeed builds up, but I am now convinced that in the right context this material could lead to bigger problems. Again, do not use these pilotchutes, unless you want to see the ground approach faster than usual. Thanks Apex. p.s. I know I'm not posting on these forums anymore, but since I believe this was a large contributor to my near fatal incident, I take this more personal.

Warning, this post has drama in it... Hey everybody, the time for me has come to move on. I will be spending my energy on other things. These forums have been a great help for me and I met many great friends through it. I have recently received some PMs and emails from different people asking for BASE related advice. Given that I only have 63 jumps, I hesitate to give advice and prefer to forward them to more experienced jumpers. I realize these emails are probably prompted by my writing style which occasionally suggests that I know what I am talking about. I do not. I'm lucky to be alive still. Changing my writing style is not an option. Lurking or occasional posting is not possible either. There is too much bullshit -not all of it bad- on these forums to be able to remain passive. So I'm going cold turkey. I've done this before in other online communities. I join the group, frantically post-whore for a while and then move on to other things in life. Thanks everybody. I had a great time here, and I hope that other students like myself will be able to learn as much from these forums as I did. To all of you; please drop me an email if you're ever in the neigbourhood. I always have a place to stay for anybody, and if you bring a rig I'll have some objects too. And remember; the risk in BASE is not the object nor the ground. The real risk is your mind. This sport is not about whether or not a particular jump is safe. This sport is about whether or not a particular jump is within your comfort zone. If that means sub-150ft freefalls, go for it! Make sure you really understand your comfort zone, and don't let your friends pressure you into growing it. Then, have the BASE knowledge and experience to asses a jump and classify it as a go; or no go. So goodbye to bits and bytes. See you all in real life. Safe jumps! Jaap p.s. I won't be reading this thread or checking PMs. I can be reached on base@jaapsuter.com.

I'm not sure if my message came across, but just to clarify; I'm a big fan of putting in blood sweat and tears before you jump instead of afterwards; be it the hike to the top, or the work to save money and do a course. If you're willing to use debt to finance your BASE career, are you also going to apply for a loan from your luck bucket? I once succumbed and increased my credit-card limit to finance a BASE trip. It was rewarding and I don't regret it. But those trips that I worked for beforehand were always better trips.

What jumpgroup are you in?

Think of it this way; hiking before the jump is more rewarding than after the jump.

edit to remove pedophelia references ~TA

Nevermind Abbie, he's just doing his greased up thing. Hop, hop, heuh!

I just realized that this quote in isolation can be interpreted differently than intended. Feel free to hijack this thread to make me laugh! Advice is still welcome. Cheers, Jaap

Mister Dry Faster Than You Heal didn't want to decapitate the excited four-year old that came running towards him on the beach, so instead he decided to demonstrate his poor canopy skills by landing eight feet away from the shore in the water. Little did he know that lake contained the muddiest and sandiest water on the face of this planet. So now I'm stuck with a rig that is not only wet, but also has shitloads of fine-grained salt in it. This salt is totally fucking with my canopy putting it much closer to its death. I have a bathtub, a showerhead, two people and a sunny roofdeck where I can shake out and dry a canopy. Does anybody have any suggestions for best dealing with this? I just spend some time in the shower trying to get the sand out but there's not a lot of room so it's not working very well. I got most of it out. My current plan is to let it dry, then shake it out completely, then fully rinse it out one more time, and let it dry and jump the crap out it. Better suggestions?

Awesome work! I have full confidence that if anybody was going to handle an offheading the best way possible it would be you or your brother. Any chance you can upload the video?

I'm afraid so. Because one of his students is a pussy or because one of his students is still alive? Seriously though, I think somebody told me that landing area has recently gotten smaller due to some added wiring. Not sure if that's true, but either way I considered it a heads-up landing area that was going to require some concentration. It's pretty small, and there's wires and fences all around it. Having only ever done one TARD before, and having my head fucked with because I was stupid enough to have my bottom pin come out, I decided walking down was the wiser choice. I didn't have enough TARD experience to garantuee a solid onheading launch. There's always tomorrow, Jaap p.s. All of the above is just politically correct mumbo jumbo. What I'm really trying to say is that there wasn't enough peer-pressure to push me into doing something stupid. Too bad. It could have made great video.

Faber brings up an important point that bears repeating. The force required to lift a packed canopy out of the container is surprisingly large, often larger than the force required to pop the pins. This is especially true when you jump larger canopies in the 300 range. We use 80 pound breakcord on static-line jumps not to pop our pins, but to deal with the sudden shockload when it starts lifting your canopy out of the packtray.

We can shake hands. We had a terrible night last night. We ended up visiting four objects. The first one had police cars patrolling the area. The second one had a bunch of union-people striking 24 hours on our landing area. On the third one my bottom-pin came lose just as I was putting on my rig, causing my entire canopy to fall out, forcing me to climb down. On the fourth one, we managed to get two people off but the third primed his velcro too much causing his packjob to come out too. It was a rather embarrassing experience and we probably should have aborted the night sooner because after the first two objects our heads were not in the right place.

I've tried it once, but I was too careless with my bottom-pin, causing my entire packjob to fall out as I was putting on my rig. Very embarrassing... Fortunately that gave me the perfect excuse to climb down the freestander, walk over to the bridge, and TARD it.