Basejumper.com - archive

I'm confused about some stuff. I started skydiving because I had an interest to get into base. I was told that having a couple hundred jumps would make base jumping easier to learn. Also I always thought of skydivers as being open minded but lately i'm getting the impression that most skydivers don't like base jumping or even talking about it. I really want to learn more about it, is there another way. As much as I love the rush of skydiving, if it's not getting me to my goal I think I'd rather be paragliding.

skydivers are people too and therefore not always open minded

skydivers are to basejumpers what whuffos are to skydivers

where skydiving gets you is up to you, not the skydivers you know

paragliding won't teach you about deployments like skydiving will (que some smartass paraglider with almost no skydives to tell us how much better base canopy pilots zero skydive paragliders are than thousand jump skydivers...)

look around some other dropzones in your area and you will find skydivers that like basejumping and actually do it too

cya

__________________________
I was told that having a couple hundred jumps would make base jumping easier to learn.
__________________________

Having skydives gets you experience flying your parachute.

I recommend getting your parachute experience under a canopy that is as close to your BASE canopy of choise as possible. Big 7 cell.

Edited to add: This is what my mentor told me when I investigated getting in to BASE about a year ago.

I know that paragliding won't help me get into base but I tried it last year and really liked it for an alternative sport. I don't know if skydiving is for me, i'm not that interested in formation skydiving, I prefer the rush and flying through the air, tracking. I'm not at all putting down skydiving, it does make me happy but I think paragliding or base jumping would do the same.

It's just that other skydivers think it gets boring to always jump alone, so it's necessary to work for your B minimum, i'm not shure if that's what I want to do, i'm a little confused

I've been jumping a sabre but this year I also did a jump on a triathlon and I get them mixed up...which is the 7-cell and which is the 9-cell?

Freefly, tracking, flocking and 'multiple orientation' dives will be right down your street, as will wingsuiting and that gps tracking derby thing...you just have to get good enough to be on them!

In all seriousness, FS skills are also damn useful. It's rare to see base jumpers in headdown...they're nearly always on their belly. It's worth being good at, for both the sake of your skydivign AND base jumping.

I don't think you're disillusioned with how skydiving fits into base. I think it's the 'post-AFF-WTF-now?' early skydiving life crisis most pople find themselves in. You gotta plough through it, preferably by getting onto high quality jumps and getting as much coaching as you can afford.

Paragliding is cool too. Do both. Chances are, wherever you find an 'E' to jump will probably be prime paraglider territiory too.

Ask around your local dropzone more, there are BASE jumpers lurking on almost every DZ out there.

Most BASE jumps are subterminal with only a couple of seconds freefall if any at all in the case of throw and gos. I like terminal freefall too much to get into BASE. The videos you see of terminal cliff jumps and tracking are not the every day jumping that most BASE jumpers do, instead they flik their local A's S's and B's.

If you like the tracking feeling look into getting enough experience to fly a wingsuit. The PF Prodigy might be perfect for you at your current experience level.

Triathlon is 7 cell.

Controversial here, but don't bother with the big 7 cells until your a lot closer to actually takign the plunge and considering base. If you 'like' speed, a big 7 cell will bore you rigid. Smaller and faster canopies are fun (as long as you're ready for the downsizes), and topping that off with a couple of dozen big7 jumps before you go seems more fun than doing 300+ jumps on a 200+ sq.ft. teabag.

Yah sabre is 9 Triathalon is 7. How big was the Triathalon and do you still have access to it?

You want as much experience as possible on a big 7 cell so that you can handle BASE specific situations with your big BASE 7 cell. Imagine having only 150ft of altitude with a tail wind at your back, trying to setup a landing into a 30ftx30ft box. Lets see you do that with a little parachute without plowing in.

This is great stuff to practice under a big 7 cell
http://asylumbase.com/adobepdf/fjccanopy.pdf
NOTE: Some of this stuff will hurt you under a small canopy.

You should also look in to an FJC. I recommend http://snakeriverbase.com/

Freeflying experience isn't going to be imperitive in BASE, but it will be important on terminal jumps.

I'm hoping some experienced BASE jumpers come in to this thread soon and give you some more info.

P.S. Don't take BASE advise from people that don't BASE jump.

Edited to say fix:
Freeflying experience isn't going to be imperitive in BASE, but it will be important on terminal jumps.

I meant belly flying. You might need the ability to move away from the wall, and make sure you don't back slide toward the wall.

you are living on the wrong continent

Flying a wingsuit sounds like a good idea, thanks

What is gps tracking derby?

If you into wingsuits, more power to you, but in terms of BASE I think you should add complexity to as slowly as possible. You probably don't want to get in to wingsuit BASE to soon.

The triathlon is a 150 that I probably could borrow again, but if i;m going to practise accuracy with it I should probably look into getting my own.

http://www.trackingderby.com/

You can participate at one of their events or use your own gps receiver anywhere. Integrates to google earth and gives you a reakdown of most important details of the freefall and canopy flight. Might be good for optimising your track - tracking dives, whilst fun, are often too steep for that.

I agree, it just seems that alot of people think I should get more skydives, and flying a wingsuit would probably give me the illusion of flying instead of falling.

150 is way to small for BASE. Some people say you could use it for BASE, but I think it's a bad idea.

BASE canopy flight is not only accuracy, but soft landings. Sometimes the ground your landing on isn't ideal and the softer the landing the better. What if wierd turbulance messes with your canopy 10 feet up. More material above your head means softer collision with the ground. What ever your ground may be.

I have no wing suit experience, but since I don't think RW is that important in beggining BASE knowledge, I would assume learning to wingsuit fly now wouldn't slow your BASE knowledge growth. It might impare your canopy flight learning though?

If you don't know how many cells your canopy has you probably don't pack it yourself, right? I would think that being comfortable packing would probably help when starting BASE and learning new techniques.

Actually, by the wingloading posted in her profile, a "150" with a BASE exit weight would be fairly close to ideal.

I didnt' think to look at her wing loading because that seems so small. I wonder if she took gear in to consideration when putting in the weight.

I no a few pretty small girls that are experienced BASE jumpers, and they probably wouldn't recommend a 150 for BASE unless you way 80-85lbs

 

I agree. Where are all the experienced BASE jumpers at. Out jumping or something...jeez. hehe

Hopefully soon there will be more experienced BASE jumpers reading this thread to review the information already provided and correct any misinformation and provide additional valuable information.

plenty has already been posted on various threads, BASEwiki, etc. be inquisitive and do your own fact checking!

or get a mentor. helping a newbie wade through all the information is the job of a mentor. the mentor ensures the information is understood in context.

the moderator attempts to quell outlandishly bad advice.

I do pack my own rig, I just haven't been jumping that often this summer.

Actually, I need to update my profile. How much weight should I add for the chute?

15lbs should be pretty close.

YIKES!! A 150 is never optimal in BASE. I'm 105 lbs loaded at .58 on a Raven I, and it is ground hungry with a good amount of forward speed. I would not recommend this canopy to land in tight spots.

A BASE specific 185ish canopy is much closer to 'ideal.'

And it's not called a chute (exept you have a pre 300ish BASE Number and are truly oldschool... :-)), it's a canopy...

Edited to remove the arrogant part of my post but I left the chute part so hokitt's following post still does make sence...

Somebody recomended a Prodigy on this forum for you. Prodigy in my opinion is the best WS to learn on.. But Phoenix reccomends a minimum of 100 skydives... and in my opinion it should only be 100 if you do them in less than a year or close to that... otherwise 200-250 is a better # at which you can start flying like a bird...
i wont comment on the rest since i dont know s@#$

When I get home I'll weigh my chutes and rigs together and let you know.

My chute is a Black Jack 240 and the other chute is a Black Jack 240. Those are assembled into Perigee Pros.

That doesn't include the other 2 chutes I'm not using. One chute is an Intercepter 225 and the other chute is a Raven III. Both of those chutes have been used to some degree in a BASE environment.

i didnt know they made ravens that are only 111 s.ft. and it looked way bigger when i jumped it.

Add all the 1s together to make a Raven III

Fixed it.

I have a 109 if you care to try it out.

The following is a bit off-topic, but it seems to have come up quite a lot in this thread, and I think it bears repeating.


The wingloading issue has been discussed quite a lot in the past. One of the best guidelines I've seen is this one:


Many factors which affect the performance of a canopy do not scale linearly with wingloading, so that someone who weighs half as much and is flying a canopy half the size will not experience similar performance.

Michael

Edited for clarity

Yes, this is correct. Add 100 to your naked weight in pounds. Add 20 if the altitude is high and/or the landing areas are difficult. Subtract 20 if the jumps have easy landing areas, like those found around many antennas.

Also,
Listening to "Daredevil" on The Tragically Hip's album "Day for Night" will help you too....



Well, it can't hurt anyway.

Later,
SMD7

This only really works for people in the 160-180lbs range though, doesn't it?

Imagine using this on a 50 lbs person. If gear is 15lbs wing loading .43

On a 300lbs person, wingloading .7875

If a 50lbs person added the extra 20 for bad landing area their windloading goes down to .38

I have no experience with a wingloading that low, but I'm assuming the canopy would collapse very easily and not represurize very easily.

What is recommended wing loading for high wind or easy landing area, normal, and bad landing area?

You are right, but how many jumpers do you know that weigh either 50 pounds or 300 pounds?

Good point. It's probably a safe estimate for wingloading.

I wonder if the canopy's weight effects wing loading. Obviously the lines and everything below them do, but does the canopy effect it at all? Bottom skin only maybe?

where did you see 100 jumps for the prodigy?...

A bit off-topic is probably an understatement.

Good points, though. Instead of posting generalizations, I should have posted links to those threads.

Then you'd be happy to fly a canopy with a topskin made of lead, I guess.

Misinformation should not be given in the hopes that "someone smarter will correct it later". The people who don't know, shouldn't say.

My advice:

Read the first post in this thread. Note the physical location of the poster (near to you) and his experience level. Skip the rest of the thread, and instead send him a PM asking if you can meet him for a beer, or out at a local dropzone.

Good observation!

The entire system and everything that hangs underneath it affects wing loading and should be included. You don't just count the bottom surface of an aircraft wing when measuring its wing loading.

Whilst the intent is well meaning, I believe your statement is correct to some extent. There is some BASE experience and you can learn from it, but more time / hard yards / lots of experience would certainly put the said author in a more positive position.

They'll get there.

It's a phase.

What about 3-d spacial awareness?

What about transitions from one orientation to another and controlling descent rates?

What about deployment at the end of the jump and ensuing canopy ride / accuracy landing?

What about air time itself?

There are some activites that are more relevant than others. BUT all air time helps you develop transferable skills!!!!!!!

Great points.

I see the baton has officially been passed on. Congrats Goldsmith, you now proudly can take your place in the dz.com Hall of Fame. Step away Dmcoco....your time is up.

ian

I just didn't want the skydivers pointing her in the wrong direction. Sorry.

No need to apologise.

It seems to me that your intent is honourable.

Why are some people questioning your input is your experience level. This is not a new phenomenon. Every now and again an excited newcomer (1 year in the sport is new) wants to help and contribute as much as possible. This is a good thing and the enthisiasm should be encouraged.

However, you must temper this with your experience level. Being a newcomer, you have not had the time to go through many of the intricacies that you need to know on order to educate others. One of these skills is to challenge newbies and question their involvement in the sport. This sport should NOT be handed to anyone on a platter. Not because they don't deserve to be in the sport or because we don't want to share the sport with others - the main reason is that when people get something with little or no effort, they do not truly appreciate what they have got. They take it for granted, they don't put effort into it . . . . . What this means for BASE jumping is that you potentially introduce liabilities to the sport. The sport does not need those type of people. Jumpers do NOT need the potential experience of serious incidents and fatalities, and most importantly of all, the families of those people should NOT go through the experience of losing a loved one.

There are many other factors too. A newcomer who is superkeen tends to overload themselves with a raft of information from many different sources. Some if that information is excellent, some contradictory, and some downright dangerous. There are some techniques appropriate to only experienced jumpers, and there are some that students must learn. This information can potentially be misinterpreted or confused with other information by the newcomer, and then delivered to another newcomer - very much like the game of Chinese whispers.

Giving information about BASE jumping to newbies involves a very high level of responsibility. Someones life is at stake!!!!!! We should all take that responsibility seriously and not lightly.

In some cases it is better to quote experienced people when giving an opinion - it gives greater credibility to what you are saying. And it will get some of those crusty oldtimers off your back too.

Other than that, keep up your enthusiasm. It is a good thing. Temper it when giving advice to newbies. And enjoy this wonderful activity that you are involved in. Spend your current time learning, don't waste it on teaching at this point. Develop the skills and experiences that you are keen to teach.

Regarding the person you are corresponding with (skyjules), she needs to put in a lot more effort before she even thinks about BASE jumping. That is made obvious to me by her lack of gear knowledge (and jump numbers etc). If skyjules is not a web troll, then I am concerned. As per her quote below, if she does not know the difference between a 9 and 7 cell and she has been jumping them at a DZ, what chance does she have of fulfilling the gear knowldege requirements of BASE jumping? This shows to me that she is not interested in what she needs to know.

A parallel - she is not interested in the climb up to the top of Everest, she only wants to stand on the top. That does NOT make her a climber!!!!!!!

Sometimes, this is how blunt you have to be. If skyjules is a reasonable person, she will take this constructive criticism on board and put some more effort in. If she is not, she does not really need to be involved in BASE jumping.

This is where experience comes in. You get to see the end result of introducing the wrong people into the sport. And you learn about the important of filtering. IF skyjules puts in the effort, great, kudos and open arms, but if she does not, well, I don't want to be standing on the edge with her.

Woah, she's a girl?

Hey Jules, come to Vancouver! I'll throw you of our local objects and burn 'm to the ground. I even have a eight-cell umbrella you can borrow!

This reminds me of an oversight and it's time to correct it. At the time this came about we were too focused on how it came about. But a Nugget is a Nugget and, "Yonkels," is a Nugget.

Mono-Nugget - or maybe just Nug – but so far the only single word Nugget.

Yonkels – it's like a whole story in one word . . .

Now we just wait for a savvy BASE gear manufacturer to actually start calling them that and it'll be set in stone.

Since evolution isn't one of those things that stops it could also be, in the future, we'll have our own language. Then I could stop saying things on the radio like, "The rats are in the cheese!"

NickD
BASE 194