Recently, several people have stated that the all–fabric Vector II reserve pilot chute doesn’t work as well as mesh-bottomed pilot chutes. This is simply not true. I made mesh-bottomed reserve pilot chutes for 15 years, and it is not reasonable to assume that I would put out a new product that was inferior to something I was already producing. There had to be a reason to make the change, and the reason is this:

Spring loaded, mesh-bottomed pilot chutes have a nasty habit of hesitating, and bouncing around on your back, when you deploy in a stable body position. (And who doesn’t want to deploy his reserve in a stable body position?) We learned to deal with this problem on main deployments by “sitting up” or performing other gymnastics at pull time. Problem is, because of my invention of the hand deployed pilot chute, many jumpers today have never had to deal with a spring loaded pilot chute, and don’t have a clue about how to “break the burble”.

So I set out to reduce hesitations on spring loaded reserve pilot chutes, and the all-fabric Vector II pilot chute does just that. Of course, I wouldn’t make that statement without proof, so I offer this video, made in 1986. As you will see, it actually inflates faster and hesitates a lot less than its mesh-bottomed cousin.