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Hooking up a skydiving PC is very similar, if not the same, as hooking up a BASE jumping PC, right?. BASE PC's are probably SIMPLER! Yet our riggers found 7 instances of PC's hooked up improperly at Bridge Day 2008. SEVEN. I realize we get a lot of first time BASE jumpers at Bridge Day each year - about 110 of the 400+ jumpers, but that shouldn't matter since methods are similar for skydiving and BASE.



While it's possible to hook up your PC improperly without immediate problems, eventually failures may occur as evidenced by last year's "detached PC" incident.




C'mon people, learn how to hook up your PC. I just don't understand why this is so hard. What am I missing? Should manufacturers "dumb down" the design of pilot chutes so that you can't hook it up improperly? FYI, here's how to do it correctly:



This educational post brought to you by the guy who doesn't want to scoop up your corpse at the bottom of my local object....

Yep, SKY & BASE both use the same knot
to attach PCs and this knot is known as a
lark's head, slip knot, and I think I heard
climbers call it half hitch.


One small addition to your fabulous set of
instructions. Once the bridle is through the
center line loop and load tapes the jumper
pulls the entire PC through the loop on the
bridle to get the knot in Jason's last photo.

Girth hitch, actually.

 
What's a PC ???

i'm sure i'll be corrected on the spot if i'm wrong here...but a half hitch is a single line tie. meaning there's a running end when you're finished.

Not to be that guy or anything cause I hate mean people on forums, but why are we talking about knots and how to hook up a PC, if you haven't figured this out yet...quit BASE jumping, matter of fact, quit skydiving, really, something bad is going to happen.

because it's better than reading the babble of base75.

HaHa, OK then, I agree, carry on!

Touche.

now you're feeling what i felt when i read your "how do you climb pegs?" post.

But I climbed them...with you!

exactly.

it's only simple when you already know what you're doing.

Sadly, there are people jumping who haven't yet figured this out.

Remember the guy at Bridge Day last year, who lost his PC in flight, because he didn't know how to attach it?


A few years ago, I ran into a guy who had around 100 BASE jumps, and needed to borrow a container (his was going back to Apex for some work). I agreed to loan him one of mine. He came by and I grabbed it for him. He kind of stared blankly at the 3 rings for a while, then said "could you show me how to attach this?"

He had around a hundred BASE jumps, and had never learned to connect the risers to the container with a standard three ring assembly.

Any thoughts on my original question:

Should manufacturers "dumb down" the design of pilot chutes so you can't hook it up improperly?

NO!

The only reason I would want to see
any change in the way a PC is attached
to a bridle is IF it improved performance
for those people who already took the
90 seconds it takes to learn a larks head.

In that other sport I have been asked to
numerous swap d-bags, PCs, and toggles
for guys with 500 to 1,000+ skydives.

I think the main problem is inserting the bridle through BOTH the centerline loop and under the apex of the four load tapes. Improperly attached PC's usually utilize only one of the above two areas.

And we haven't even talked about the double centerline problem that Moe Viletto identified at BD 2008. Stay tuned for that discussion shortly.....

You can buy PC's from Asylum with a single point attachment (just one loop). It's a $15 option, or standard on the top of the line (Toxic) PC.

The single point attachment doesn't just help with totally improper attachment (like the break-away PC at Bridge Day). It also (in fact was originally meant to) makes it impossible to asymmetrically attach the PC, which is a much more common (but often less deadly} problem.

Hi Jason,
BASE instruction should teach this (and how to check for symmetry before and after installation) in the gear config part of the course. Understandably, this (BASE instruction) is not really viable for BD considering the nature of BD. There are ways to turn the BD beginners on to it in the seminars. You've done well so far. I got faith in ya.
Take care,
space

I have gotten my past 3 pilot chutes with single point from Marty for this reason. Its not like hooking up a pilot chute is a super complicated process, but neither is remembering to take a pull up chord off your pilot chute. Eliminating a potential problem area without any consequence (that I can think of) is always good in my book.

For the longer (4 day) Bridge Day FJC, we do teach PC attachment (and symmetry checking).

We have not taught PC attachment in the shorter (6 hour) beginnner course, but let me think about trying to work it in next year. I wonder if we could insert a short section on rigging (making sure the brakes are properly routed for the slider configuration, attaching the PC, maybe a few other things) at the beginning of the packing demo?

Sounds like a great idea in implementing PC attachment instruction to the 8 hour course. However, it's not always the first time BASE jumpers that don't know how to hook up their PC. I remember one guy who had plenty of skydives and 35+ BASE jumps. Plus, everyone should have learned this way back in their skydiving days.....

I ran into a base jumper once who would take the Bridal off the canopy. Apparently he/she thought you had to do that to then be able to get the bridal off the PC. When I showed the "right" way to disasemmble the PC, he/she was "flabbergasted"....

Several manufacturers used to make the bridle in such a way that you pretty much had to do that (the attachment hole on the PC end was tiny). They did this to minimize the chance of entangling a finger with the PC/bridle attachment point, after Dennis McGlynn had a nasty scare from that on a low hand held jump. At the time, it became standard practice in many crews to just keep a bridle on every PC (since bridles were cheap). When I started jumping, I knew several people who did this, and at least one manufacturer who would automatically assume you wanted a bridle with each PC you ordered, unless you specified otherwise. It's possible that he learned from someone old school enough that they had gear manufactured in that era.

Hey Tom,
I know this is an old thread, Im just tired of reading about who is going to get banned next... Instead of trying to find time to teach someone something they should know, why not have them demonstrate it before you take time to teach them anything?

Who votes natural selection should stand?? Shouldn't one be an expert , and I use that term looseliiiiiieeee, before fixed object jumping?? WTF

When I started BASE, someone had to show me how to hook up a PC.

Skydiving didn't cover that, because my PC there was sewn on, with a kill line.

I think PC attachment is actually a pretty BASE specific skill. As such it's probably appropriate to teach it in the FJC setting.

Seems like a no-brainer to include in FJC.
As far as a BASE specific skill: By the time u r ready for BASE should you not have some basic parachute rigging knowledge. Like looking at a PC/bridle and larks-heading it through the most obviously strongest point!

i attached my pilot chute incorrectly for a couple hundred jumps and i ran into a base jumper who showed me the errors of my ways. remember, no task is so simple that it cannot be done wrong.