Basejumper.com - archive

Well.... my primary interest with base is terminal tracking and wingsuit base. I know Ill have to do the tatter totter before I can head out to Norway. Here is the gear question. I got a raven modified for base from the loft I apprentice at. I figure that thing is going to be good enough for a couple of jumps from the tatter. So I was thinking of investing into an LD2 rather then buying a perigree pro, a zak2 or gargoyle....So at first Id probably just use some cheap vlecro rig to learn to base jump and have my baller set up for the big walls in Norway next summer.... any thoughts? Am I the kid thats buying a velo because he doesnt wanna spend money on a crossfire?

with the cost of decent used gear I would just get a basic used p-pro/zak with a standard main ( ace/ troll). either jump it a lot till your ready for norway and sell it for an LD2 or keep it and then buy the LD2. I really would not count your health on a modified raven with the low cost of good proven base gear. decide to jump the tater in marginal winds and end up in the rock garden with a mod raven, good luck. not something you want to mess around with. buy the right gear and take your time, the walls in norway will be there for a while. if u cant afford decent gear, u certainly cant afford a trip to norway or the beer in norway anyway. if u cant afford the beer, what is the point ?

.
correlate your value on your life to the quality of your gear. Practicing high jumps on the potato aint really the way to go. You obviously are not in the pioneering mode, So where is your mentor and why did you disagree with him? PM if you feel more comfortable.
Take care,
space

The LD2 only makes sense if you're getting a Trango in there and that would leave you with SU only rig. Probably not good call for your first (proper) rig if don't happen to live underneath terminal wall. Have you considered the Hybrid2 from Adrenalinebase? It is still very low profile and lightweight but has the packing volume to take standard canopies (Troll etc) and is suitable for SD jumps as well. That way you could practise with your initial rig from your local objects and still enjoy the benefits of lighter rig with low profile next summer.

planning on WSing Norway next summer might be a bad idea as well.

have you read up on a reasonable WS progression? how many WS skydives do you have? how many BASE jumps do you think you will have? what WS do you have?

initial training can be hazardous, especially if you want to pound out jumps and gain experience to WS BASE. is that the time to go cheap on gear?

what happens if you actually like the non-terminal wall stuff? with zero experience, how do you know what is right for you?

I'm thinking showing up at Norway to jump a new cliff, with a WS you have never BASE jumped, with a new rig, with a limited number of BASE jumps has DANGER written all over it.

but hey, it is BASE. you get to make the call and live/die with the consequences.
jumpers have found several ways to get on The List while jumping that "safe" cliff. there is always room to add another...

I started out in Norway this summer and spent two weeks doing my first 15 jumps. I however prepared myself. I had done a lot of tracking whilst skydiving and have been lurking on these forums since 2007 just reading and trying to learn. I also invested in good kit. Bouncing because you bought cheap non specific kit is so not worth it. Even though I have done WS from a plane I would not even consider going off a cliff till I had clocked up a couple of hundred WS jumps on the same suit. My recommendation would be to have fun sorting out your tracking and Norway will do that and think about WS when you have some general BASE experience. I am now learning all over again how to do low stuff in England and it is awesome in a totally different way. Mate just enjoy the slow progression. I have a long way to go and intend to love it all.

I think I was misunderstood.... I have no intention of WS any time soon... thats just the goal in the distant future (2-3) year...neither do I have any intention of doing a lot so SD stuff...for the most part the SD will be bridges... then again I dont know who Ill meet and where those people are gonna drag me out to and how I am going to behave myself.... neverthless if my goal is only tracking off of terminal walls, is this such a bad idea considering I will have a slider up velcro rig with a raven?

Why would you not intend to do a lot of SD? There are so many good SD objects to be jumped!

So at first Id probably just use some cheap vlecro rig to learn to base jump

correlate your value on your life to the quality of your gear. Practicing high jumps on the potato aint really the way to go. You obviously are not in the pioneering mode, So where is your mentor and why did you disagree with him? PM if you feel more comfortable.
Take care,
space
I know this is a repost but what part of "bad idea" do you not understand?
Take care,
space

sounds like you are leaving the door open to SD jumps.

buy the best gear you can afford. it might save you a hospital visit.

if you buy quality stuff, you can sell it if/when you outgrow it. it will also maximize your safety.

why is this so hard to understand?

or it will keep me from jumping technical SD stuff to begin with... What I'll do is this... Ill skydive a troll or bj and my raven and compare them... if I can handle both fine Ill stick with the raven... if not ill buy a decent base canopy

why ask if you have already made up your mind?

You asked "Is this a bad idea?"
My answer > Yes.

Actually before even reading your post I was pretty sure what the answer would be just from the subject line. If there is any doubt - there is no doubt.

However, keep asking other people and eventually you'll get someone to give you the answer you want.

what about the inflation characteristics? there is a reason manufacturers added vents to the bottom skin. you will NEVER understand these traits by jumping out of a plane.

I know a jumper who went cheap & jumped a Raven. he never really got into BASE, was nervous, and the Raven inflated very poorly. the jumper locked up, and slammed into a few objects. he lost a foot in the process.

but it looks like you only want to hear ONE thing. if you don't want to listen, odds are higher you will get injured.

fine.. Ill scrap the raven.

You'll thank yourself when you're standing at the exit point. There's a lot more to think about than gear fear..

What up? The Idea of saving money in a sport as this not so good, but Ravens rock.
Take care,
space

well thx for the conflicting input tracey :)

+10000000

 

Out of curiosity....Whats the major difference between your standard 7 cell reserve and base canopy beyond the obvious (such as reinforcements, vents and slider). Just curious. @Crhis...did you read my original post?

Velcro makes a just fine slider up rig.

Too bad LeRoy burned in. You two would have gotten along great...

to all the people ragging on the ravens...
have you actually jumped one? seen one?
those ragging are probably the ones who gave me shady looks in kl, and then proceed to land their hi performance base main on the water tank, while i put the ragged raven down on the runway in quite a bit of wind.

while i would definately not recommend it to a beginner, for an more or less experienced jumper as a cheap backup or third rig it is just fine.
openings slider off, with a correct deep brake setting are on rails, and by deep i mean almost matching the A lines. for my weight at least, on a 4. pressurization is ok around 2 sec, 3 and after looks a bit strange hard to describe, strange pressure waves flowing through te whole wing. you know what you'll get on a go and throw, a nice jellyfish.
subterminal: ok, had one 180 off so far, but thast was body position.

the funny thing is that by far the worst and inconsistent are the wingsuit deployments, the environment i usually bought it for originally.man i got all sorts of funky openings under a wingsuit.
all with a standard slider size, large mesh'ed.
i have jumped it as low as 270 feet and while it is of course a bit mushy it is not much worse than an mojo.
concerning the opening.
landings and approaches need more feel as it is a bit zippy and groundhungry at times.
also i wouldn't want to land it in super deep brakes...
but as a daily driver for easy objects it is my choice to save on my "good" canopys.
i would prefer any base specific canopy over it of course but in the second or third row it does its job just fine.
now keep talking, internet jumpers.

how high do you load it?

do youself a favor and get a real canopy.
no problems with a velcro rig that is well maintained, but get a decent canopy.
i had 300 basejumps and 1000+skydives before i started jumping ravens. it is not the canopy to figure things out. you will put yourself into the corner starting out, no way around it, evryone makes mistakes. and if you do you want a problem solver above you, not a potential problem causer with a funny stall recovery behaviour.
i load it at 0,74 considering the factory specs of 282 sqft.
it is smaller than that though.

nur neugierig :)... ich kauf nen seven

quick question about canopy choice... So I talked to steve at apex and he highly recommended I get a canopy with vents, another experienced jumper in Perris said so as well. Both said even if my main interest is terminal base. As far as I understand it, vents provide faster and more consistent pressurization, allow to canopy to sink more effectively (deeper stall point...canopy can act as round), and allow the canopy to remain inflated when the nose is pinched off because its against the object you just jumped from. So why do I ask? Well cuz Im an idiot that gets fixated on certain ideas.. I want the seven, its sound like a very nice canopy. Good and consistent pressurization, deep stall point, easy to pack...from what I have read so far people that jumped it liked it. So how bad of an idea is the seven, taking into account that my main interest is terminal base?

The seven is a great choice. Worlds better than a raven because it is a built for base jumping canopy. I have heard the seven actually opens as fast (if not faster) than most vented canopies.

I actually have one in the mail. I'll let you know if I would recommend it or not... but I am sure I will due to all the good reviews it has gotten.

Jumping slider down with a surfboard while wearing a wingsuit makes little sense.

I have always been a big fan of the raven. But it is interesting to me that you want to use it only until you go terminal wall jumping in norway. terminal is where the raven performs the best.

seems to me you have it backwards. get a nice vented canopy for everything around here and then use your raven when you go for long hikes to big terminal cliffs with nice LZs. you will find the raven to pack small, be lightweight-ish, and open consistent at terminal without ever spanking you.

And if you are looking to save money. yes. velcro is awesome. Ideal for learning because it is easier to pack and you wont be doing any of the stuff that velcro is not best for anyway (aerials beyond 5 seconds, wingsuiting etc...) you just need to be in tune with your velcro rig and know what it can and can't handle.

I don't really want to start up a new thread so I'll ask in this thread. Is a more low proilfish rig like the Hyrbid2 or the Snekor appropriate as a first rig (dedicated to terminal jumps mostly but with the occasional slider down jump). I have a Seven on the way in case you haven't read this thread. I called flyyourbody and was told yes. What are the downsides of a low profile rig?

flyyourbody told you it was a bad idea to purchase as snekor as a first rig? That sounds odd.

I am currently teaching a kid how to base jump and his first container is the snekor. My argument is that, while the one downside is that any low profile rig is more difficult to pack, the advantage of getting used to toggles in the shoulder strap mounted position (aka, invincibility toggles) is invaluable.

This toggle mounting position allows quicker input on the toggles on all jumps with and without a wingsuit. one can also pack the toggles onto the risers, the traditional way if preferred. I do that on some of my non-wingsuit jumps because I have 800 plus jumps with toggles mounted in that spot and the muscle memory is tough to override. I wish i had started with the toggles in the shoulder strap position from base jump number 1.

the yes referred to the prior sentence not the subject headline of this thread...sorry for the confusion

I cannot comment on Snekor but have seen a lot of Hybrid2's around and jumped one on some jumps. A short answer to you question is "yes" (if it's suitable for a first rig). It is a bit more difficult to pack (mainly because of the through loop) but apart from that it does the job like any other 2-pin. The real question however is that what is the benefit of getting low profilish rig as a first container? It doesn't come standard with 3-rings but if you use it as overall rig you might want to get that option. It adds more cost to your rig and weight as well. You end up probably paying more than for example Zak2 and for pretty much no benefit. The weight difference is there but with 3rings etc options it probably isn't noticeable. Difference in aerodynamics? Since it is your first rig, surely not your biggest priority. More difficult to pack as well. The only remaining benefit of course is the coolness factor because all the big boys in youtube have thin rigs as well and so should you. :)

So seriously, if you get good deal on Hybrid2 or Snekor it most likely will serve you well. But I would not recommend burning any extra buxx (over a traditional 2pin) to get one since you will not be noticing the benefit.