Javelin Aurora

Looking for updated reviews on the Javelin Aurora from Sunpath. 

I need a new container and only plan on wingsuit flying from this point on. 

Thanks

Scott

(its long) I had to spend some time to adjust to it, but I think its "accepted by my muscle memory" now. The rig is very long, so PC handle is at full arm stretch in my case. (its comfortable) I came from a rather new Icon Next rig and the first thing I noticed is it is a lot more comfortable on you. (it is comfortable) Packing the main is different from other rigs, Once you learn the packing method, take just a few jumps, packing is super easy. (its aerodynamic) Flying steep I notice the effect of the Neoprene flap that keeps air from going btw rig and my back, feels good. In normal flight there is no difference. (it has a weak Reserve PC spring) I am not and was never a fan of the Javenlin reserve container system and especially that weak reserve PC spring. I have a video of my rigger poping the reserve. It jumps 3 feet away only. I can at least imagine situation where a wingsuit flyer would want that reserve PC to "get the hell out there". The reserve PC spring is incredible weak and is from a time where everybody was hurtling their body towards the ground at terminal speed in freefall. I think they need to rethink this system..Meanwhile I can canonball myself out of any reserve PC in-tow situations and I never go low anyway. I am hoping they will update that reserve PC. To sum up: I think the latest Icon long rig is also optimal for wingsuiting really and so the main advantage with the Aurora is that main containe and the easy packing and the different (and perfect) orientation of the bag that in theory should be more optimal for wingsuit deployments. And it is more comfortable.for sure. So: Comfortable.

+1 on the Icon long. The length and profile are dope. 

Put about 50 jumps on Aurora. Excellent rig for WS. Well thought out. Very comfortable and light (no articulated harness - less metal, may be the material is lighter as well). Love the long and flat concept, very easy to reach hackey. The giant PC compartment is very elastic. Makes me worry a bit about the PC coming out prematurely. I love the mechanics of all in line DBag and corner less container. Looks and feels great:).

How is the packing with the longer d-bag?

On 4/1/2019 at 2:57 AM, birdynamnam said:

(its long) I had to spend some time to adjust to it, but I think its "accepted by my muscle memory" now. The rig is very long, so PC handle is at full arm stretch in my case. (its comfortable) I came from a rather new Icon Next rig and the first thing I noticed is it is a lot more comfortable on you. (it is comfortable) Packing the main is different from other rigs, Once you learn the packing method, take just a few jumps, packing is super easy. (its aerodynamic) Flying steep I notice the effect of the Neoprene flap that keeps air from going btw rig and my back, feels good. In normal flight there is no difference. (it has a weak Reserve PC spring) I am not and was never a fan of the Javenlin reserve container system and especially that weak reserve PC spring. I have a video of my rigger poping the reserve. It jumps 3 feet away only. I can at least imagine situation where a wingsuit flyer would want that reserve PC to "get the hell out there". The reserve PC spring is incredible weak and is from a time where everybody was hurtling their body towards the ground at terminal speed in freefall. I think they need to rethink this system..Meanwhile I can canonball myself out of any reserve PC in-tow situations and I never go low anyway. I am hoping they will update that reserve PC. To sum up: I think the latest Icon long rig is also optimal for wingsuiting really and so the main advantage with the Aurora is that main containe and the easy packing and the different (and perfect) orientation of the bag that in theory should be more optimal for wingsuit deployments. And it is more comfortable.for sure. So: Comfortable.

It seriously only jumps 3 ft?!? Is that common on all Sunpath reserve PC's?

6 hours ago, gunsmokex said:

It seriously only jumps 3 ft?!? Is that common on all Sunpath reserve PC's?

I used to have a plain vanilla Javelin rig and that's what it did also as they all use the same reserve PC. When I got the Aurora I was hopeing they had put some more muscle into the spring, but they haven't 

I’ve got a Jav and I’m not worried, but if you are, Racer says they have the strongest spring on the market ;p 

2 hours ago, skydave89 said:

I’ve got a Jav and I’m not worried, but if you are, Racer says they have the strongest spring on the market ;p 

point being?

Yeah my Vector II spring about took off my riggers picture on his wall. Funny thing is my other rigger said he'd like me to get away from jumping Vector containers. Ill file this information away for when we have the discussion about Vector II containers vs. Javelin. Can't wait to see what he says.

I think a lot of people in the skydiving community think that the more $$ you spend the safer you are. My latest "new" container cost $50. Container only. The rest of the parts are being swapped out from my old worn Vector II. But I love UPTs transparency when it comes to their rigs. Example of such is the old school video on Youtube showing the benefits of a meshless reserve PC. 

4 hours ago, birdynamnam said:

I used to have a plain vanilla Javelin rig and that's what it did also as they all use the same reserve PC. When I got the Aurora I was hopeing they had put some more muscle into the spring, but they haven't 

On ‎4‎/‎26‎/‎2019 at 8:41 PM, urowolf said:

Put about 50 jumps on Aurora. Excellent rig for WS. Well thought out. Very comfortable and light (no articulated harness - less metal, may be the material is lighter as well). Love the long and flat concept, very easy to reach hackey. The giant PC compartment is very elastic. Makes me worry a bit about the PC coming out prematurely. I love the mechanics of all in line DBag and corner less container. Looks and feels great:).

I got my rigger to split the BOC into 2 with a simple stitch line and add a bridle cover, I can now select either a top BOC pouch or bottom, as I also was concerned about loos BOC. works nicely now, cost all of $20 and about 30 mins work, images attached, several friends have now made the mod also.

that's one solution. I pack it "around the corner" against my back. The pouch goes all the way back there, It sits well and highly protected offcourse and it is still easy reachable be it with small or large wingsuits

Just a thought: A couple of years ago while jumping in Z-hills I met a man. He approached me and kindly asked if he could look at my rig as I was jumping a certain one piece tracking suit and he stated that he was writing an article for Blue Sky Mag about wear and tear of equipment directly related to zippers and containers and the like...

Naturally I said look all you want. Later he showed me his novel approach to placing his deployment bag inside the container and rotating it down instead of up (WS specific naturally). We talked that day and he gave me a T-shirt and a business card. It wasn't until I returned home and looked him up that I discovered I was talking to a FUCKING LEGEND!

Moe Viletto.  If by the odd circumstance you BASE jump and don't know who he is, look him up! 

I bring it up because I've never heard anyone discuss his approach to the D bag positioning...   

On 5/2/2019 at 4:29 PM, birdynamnam said:

that's one solution. I pack it "around the corner" against my back. The pouch goes all the way back there, It sits well and highly protected offcourse and it is still easy reachable be it with small or large wingsuits

Tried that but still way too easy to pull out and catch in aircraft.

On 5/1/2019 at 6:29 AM, gunsmokex said:

It seriously only jumps 3 ft?!? Is that common on all Sunpath reserve PC's?

If your reserve PC only goes out 3 feet you may want to talk to your rigger and/or bring that up with Sunpath. Especially for a wingsuit rig with a potentially huge burble. I've never personally seen an Aurora but I've owned a newer Javelin and my husband has an older Javelin. Both reserve PCs flew across the room and would gladly break your nose if you were standing too close.

2 hours ago, sedsquare said:

If your reserve PC only goes out 3 feet you may want to talk to your rigger and/or bring that up with Sunpath. Especially for a wingsuit rig with a potentially huge burble. I've never personally seen an Aurora but I've owned a newer Javelin and my husband has an older Javelin. Both reserve PCs flew across the room and would gladly break your nose if you were standing too close.

PM me for a link to the video. It was packed by a super experienced rigger in the US 

On 5/6/2019 at 10:01 AM, sedsquare said:

If your reserve PC only goes out 3 feet you may want to talk to your rigger and/or bring that up with Sunpath. Especially for a wingsuit rig with a potentially huge burble. I've never personally seen an Aurora but I've owned a newer Javelin and my husband has an older Javelin. Both reserve PCs flew across the room and would gladly break your nose if you were standing too close.

Across the room and up are very different things. 

On 5/2/2019 at 5:31 AM, verticalflyer said:

I got my rigger to split the BOC into 2 with a simple stitch line and add a bridle cover, I can now select either a top BOC pouch or bottom, as I also was concerned about loos BOC. works nicely now, cost all of $20 and about 30 mins work, images attached, several friends have now made the mod also.

Interesting.

Thanks for posting up the images.

I'm considering buying a new rig JUST to have the main pud lower on my back for WS.

On 5/4/2019 at 8:58 AM, timski said:

Just a thought: A couple of years ago while jumping in Z-hills I met a man. He approached me and kindly asked if he could look at my rig as I was jumping a certain one piece tracking suit and he stated that he was writing an article for Blue Sky Mag about wear and tear of equipment directly related to zippers and containers and the like...

Naturally I said look all you want. Later he showed me his novel approach to placing his deployment bag inside the container and rotating it down instead of up (WS specific naturally). We talked that day and he gave me a T-shirt and a business card. It wasn't until I returned home and looked him up that I discovered I was talking to a FUCKING LEGEND!

Moe Viletto.  If by the odd circumstance you BASE jump and don't know who he is, look him up! 

I bring it up because I've never heard anyone discuss his approach to the D bag positioning...   

 

Lucky you.

I knew you must be talking about Moe as soon as I read your first paragraph.

He is pretty picky about his zipper care.

I've been using the main dbag lines lines next to the reserve container orientation for nearly 3 years with good success.

just take care to ensure no lines are around the closing loop attachment point and you should be good to go.

Craig

BASE 93

20 minutes ago, kleggo said:

Lucky you.

I knew you must be talking about Moe as soon as I read your first paragraph.

He is pretty picky about his zipper care.

 

I've been using the main dbag lines lines next to the reserve container orientation for nearly 3 years with good success.

just take care to ensure no lines are around the closing loop attachment point and you should be good to go.

 

Craig

BASE 93

I'm still using a traditional D bag and rotating up. My only mods are dynamics corners on my vector with a sky snatch. I'm getting comfortable consistent openings and fly suits with a good flare...  But thank you for the input.    

On 5/4/2019 at 5:58 AM, timski said:

Just a thought: A couple of years ago while jumping in Z-hills I met a man. He approached me and kindly asked if he could look at my rig as I was jumping a certain one piece tracking suit and he stated that he was writing an article for Blue Sky Mag about wear and tear of equipment directly related to zippers and containers and the like...

Naturally I said look all you want. Later he showed me his novel approach to placing his deployment bag inside the container and rotating it down instead of up (WS specific naturally). We talked that day and he gave me a T-shirt and a business card. It wasn't until I returned home and looked him up that I discovered I was talking to a FUCKING LEGEND!

Moe Viletto.  If by the odd circumstance you BASE jump and don't know who he is, look him up! 

I bring it up because I've never heard anyone discuss his approach to the D bag positioning...   

 

It's not that uncommon. I know several people who have mentioned it. I brought up this packing orientation to the container manufactures when I visited them in Deland last. The answer I got was, with regards to D bag orientation, if you can think of it they have already tested it and it's not approved for a reason. I have never found the need for it personally. I have tons and tons of videos of my openings and I've never seen the bag spin around during extraction. If I got linetwists, it was not because of how I positioned the D bag.

In regards to the flipped D-Bag, I don't see an issue with it if your closing loop is mounted to your bottom flat as theres no snag hazards, and you're probably fine if you have a floor mounted closing loop but it could present a snag hazard (one reason they don't recommend flipping the bag that way).  I have my bag normally oriented and have never had any issues though.

One hazard that someone might be dumb enough to miss (like I did) is that you you can only flip the bag with bottomless corners!  After having a few funky openings (probably poor technique) I was looking to make my older (J2 from '92) a bit more wingsuit friendly.  I hadn't gotten around to cutting the corners but someone recommend I flip the bag.  I figured why not, let's see if it helps anything, it made logical sense.  First few jumps went fine but then I did a big flare before deploying so I was pitching at a lower airspeed and after a few seconds of nothing happening, I started to shake back and forth and it finally came out.

looking at rear footage, the pin was popped before the PC even inflated (so no pinlock) but the bag was held in by the corners.  Usually with the horizontal openings in a wingsuit, the bag gets rolled up and over the corners but since I had lower airspeed and the bridle was pulling straight back, it was pulling the bag deeper into the corners rather than rolling it out.  It would be a non issue with bottomless corers as there would be nothing to trap it.

On 5/2/2019 at 5:31 AM, verticalflyer said:

I got my rigger to split the BOC into 2 with a simple stitch line and add a bridle cover, I can now select either a top BOC pouch or bottom, as I also was concerned about loos BOC. works nicely now, cost all of $20 and about 30 mins work, images attached, several friends have now made the mod also.

 

What's going on on the left hand side of your container??

19 hours ago, richoH said:

What's going on on the left hand side of your container??

great question

I just purchased one of these custom made for me. The sizing was built for somebody much shorter than me and had to be sent back for modifications. Leg straps are paper thin but it’s not likely that I’ll be doing any high pulls. Chest strap is up around my Adam’s apple but hasn’t crushed it yet. The pull is odd. I’ll get use to it but it’s not natural yet.

Having a freefly tab on a Wingsuit only rig seems a bit odd seeing how we point out the challenges of having one to new students. Still not a deal breaker. Just odd. 

I do like the adjustable laterals to be able to seat  the rig against your lower back to reduce the air gap. 

I do like having a skyhook again. 

Packing is about a 3 jump learning curve. Super easy. 

It is light weight

I’ll give this 3.75 stars out of 5. If it was a perfect fit I’d give it a 4.

 Definitely not a must have for a Wingsuiter but I wouldn’t discourage someone from buying it.