Basejumper.com - archive

Got a Vision rig from Dennis about dozen or more years ago. perfect condition, less than 30 jumps, no water landings. Got a two pin rig coming from Apex within two weeks or so...As soon as rig is shipped, I'm looking to sell the Vision...These rigs are built bomb proof, and you can literally in no way get the velcro to inadvertently open and spill canopy. I've done multiple somersaults on carpet in attempt to open and dump canopy, it just don't happen. It's a feel good warm and fuzzy old school rig. With visions no longer being manu., I'm wondering if there are BASE history buffs/ old schoolers who would like to buy this rig...highest bidder naturally.
black, royal blue, silver old school colors to boot!!!

I still jump one as my second rig. Bought it in 1998. Do you have a pic you could post?

Peace,
Pauly

LOL...If that's 'Old School', I'd hate to see how you classify my mid-1980's T&T velcro rig.

Todd was still building gear with his brother Troy out of a garage in SoCal when they put this one together.

359

can you post a picture of this antique here?

Old T and T'scool. Had one until recently. Race track like shrivel flap, more flap than rig!!! Boxy like an isuzu troooper. Wish i had held onto it, as well as that old unit 3 which never opened off heading with two minue stack pack. Even packed asymmetrically those bastards opened like square rounds...er...so to speak.

Mine is packed off in storage, so I'm hoping 386 has a pic of his T&T he can post.

359

not to imply that I would actually jump that unit 3, no....no no no no no no...Had a multi bridle..well two anyway...landed much like a round except for the extra forward roll!
Yuri had good story about pegasus...cut it away in arkansas river, and one weekend in West Virginia camping out with river trekkies, saw one had it hanging like a tapestry...he had found the canopy on a raft trip on the bottom of the river downstream from the big bridge out west when there was low water. small world eh? Don't believe Yuri got it back, but for nostalgia would have been awesome gift.

I have three of Todd's early (TNT Rigging) rigs. He always handed them out first in our crew to de-bug before selling them. Two are the oval flap type and the last one had the more modern rectangular flap. And that last one also had that oh so pretty red interior pack tray.

All three are still quite jumpable except they were made to fit the 220ish skydiving canopies we were using back then. Real BASE canopies were still some years away.

BTW, TNT wasn't a reference to an explosive it stood for the two real life brothers who started the company, Todd and Troy. And of course the lineage of the company is TNT Rigging, then Basic Research, and now Apex BASE.

Todd started TNT rigging in about 1988-89. He and Adam Filipino (Consolidated Rigging) were about the only ones building BASE containers in any great numbers, until a bit later when Dennis McGlynn started "Gravity Sports."

Up until that time there were a few other people trying to start BASE equipment companies who sold Hank's big 52 inch pilot chutes, longer bridles, direct bags, and things like that in mail order fashion. But basically if you wanted a BASE rig at that time you'd have a skydiving rigger build you one, or you did it yourself.

And since building a harness from scratch was beyond most people (not having a harness machine) these were mostly "Frankenstein" rigs. A "Frankie" was an old skydiving rig that you picked the stitches out of to remove the container from the harness. Then you sewed onto the harness a very basic four flap piece of Parapak or Cordura. After adding a Velcro flap you had yourself a very basic BASE container. Depending on your skill level some of these were pretty crude but they all worked . . .

I knew a few people that did build harnesses themselves by hand using an awl and a leather palm to push the big needle through the webbing. Ritchie Stein was literally in the middle of doing one in a trailer in Arizona in1984. It was the very night his phone rang with the news that Carl Boenish was dead. Carl was Ritchie's real life mentor (not many can say that) and he went on to BASE jump the crap out of that rig . . .

NickD

I may be meeting Richie again. It has been many years since I have seen him. He's here in Houston. He is an insurance claims adjuster, now married, with 2 small kids.

edit:

he's visiting Houston for work related to destruction from Hurricane Ike. I first met him by chance at a cliff in the southwest in 1992. My god, he had more than 500 base jumps then. And then in 1996, he had nearly 900 base jumps. How prolific!

Tell 'em "Coach" sez hey!

He'll know you mean me . . .

NickD

Yeah, I'm only one object away from having my RS #.

If there's a suitable B in H Town, would you mind giving me a call, and lending Rich a rig for a few minutes?

359

Tell Richie I said hello as well. He helped me get my BASE # in 1995 off a big NPS rock.

I like Nick's usage of the word "DEBUG" in his last post.

LOL, me too come to think of it . . .

All I need is a cliff for a RS #.

NickD

My god his base rig was rode hard and put up wet when i last saw him...years ago at a B.Day. Bet most of those 900 were on that single rig...But, if it ain't broke, don't fix it...

was that one of those red rigs? I have one, it's a converted wonder hog built by J.D. Walker, BASE 37. I made my first 200 base jumps on that scary thing! Intentional aerials were not a possibility.

Remind me to show you a rig I have at home. I'll take pictures and post them also.

It's an Adam rig built in probably 1990? My Interceptor 225 was in it when I bought the canopy.

believe so. small velcro strips. figured it would dump if he farted too hard. If dp's are modern day rigs, his was an old cessna 180 tail dragger

I didn't even bother taking my old 1984 base rig to the exit point at Bridge Day in 2005? (it was the 3rd rig I brought). I thought they wouldn't let me jump it since it looked so ancient, kind of like medicine in the 18th century. Still worked for several hundred jumps for me though, including terminal with a handheld pilot chute. From what I recall, Richie used a Unit canopy which had two attachment points. Interestingly, many of the older canopyies have the things we call cutting innovations today. BASE 175's stratocloud canopy had multiple attachment points and bottom skin air inlets.