pchapman

Yes and no. The shape is similar, both being on the front of the slider with a pocket. But the flag part can be a foot or two long, so that it physically covers up the nose cells at the beginning of opening. I have a huge one in my Parafoil and PD uses them in their Zero. The pocket is still part of it to add drag to the slider. In any case for this thread, a flag slider is just one of those things that could help... But doesn't really get at the root of the issue. Sounds like Precision could have done a better job with selling the canopy. While the customer is right, a company can use their experience to recommend what is really not recommended or tested. Very poor form to make one and then say they never build them like that... Jumper age is of course is a factor too. While one shouldn't get bruises from openings, I bet that twenty years on, openings all feel harder.

I kind of found that 2 pin containers didn't compress a pilot chute as well as a 1 pin. With the closing loop ends off to the sides of the pilot chute, it led to larger bending forces on the flaps on top. It was OK for less strong but decent PC's (eg, 357 Magnum) but when I tried putting a Vector PC into an old 2 pin, it really distorted the flaps. But a modern design would be better as it would be designed to take greater forces. A single pin with a loop through the middle of the PC anchors it a lot better in my opinion. It was the early Mirages that were 2 pins vertically? Just about the only 2 pin vertical design I recall. Maybe the fast openings that were mentioned, are due more to the relatively wide and non brick like containers of the time?

Fun fact(oid): The word "factoid" has also commonly started to be used to describe real facts, although sometimes trivial ones or ones presented in isolation without supporting evidence. Which does confuse the meaning of the word greatly.

I know the Evolution was like that. Dunno about others. Cascading was across the span not across the chord. Also, cascading hit every chamber not every second. So when pro packing there might be 10 A lines on each side. Combining that cascading with separate A and B risers, you could pull on the A riser and thus A lines only , and easily fold the nose under, causing the canopy to spin around. Lots of fun up high, but I guess you wouldn't want to accidentally yank a front riser down low, forgetting what canopy you were under. (I've still got a Super Evolution 140 I once picked up.)

On the way up in the plane, you should see it flash a small "Altitude" readout, every 7 seconds or something. That'll tell you that it is on. You'll also find that button presses on the ground do different things depending on whether it is On or Off. e.g, left button press gives the 1111 display if it is On, prompting you to go through the presses to bring up the full screen. But that's all from memory so I might have details wrong.

I don't know about the ISP ... but having handy little summaries of things to know or review sure are handy around the DZ. Not something every DZ has. Checklists are very useful for instructors too and not just students. Nice job. If one wants to be picky, there are those cases where what the student should know may vary by jump level. That could include Loss of Instructors or other things that a student should be taught sometime, but might be glossed over or omitted on the first couple jumps to avoid overwhelming them. Still it can work with your list -- an instructor might look at the Loss of Instructors entry and tailor his expectations to the student's level.

Strong had the "Z-po". ParaFlite had the "Turbo Z". To oversimplify slightly, just about any zero-p 9-cell canopy in those days was like a Sabre... although not a literal direct copy. You'd have to see how each opens and flies. My guess would still be to go for the Sabre if you expect to sell it again, as they are still known in the industry (and still kicking around DZ's) while the others are pretty much forgotten.

I can't answer your question specifically about an N3 on a wrist (I assume). You'd think someone else would have info. But spikes from changing angles of flight can happen, presumably especially when the device is more exposed to the airflow. I have a ProTrack on an external helmet mount, using an open clip. Every time I track off from a belly formation, it shows a spike to 160 mph vertically or similar. That clearly is an artifact and not a sign of horrible tracking. Your chart did show multiple spikes though, during what I guess is plain belly flying. It's messy enough that there's really no usable data left...

Ugliest pilot rigs I've seen: Rigs for a DZ's pilots that are just early 1980s skydiving rigs with round reserves, with the main pulled out and replaced by a cushion. Theoretically they get repacked each year, but I've got the feeling they are at the bottom of the priority list. Oldest pilot rigs: In 2002 I packed a '65 C-9 in an NB-8. Couldn't rip it in pull tests... so I packed it .... with the usual talk to the pilot about suggestions for something more modern. (It was 37 years old then. I've never had to use a reserve over 34 years old.) A couple years later there was a 28' Reliance canopy of unknown date in a military seatpack. Given the little I now know about Reliance from Poynters, maybe it was an even older canopy. Ugh. In recent years I've seen an old Security 150, or maybe worse, an Eddie Grimm copy of a Security 150. At least they are old enough not to have any mesh in the the vents, so there's no acid mesh issue....

Yeah, I've gone through various RSL threads lately.

It looks like the ring was a retrofit. (A close look at the stitching suggests that.) I'm guessing the rig first had a left side 'conventional' RSL retrofit, with an RSL ring -- over the normal pinned ripcord -- between the one ring and the end of the ripcord housing, and velcro added to a reserve riser. Then later the ring was made irrelevant, by putting on a figure-9 RSL / ripcord pin, and a ripcord that pulls the RSL, in typical Vector fashion. So to sum up again: It seems the small ring doesn't matter now. Lack of any big ring for the figure-9 RSL, means that while the design is incorrect for a Vector II, it is consistent with the design principles of the later Vector III RSL's.

For those with an interest in Cannonball Run type drives, there is the documentary film "32 hours 7 minutes", more or less about other records or attempts in the 2000's. It's out there on P2P.

Simple: I'm good with either method, but where AFF is good is that it allows that fraction of students with bigger stability issues to have the assistance of instructors in freefall, instead of trying to fix it entirely by themselves, jump after jump after jump with little progress. (And in AFF they have more time to work on stability per jump.) That said, AFF students do occasionally get stuck on a level for a number of jumps. Tunnel is even better for instructor involvement in teaching stability, although even that doesn't guarantee instant perfection in the sky.

Seeing a student's eyes is nice, but seems hardly essential. (It doesn't seem to be in the USPA Skydiver's Information Manual as far as I can tell, although not everything good is necessarily in that manual.) When instructing, I'm usually busy watching a student's arms and legs and torso and head. In AFF, it won't be until a few jumps down the road where an instructor is face to face with the student in freefall anyway. I guess Dave Lepka has pretty much pointed this stuff out already, but I'm still surprised at how uncompromising some DZ's are.

RSL velcro on the user's left side reserve risers. Edit: Since the modern Vector III doesn't have the guide ring and works in practice, and I have found a Bill Booth statement about how it was never necessary to have the guide ring (with a figure-9 pin and soft closing loop)... I guess I'll accept the configuration. (I do still wonder if a configuration like that might 'tow' for a moment when pulling at 90 degrees like some bag lock mals, before rotating the jumper and clearing...)

Except that this is a Vector II of a customer's that certainly doesn't have a Skyhook. But your comment does remind me to highlight how Skyhooks work: The Skyhook doesn't use a mechanism to direct the RSL pull direction, which overturns the old standard of having such a thing. E.g., the 'big ring' for the RSL to go through is removed (as the Skyhook isn't going to go through it) [Edit: emphasis added] So does that then imply that an older system configured with a figure-9 pin and no RSL directional control is safe after all?? Vector II with figure-9 pin RSL has the ring, modern Vector III with Skyhook or just RSL does not. [edit] But an older Vector III with an RSL has the old big ring, in which case the manual shows to use the RSL through the ring after all...

This isn't an Action Air RSL is it? Weren't they more conventional, with straight pin ripcord and RSL ring over the cable? And I think they were labelled. I'm wondering if the thing in the photo is more 'home made'? (The rig was in Lodi until recently. Without trying to be biased against them, strange things come from there. Last month I found a Raven that was there many years and never had the bartack bulletin done...) The pictured Vector uses the figure-9 pin on the RSL, with the loop end of the ripcord pulling the RSL pin. (That the reserve cable goes through or does not go through the small ring doesn't matter either way.) That's OK, but there's no big ring for the RSL. In a non-ideal cutaway going more head low, there's nothing to keep the RSL lanyard from trying to bend the pin, nothing to keep a good direction of pull on the RSL. Yuck? I'm not releasing this rig for use with the RSL unless I'm convinced otherwise. (Edit: I'm in Canada, so I don't have to care about TSOs specifically. But safety, yes.) [inline Vector_RSL_questioned.jpg]

Off topic: Hey, I thought it was in his cop show "Hunter". Not the most sophisticated of shows, but it worked for me when a teen.

Funny, I was doing the same, and saw this - see photo - on the guy ahead of me. Hardly a fatal error, but having a flipped through leg strap sure loads the harness webbing in a less than ideal way. Hard to spot with black harness on black clothing. At least for him, it was probably better that I as some random jumper caught it, than for him to get to the front of the line and have the Staff gear check guys spot it.

It is an interesting question: In the case of a Jav NJK with an OP 143 in it, is the owner a total idiot, or just someone who overstuffed the rig a little? And what of the original rigger? As a rigger you don't normally start looking up rig and canopy sizes before a repack. Indeed, if the original rigger were handed the reserve and rig and manuals, there would have been no guidance in there. I just had a look and sizing info for the Javelin isn't in the manual. One has to go online to find anything. Online, Sunpath mentions a 113-120 reserve for that rig, with the next larger sized rigs holding a 126 or more. Now the OP 143 is a low bulk canopy and PD says it packs roughly like a PD 126. But there's no law that says that since 126 > 120 so you can't pack it. And indeed a google search easily finds people on DZ.com comparing an OP 143 to a Tempo 120 or PD 113, although opinions certainly differ and some say that the OP 143 isn't that small at all! So on the one hand, it does sound like the canopy is probably bigger than what is recommended for the rig -- the rig is likely overstuffed (which means a lot when one is starting with a tiny rig). Some people say it would be, yet some more optimistic ones don't think it would be. On the other hand, there isn't anything clearly saying that the canopy combination is incorrect or disallowed or just plain evil. (Low bulk canopies aren't specifically mentioned in Sunpath's list.) In any case riggers are starting to pay more attention to how overstuffing affects functionality, and not just the brick factor, reserve shape, and ability to close flaps and tuck tabs. Note also irishrigger's point that the issue with reserve extraction force on this rig may relate to rig design at least as much as reserve sizing.

That's nice to know. I'll have to read up more on current best practices. ... Because balling up was mentioned a lot in publications in the old days. E.g., as a technique in the old Birdman BMI Checklist, or Phoenix Fly manuals as of 2005, or indeed in the currently available BPA Wingsuit Training manual (although 2nd in the list after 'diving out' of a spin).

Who knows. But I'm not going to get a tiny reserve just to match my tiny main. It is much more likely that I'll use my reserve alone, than have a two-out, so any mismatch is of lesser concern. Just my opinion.

I DON'T teach the ball. But I can see where the idea comes from: Instability can come from improper use of one's control surfaces. Balling up should neutralize the control surfaces, get them out of the way, "reset" everything, even if it might temporarily speed up any rotation and also increase the fall rate.

To get a newbie up to speed: That is a bit of a contentious issue that isn't much talked about. Every company says they have high drag pilot chutes. Most companies don't say anything else about their, or other companies' pilot chutes. One company owner, John Sherman, who made the comments on the video about another company's pilot chute, is more vocal about things and stirs things up. There are many including myself who disagree with some of the things he says, but he is willing to talk about things that other parachute system designers don't in public, so his opinions are worth hearing. Reserve pilot chutes vary in their size, weight, spring strength, spring length, fabric type, number of flaps they are stuck under, and proportion to which there is solid fabric vs. mesh (or open space) in the inlet to the pilot chute. You also get the same pilot chute for a given brand rig no matter whether your reserve is a 99 or 360. So there are many many variables to debate if one likes, and there's no big table online where one can go check the numbers. Some companies have pilot chute inlet area that isn't simply pretty much the bottom half of the pilot chute, but a smaller area than that. E.g. Sunrise/Wings, VSE/Infinity, UPT/Vector. I'm not sure of the full logic but those pilot chutes are accepted as perfectly normal in the industry. One justification is that the pilot chute will be spilling a lot of air anyway, so such a huge 'inlet' isn't required. Also possibly less oscillation if there's less air spilled. And if the pilot chute is bouncing around in a burble, more solid fabric may allow the pilot chute to catch air better when it is for example sideways to the air flow. As for exactly what the effects of varying inlet size on drag are, who knows, for not much is published. (Anyone know more specifically about the justifications used?) This thread has been more about making the rig not too tight to pull the reserve out at some angles, than worrying about exactly how much drag the pilot chute produces.

It was hardest for me to learn that I really needed to buy a weight belt to fall at the right speed (for someone tall and skinny). It wasn't a crutch but an essential tool that, if used earlier, would have prevented me from picking up bad RW habits and wasting time in freefall with others. Also, it was hard for me to learn to move less when maneuvering in RW -- my legs were too busy, moving around and adjusting needlessly. But all the above is because I didn't have any real RW coaching and just learned on my own.