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I'm trying to find input on which canopy would be best for me to use in WS Base. I now have a Trango 2 and I'm looking for a canopy with better flare and also a slightly smaller canopy which would give me some more agility. The ones that seam most interesting are the Feather, Lobo and maybe Outlaw light or PD Proxy?
(Ibex does not come in a small enough size)
For those who have experience with these, or any other alternative, which would you recommend and why?

You should consider this before down sizing for the sake of agility:

Do you REALLY want to be under a smaller, faster canopy the day you open up with line twists and a 180? Do you REALLY want more agility the day you need to sink it in between boulders, because you opened low/got an off heading/decided to jump that sweet jump with a tight landing?
I'm not trying to put you down, but you should really reconsider down sizing for the sake of agility- unless you have been jumping a under loaded canopy up until now, of course...

You should really consider the OSP ultralite - it's a great canopy. I love mine and my ws openings are amazing. Get dacron lines and you can jump it all :)

Which slider & pc do you use for ws?

Regular big mesh slider. 38' snatch pc when I fly my Aura, 36' snatch if I fly my T-bird. I've jumped the T-bird with a 38 quite a bit as well, but have settled for a 36 and pull with little flare. I flare my Aura hard and pull during the flare.

They don't make a small enough Ibex?!? I am about 140lb (63kg) and I have an Ibex 230. I used to be a competitive swooper & I'm a bit scared to fly the Ibex into the LZ's that I frequent on WS jumps. It is very fast and has excellent glide and flare, which makes it eat up a lot of ground even on a regular straight in landing. You can also do a 270 on the front risers, no problem. Even a 45 degree front riser carve can result in a ridiculous swoop. [url"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx0s8xk5Zls"]Yaru and I got bored in Europe and started throwing down some freestyle swoops & this was the result. The Proxy is a pretty comparable canopy, and in my opinion neither canopy is suitable for the majority of base jumpers.
I'll take a Outlaw or OSP any day of the week. They are much more docile, less sensitive to asymmetry in the harness on opening, and sink into tiny LZ's with confidence.
Is there a specific reason you want such a small canopy?

More docile is not really what I am looking for. I'm not necessarily looking for the fastest canopy available either, just a slightly higher wing loading than what I have now. The point Heat makes of what is ideal when you are in line twists is valid, in those cases larger and more docile is an advantage, of course. But since my weight is 60 kg even a 200 square foot Lobo does put me right in their recommended range. I'm not aiming to go way higher in WL than what others do. The performance I'm getting out of the Trango is not as good as I believe I could get out of a normally sized base canopy. The Feather is also available in 200, Outlaw has 204, my Trango is 205 (which is a larger canopy since they measure differently) I am confident with a slightly smaller canopy in small LZ, 200 is still large compared to anything I would skydive with.
The question was not should I go smaller or not, I will stay in the recommended WL range, I'm light, so the size will be smaller. The OSP is an option.

you forgot to mention the day you end up with some real malfunction like a lineover or a tension knot...

I find it interesting that people with lightweight canopies still use full size pilot chutes. I understand there is a combination between size of pilot chutes for pulling weight and size of pilot chute due to burble size. Just for numbers sake I would imagine the weight of a lightweight canopy is half the weight of a normal canopy so wouldn't a larger pilot chute with more external force do more damage/open a lighter canopy faster than a heavier canopy or is that a fallacy? To dial in a canopy opening even better wouldn't we then get into more custom pilot chute sizes such as a 30-35 to scale down to get the same ratio of pull force comparable and ideal size to the weight of the canopy and burble protection? Is anyone doing research into this? With the different speeds at which different wingsuits fly at this might be a moot point but just curious. Also, are people flying regular 180s-310+s for the most part fly a 36/38s ws'ing or are people with the smaller and larger wings using larger or smaller pc's?

Thanks Heat for the other reply. Now I am not necessarily directing this question to you, so if others have opinions please feel free to jump in as well!

I've tried different configurations and for me, that's what works best :)
I want to get more into slick tracking again next year. I'll most likely go with a 34 PC on my 225 OSP UL for those jumps.
I've always liked trying out different gear configs and figuring out what works best, again for myself.

I have a friend who jumps a 265 Trango and a 34' with his Jedei2. He didn't really have an answer as to why when I asked him about it

no and yes.
more damage -> peak in force from PC to bridle attachment point, canopy, lines, etc. happens right when it hits linestretch. so so given that the load on the system varies with speed and PC size, no matter what canopy inbetween you and the PC.
open faster -> if by "open" you mean the time it takes to linestretch. yes, of course. and thats actually the critical part. you want to have the PC pull the canopy out reasonably fast, because if it does that too slow the canopy can do all kinds of weird shit on the way to linestretch (like twist and probably catch air here or there). and on the other side, if the PC is too big it ends up ripping the packjob apart when it lifts the canopy off your back, stretching out the centercell, which then again can lead to linedumps, and quite some length differentials in linegroups, etc.

i know that bill booth back in the days did quite a load of experiments to find a rule of thumb for the right pilotchute size, and ended up with a certain timespan (some fraction of a second, i would have to dig it up how much exactly) for getting canopy off and to linestretch, that is the sweetspot for the best malfunction rate.
i do think that the PC/delay tables that manufacturers offer were not pulled out of thin air, and i guess they all did their testing. but now with a huge variety of sizes and also different materials, and even more important, tracking and wingsuiting, those are a good starting point, but if your tracker/wingsuiter just film a few of your openings and see what goes on, since both tracking and wingsuiting speeds can differ massively depending on the jumper and its flying style.
so what i want to say here, nobody can take that testing off of you, you have to do it yourself.

I will just add to what has been said that the recommended size for the Lobo are not the same as for other canopies on the market.
For each canopy you should see and follow the recommendation of the manufacturer.
Because I have seen 2 accidents (one fatal) because of canopies which too much speed after opening (not only the size but also the brake setup) I would not recommend to downsize too much, it's not about the landing, but the time you got with some line twist facing an obstacle. If you are going forward with twice the usual speed in half brakes you have half the time you should to resolve problems.

For the PC I am actually using a 40 for all my jumps (mono tracksuit and wingsuit).
Reason are simple:
- the size of the PC you need depends mainly on your opening speed. For a 3-4 seconds slick slider up you will not use a 36, and it's because your speed is about 75 mph/ 120kmh, after a good glide in wingsuit you are way under this speed so you need at least the same size of PC.
- second is if I fucked up my exiy I can pull in the first 2 seconds and have an efficent PC to get my canopy out, not the best situation but better than hitting the ground with the canopy in.

Using a rear camera is good to see if your PC is too small, you can see the bridle making an arch when the canopy gets out, and the lines too. If you miss some tension here you can get more knots I think.
A too big PC, or too much speed with the PC you are using, will fuck up the packing.

What exactly about the performance are you looking to increase by downsizing? 7 cell f111 canopies aren't really known for getting dramatically more performance the smaller you go, especially if you aren't in an Lz that makes front riser turn a viable option.

As echoed by others already, I'd put the feather and he ibex in the "swoopy" aggressive category. I find the feather has awesome range, and is the less aggressive of the two. I LOVE the way the ibex swoops, but it wouldn't be my first choice for a tight Lz. I jump a 230 and weight about 75 kg, and I definitely wouldn't want a smaller one.

I use a 38zp pc for all my wingsuit jumps, and 34 for tracking. I haven't jumped my sausage in the base environment yet, and haven't really decided what I'll use, but probably the 34.

I just got the outlaw lite 226 and only have 4 wingsuit jumps on it so far. The opening are great and I like the canopy so far. It has less flare power than my bj but it's not bad. Have not been playing with the fronts yet. I use a 36 PC and works great but I do not do monster flares to pitch so my speed is a little faster than most.

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Ultralight 265 Trango-2 by Atair

 
I think people are getting hung up on the downsizing in some kind of unwarranted notion that you need to help me avoid making a bad or uninformed choice. Thanks for the concern but I really do not think it is a problem, a 200 square foot canopy gives me a wing loading of about 0,715, which is not very high.


I do believe a slightly higher WL gives a slightly higher speed, slightly better penetration into head winds and a slightly better flare. Not looking for dramatically better performance, just a little better.
If it's a good design I should still be able to sink it in.

Thanks for the answers so far.
The Lynx mentioned an another thread might be an option.

Things happen quicker on smaller airfoils and shorter lines regardless of wingloading. Same analogy as the small girl who starts skydiving and is 1:1 on a 107. I agree with you on speed, and flare to a point. I've heard many people talk about penetrating winds and things like that, and I often wonder why people are jumping when it's so windy!

Side Note: good point about the size of wing
affecting rate of malfunction and severity....

The smaller a wing is the more any asymmetry,
tension knot, line-over, etc. is going to affect it.

A smaller canopy will take longer to fly as well.

Longer to fly where? Pretty sure it would get down quicker and open faster.

Define open faster? Faster in time or altitude? Some aspects will happen faster due to lighter weight and lower volume. Other aspects will take longer to achieve due to less fabric and a higher necessary airspeed needed to "fly". There is obviously variables between slider up and slider down deployments as well as wingloadings.

^ Agree