Basejumper.com - archive

Hi,
I am a little worried about hard landings and injuries under F111 canopies with a weak flare compared to skydiving canopies.

For my FJC I can use a FOX 245 loaded at 0,72.
I know the FOX is a well proven canopy, but are the newer design canopies like Outlaw, Flik or Troll with ZP nose a lot better in terms of flaring (and glide) ?

Does the steeper approach on BASE canopies require a different flare than on a steep skydiving canopy (in my case PD Storm at 1.2), like start the flare higher up ?

Weak flare?

I wouldnt worry about that sort of thing the fox will be fine u really would have to try hard to fuck yourself up.....ive seen non skydivers ground launch 25 year old ravens off a mountain and flare the landing fine and this was there first intruduction to flying a parachute.......

how many skydives do you have? how many canopies have you jumped in your quest to BASE? what kind of prep have you done to get ready?

700+ skydives. Canopy Progression is Silhouette170 after getting licenced, about 350 jumps on a Pulse170, 50 on a Storm150. Various tandem canopies.
Prep so far is tracking a PF standard TS for 50 jumps (got 250 WS jumps as well), 3 balloon tracking jumps. Planning to skydive a BASE canopy before the FJC. Watched some jumpers at Brento exit&LZ, some of them had crappy landings even though being experienced. That's why I asked.

Wait u have over 700 skydives and the most hectic skydive canopy u fly is a storm 150 at 1.2loading?....as in roughly 70kg in weight and only progressed to a 150? My calculations most likeley askew

Yeah I'm in no hurry to downsize.. seen too much shit and don't like to break myself.

And I don't like landing off (especially in Lodi ) and prefer a bigger canopy that gets me home from a bad spot. Demoed a Storm135 though for 5 jumps and liked it.

You should be fine. Maybe flare a tiny bit higher than you normally would, but youll be able to feel where the stroke should be during a practice flare. I like a little front riser for some speed to increase the flare. I swoop my base canopies all the time and can pop up still after dragging a toe. You can get way more out of a base canopy than you think.

One way to look at it is a base canopy will be like an oversized skydiving reserve....at your jump no im sure u have landed a reserve and managed it....skydiving reserves used to be used in base all the time and still are used by some.....at the end of the day there all f111 canopies at low wing loadings
.....

Watching some randoms have crappy landings is a reflection on them not on BASE canopy's in general, sky jump it once and you will be fine

Ok good to know. I once demoed an Optimum143 reserve at the PD demo tour in high winds and was surprised that it had almost zero forward speed into the wind compared to my Storm, almost got caught off guard on base leg over the parking lot

You will be totally fine- you have more experience than most people do when they start anymore. You won't be flying in high wind environments (hopefully) either. Don't overthink it, its a huge fucking parachute!

I don't have that many skydives but pretty close Im on a 135 loaded at 1.3 and don't plan on downsizing anytime soon but I wing suit 95% of my jumps

Thanks for your answers guys!

there is nothing wrong with not having the wish to downsize at skydiving - i don't understand why others are irritated of this fact.

with many jumps on big canopies you might be even better prepared for landings with basecanopies than on small ones. but jumping really small crossbraced canopies will help to get a better symmetrical harness load on openings wich also can lead to less problems in base enviornment.

in base you will always feel that canopies are having a little less flare power than in skydives, reason is easy: the more wingload, the more flare power. the less wingload, the less flare power. but i wouldn't choose a smaller base canopy for better flares. you will get used to it easialy after some jumps. you will only get hard landings if you miss the flare timing - same as on skydives too - just that the reaction is delayed so you need to ajust your timing.

to your question: every canopy is loosing flare power the further it's live span goes. ZP leading edges help to slow down this a little bit. i personally feel that vents help to improve better flare power too, but i had discussions with other jumpers that belive the opposite. but overall, i don't think there is too much differences in flare power on the different canopies on the market.

canopies i have jumped and my expierence is based on: Troll, OSP, Trango 2, Trango 3, Ibex, Ace

I did 20 jumps on a X228 - an old 7 cell F111. It had fuck all flare and my landings really sucked. I think I busted a toe standing it up when I should have PLF'd.

When I started skydiving my brand new Fox I found it had a beautiful flare. The flare felt like my Sabre2 in comparison to the X228.

I went over 2,000 SKY jumps before I used a reserve.

I do not think/believe vents help with the flare.

Smaller SKY parachutes (higher wing loading)
also enables one to jump in stronger winds.

One of the difficulties for new BASE jumpers is
getting used to "zoo" toggles, meaning your
control lines run directly from your canopy to
your hands, versus through the guide rings
which acts as a fulcrum and give you some
small mechanical advantage to your inputs.

My advice usually is to be more aggressive,
strong, full body input, not just your hands but
also include arms and shoulders, man-handle
that big F1-11 boat like you're driving a big
old truck without power steering.

Ooh, and one last thing, buy and wear boots!

It's not really a "new v. old" canopy question. Some of the newer canopies have weaker flare, and some of the older ones have stronger flare.

If you want the strongest possible full flight flare look at the Lobo or the Proxy. There are other trade offs, though, and in my mind strength of full flight flare is further down on the priority list, behind sink ability, glide ratio, and part brake flare.

You're over thinking the issue of flare. skydive once, do a few practice flares up high and then prepare to PLF on landing.

Eh, there isn't really a mechanical advantage. It's actually the opposite, the ring adds friction and increases the force required to deflect the tail. It also absorbs some of the input provided by the canopy about how stable/pressurized it is and how deep you can sink it without stalling. That's why freestyle/acro PG pilots fly without pulleys.

On the other hand: A little mechanical advantage of guide rings is lowering the risk of brake fire on opening with high deployment speed in skydiving... and if you do lose a toggle, you can simply reach up and grab it vs. having it dangling out of your reach and having to land only with rears.

Didn't Zoo Toggles get introduced in the first place to deal with a possible line over easier?

Yes, "Zoo Toggles" (also called the Line Release Modification) is meant to make clearing a line over easier and faster. Losing a toggle is a real possibility, making practice landings on rear risers a good idea for training (you can practice this in the skydive environment too, with the control lines still inside the keeper rings). Two methods of dealing with a lost toggle are flaring on both rear risers, or flaring with one toggle and one rear riser (you will keep the remaining toggle in your hand in both situations though).

Personally, I've only done it one time, and I used both risers, because I didn't feel comfortable that I could symmetrically flare with two different inputs in a high pressure situation. It was a pretty hard landing, but you can certainly stand it up. I think seriously underloading my canopy (0.6ish) probably softened the landing dramatically.

Exactly. The 0-3 fabric does not have the same dynamic flare that ZP fabric does so start flaring earlier. This is the same reason you see people burn in trying to land their reserves. At 700 skydives it won't be long before you no longer notice the difference.

Who calls them "zoo toggles"? Literally first time I've heard that in almost 10 years of jumping.

I have only heard that term used by two very old people
both of whom started jumping before I was born in '72.

I have read the term "Line Release Modification" but I
can't recall anyone using that term verbally in person.

What do you call them?

Almost no one because no one has them anymore. Line release riser set up is not a zoo toggle.

I used to have one toggle but can't seem to find it so it's probably gone. It was a pin release toggle. The release was on the actual toggle. They were not very secure.

I have a toggle that stows the standard way and it has a straight pin that stows along side it. Both are used when stowed properly. However, it doesn't release for a line over. The pin is used to stop the toggles from coming prematurely unstowed during opening on a SD jump. It is on a container I have from 1992. I'm sure old people like Tim have seen them before. ; )

Ody

Fronts for safety!

There are no bad canopies, only bad canopy pilots

Like the good doctor, I've never heard them called Zoo Toggles before either. Conversationally I say "Line Release Mod", "LRM", or just describe them as "not routed through the guide ring".

I have a set of pin toggle risers (picture attached), that I recently got with a Mojo I bought. They aren't related to the line release mod, however I think you can certainly configure pin toggles to be used with a line release mod.

I got similar ones somewhere off a old reactor container with a mojo theres a pin beside the usual toggle stow so the top of the toggle stows like normal but the pin parallel to it has its own stow to but the pin is what the brake seting uses

Just fly the canopy all the way to the ground.