crapflinger2000

I would guess they are referring to this. (Ignore the kicker plate) I don't know how aerodynamically sound they are as a pilot chute once they are out of the pack. Maybe they are OK in that regard. They might be referencing the springs, which are OK as long as you are happy with a PC that basically just poops the flaps open and then, spent by that effort, lays serenely on your back, chilling out in the burble.

Sorry, what is a "half stow diaper"? Is that the type where you only lock it shut with half the line groups and the rest of the lines go in the pack tray? If so, when I was rigging I always tore my hair out trying to make sure that there was a tiny bit of slack in the line group that locked the diaper, to ensure that it only tensioned at the very last moment to prevent premature diaper release while the lines were playing out of the pack tray. The amount of slack was minimal to the point it probably would have accomplished nothing but I felt better about it. Was that a useless effort on my part?

Depends entirely on the canopy. I had an old Stilleto 120 that "never hurt nobody". No matter what, it opened wonderfully and on-heading. When I was doing RW with it my MO was always "track like a mother and dump." Now, was I technically dumping while in a track body position? No. But I was so fast on the hackey that I definitely retained most of my fwd speed. I learned not to do that on my Velocity 90... still sniveled like crazy but much more sensitive to heading performance, so I always took a moment to square up a bit.

Changing to soft links because of this is like deciding to only drive Fords from now on because Jiffy Lube screwed up and sent your Toyota out of the shop without any oil in it.

Not sure if you were pointing this out to me or to the general populace, but FWIW I DO know that. However in basic function they ARE similar in that they activate the reserve in way that is not DIRECTLY controlled by me. The point I was trying to make was that for me personally, I only wanted one such device on my rig. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

OK so I've been out of the game for awhile, packed a few racers (my only round save was on a racer), never felt they were that problematic, although they did kick my OCD up a few notches. Question1: I think I recall that it is OK to convert the dual RSL to a more standard single riser RSL? In the field. Yes or No? Question2: If the answer to the above is yes, which seems a pretty darn simple fix, doesn't a brand new 2018 Racer then pretty much automatically move from the "You gonna DIE!!!!!!!!!" bucket to "It's perfectly safe" bucket? Of course you can always not use the RSL. I never had one in favor of a cypres. I certainly understand wanting every "get it out quicker" feature available, but my own personal preference was to have only ONE "out of my control" reserve activation device to keep decision making under pressure simpler. I am more of a "its not for the reasons we can think of, but for the reasons we CAN'T think of" kind of guy. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

While happy there is another conservative on the court, not that happy that it's Brett since I tend to believe the Ford thing occurred. I think Trump and the right would have been better served by dumping Brett and nominating a right leaning woman and ramming that through, rather than Brett which is just going to inflame left vs right. However one thing you bring up is spot on. Unless the democratic party completely, and I mean COMPLETELY cuts ties with the Clintons, then their squawking about Brett was nothing more than political window dressing for the desire to delay confirming anyone until after the mid-terms. Bill has been accused of quite a few sexual assault / harassment incidents in his time (including actual, not attempted, rape), and Hilary was complicit in attacking most if not all of those women in defense of Bill. By the standard applied to Brett, the Clintons should never be invited to speak at ANYTHING ever again and there should be a mob following them around and hounding them whenever they set foot in public. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

A long time ago when I was a rigger a tandem had a chop and reserve deployment. The main risers came back with the RSL missing. Considering all the possible factors I tore my hair out for a bit trying to figure out why it had come off and if the snap shackle (and any others still on the rigs) was defective. After awhile I gave up and put it in the "S**t happens" bucket and moved on since I could detect no obvious problem with the rest of the RSL shackles. TL/DR: Apparently the shackles are not reliable in terms of staying shackled so yes, pull both handles. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

Not really suggestions but a couple thoughts. 1) Learn to say NO. When I first got my ticket I thought I was supposed to know how to do everything and service every customer's want, no matter how stupid. I in turn did some very stupid sh*t. 2) You are in a golden age of rigging information availability. What I would have given to have this forum available to me when I had "is the bad/ok" decisions to make. Make use of it. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

Sorry did not mean to imply that the other helmets at the time (we are talking very early 2000s here) had NO capability for getting out of it, just that it would take some extra doing potentially. One in particular had a latch where if you "popped" it, it only loosened it; in order to really free it you had to do an additional push-pull move to undo the chin thingy. I think in theory you could probably get it off your head even when just loosened, but everyone who tried it on the ground was loosing skin trying it, or at least saying "ouch ouch ouch!", so it did not seem overly easy to actually get out of quickly. Hopefully today's high speed stuff is better. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

When I jumped video I got a ration of sh*t from other video folks for continuing to jump a crappy old ProTec video helmet. Was it marginally more snaggy than the high-speed $250 helmets they were jumping? Yeah. I taped the crap out of it to try to minimize. But I had ditched the neck strap and only relied on the externally snapped chin-cup type strap, and could ditch the whole mess with either hand in milliseconds, which was way more than could be said for some of the set-ups in vogue at the time. Were I to get back into it I would jump the same ghetto set-up, even if I was just jumping a go-pro. Was it conceivable that I could lose my whole set up on accident if something came unsnapped? Sure (but never did in a couple thousand camera jumps). I was happy to live with that risk if it meant I could pretty much instantly be rid of the whole affair if there was some entanglement. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

Funny, I think my supervised pack jobs were about a 75%/25% mix of sport rigs and bailouts. So while never tested on rounds I did know how to pack them. Like all new riggers I was nervous until I felt things I had packed had been tested "in anger". So there came a time where I packed a round into a racer, neither category of which my pack jobs had ever been used before. The very next day after packing it, it got deployed, and I had a triumphant "two birds with one stone" feeling. A bit more confidence that I knew wtf I was doing ensued. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

I am years out of the rigging game but always wondered why I was able to pack a bailout back rig but could not pack a seat rig. Of course I understand the administrative "why?" [Cuz you are not seat rated, dufus]. But practically speaking I perceived that there is no special secret "seat" (or "chest") sauce conferred upon someone when they get that rating. If you can get a manual for the container, pack to those instructions, everything would work just fine regardless of what type of container you did your 20 repacks on. That is, unless when you get your seat rating they induct you into the secret society of seat rig packers where they tell you "Now you can be told that when packing a Seat rig you must induce a 1/2 twist in the lines each time you make a stow, while reciting the mantra "ubba dubba dee", for otherwise the rig shall surely malfunction. It has been an unspoken rule that this crucial detail shall be withheld from all manuals since the dawn of time, so help me god". All kidding aside, for those with multiple ratings, ARE there actual unwritten "things" you need to know to pack some other container than "back"? Old loft had an old chest container. Pulled it out, found some instructions, packed it, seemed straightfwd. Unpacked it for just in case reasons and tossed it back in the closet. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

I would submit that in general anything you can by floating the exit can be done with your head pointed at the ground (and vice versa). The main thing is that your tum-tum is facing the prop blast; which direction your head is pointed makes no difference. I would guess perhaps what he was talking about is executing a brief hard "flare" against the relative wind to kill off some fwd momentum. I believe I saw something about this in one of the "how to skydive" books I bought long ago. I think the passage indicated that someone who does this big flare to kill off fwd momentum gains some advantage over someone who just dives out head first and starts diving on the formation (that person will seem to be poised to get there fast but in reality he's still carrying momentum (fwd vector from plane) while he is diving). To my first point, I would say that you can execute this big flare head up or head down. And I'd rather do it head down and not lose time in transitioning to a diving position. Also who knows maybe this person was REALLY good at backsliding down the hill to the formation or something. As far as diving out, for the longest time my problem was not flipping over but rather doing an "auto-turn" on the hill after exit to where I was looking at the plane. Very frustrating. Finally clued in that I was leaving my feet up on my butt for too long and losing some directional control. I guess just some "me" peculiarity. Learned to just briefly pop my feet up on butt just long enough to clear the prop blast and then stick 'em back out and start diving. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?

As other people have pointed out, you pick a canopy to suit what you are doing. Have thousands of camera jumps with a SLR (not DSLR but old enough to make the weights comparable). Plus a digital TRV17. Never an issue with my St 120 (and then Velocity) that I was jumping. As is normal you do get the unexplained slammer once in awhile, no broken necks that I am aware of. I did take a break from video until my neck recovered from a BASE slammer. When I re-started it was not quite fully back to normal but close enough. To be clear I did not do this with a "oh well WTF hope I don't break my neck" attitude. You should do whatever you can to mitigate the risk even with a slower opening canopy. If you can't pack your canopy to consistently open nicely when it comes out of the bag, learn to pack. If someone doesn't understand that the main thing that will hurt them is inadequate line stow tension and they pack microline in single stow large rubber bands, that's on them. Also, what you do with your head during opening plays a role. I never looked up at the opening, just kept head still looking at horizon, until / unless it was taking an inordinate amount of time open and I decided I had to see wtf was going on. Also at times when I had to borrow a rig with someone's Sabre 150 in it to make a load, I might toss the PC and then bring both arms in to brace against my chin, elbows down, for just in case purposes. You are in "solution in search of a problem" territory here. __________________________________________________ What would Vic Mackey do?