Parachutes and pricing

The two kits I'm currently working on didn't include chutes, so I've been shopping around. After doing some obligatory research on TRF I learned Fruity Chutes are "the best," but since I'm not the CEO of a Fortune 500 company I had to keep looking. Seriously, who is paying that much for parachutes when there are a pile of other options?

I kind of liked what I saw from Rocketman and others (decent quality for a fair price) but ultimately went with Top Flight Recovery because A) they look like the chutes I've used in previous L1 and L2 kits and B) good specs and C) good reviews and D) I like their color options. Plus I got 2 for less than half the price of an equivalent single Fruity Chute.

I mean geez if the chute slows it down to the desired FPS and doesn't tangle that's all one can ask for. If a TFR is 1/5 the price of a Fruity Chute, can someone explain to me how a Fruity Chute is 5x better?

There is a time & place for both.. The F chute are fantastic when doing a high alt, minimum diameter, where every inch of space is at a premium. F chutes for the size carry more weight & pack well.
Even larger projects that are space starved can be recovered easily by F chutes. Not that they don't stand alone & excel they do. There is always a market for Ferrari's even if the majority of owners never drive them over 80mph...lol

Top flight is a great chute & value, will do everything the sport flier needs it to do and last the lifetime of several rockets.
In-between is Spherachutes......Wildmans Recon's,& Sky-angle. Just to name a few. They all have a place in the rocket world as you will find out as your journey progresses.

I only use Fruitychutes. I have 7 of them, from 24" to 120". Yeah they're not cheap but they are the best and if you spend a lot of time and money on your rockets it doesn't make sense to scrimp on parachutes.

Check out Bama recovery. He does excellent work and his service is great.

I needed two polyconical parachutes for NXRS and BJ made and shipped them to me in less than a week. I got numerous compliments, the ‘chutes are beautiful and the attention to detail is amazing.

The six foot parachute was for a eight pound rocket and the five foot for a seven pound rocket (very gentle descent on both). Both parachutes totaled $99 with free shipping.

This flight resulted in my rocket hanging from the flag at the end of the flight line.

For my Formula 200 (55# on the pad with an M motor), I looked at Fruity, Rocketman, Tack, PML, etc. I ended up going with a 15' silk military surplus chute for $80. The only drawback is the number of shroud lines. With a Rocketman, you get four. With the military, you get 18. So every so often I need to untie the lines from the shroud, stretch everything out and untangle it, then retie them. Pain the butt? Yes. But it's a great chute, and looks good coming down.

It’s very difficult to do better than Rocketman parachutes for any sizable rocket. Plus, there are enough out there that you can find a good used one in almost any size you want.

+1 on the Fruity Chutes.
If you're trying to fit a 48" chute into the nosecone of a Madcow Tomach, nothing beats a FC Iris Ultra Compact. Yep, pretty expensive...but worth it for that situation.

I'll second rocketman, they pack small, are easy to pack in deployment bags, less to tangle, strong.

Frank

Your other option is to sew the chutes yourself. It's not hard, you can pick the type of chute you want, the weight of rip stop and the size and type of shrouds. I bought all the materials, including D rings, nylon webbing, paracord, ripstop, and thread to make my L3 chutes and so far have made a 9' 24 gore, 60" 12 gore, and a 28" 8 gore all from the $110 of original materials. The down side is the time. I had 40 hours in the 9' chute alone, but hey, it's a hobby and that's what a hobby is for, spend time at it.

Here's a LINK to my build thread for the 9' chute.

Handeman said:

Here's a LINK to my build thread for the 9' chute.

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Really nice, I hadn't seen that thread before. But a lot of work. Yeah it's a hobby but 40 hours of sewing isn't my idea of fun.

Of course many people would say the same thing about 40 hours of sanding.

A good chute is worth paying for.

+1 for Spherachutes. Excellent quality and outstanding delivery times. I also use TF and RM as well as a few customs.

Fruitychutes - for the amount of money spent on rocket, motor, electronics, my time, etc... and knowing the places that I launch are either the salt-flats or hardpan, no soft landings... Spent the little extra to make sure the rockets land gently. Plus once owned, can switch them to other rockets... I guess I see it as an investment, not a cost...

I get the "small pack size" argument. I used to use a synthetic sleeping bag for backpacking but switched to down several months ago. The down bag easily squishes down to a fraction of the size of the synthetic, and after using it I'm a believer that it was worth 2x the price.

I suppose I may get to the point where a Fruity Chute seems like an indispensable recovery option. Until then I'll stick with Rocketman, Top Flight, etc. Necessity is the mother of invention expensive hardware.

I tend to agree with you. I don't get jazzed up by fancy parachutes. If it does its primary job (proper descent speed), that's good enough for me. If the kit come with a chute (rare these days), I just use it, even if it is low-tech nylon parasheet.

I never had packing issues until I started building with fiberglass. These rockets (and the upgraded hardware needed) are much heavier than cardboard and need a bigger chute CdA for the same diameter of airframe. Vicious circle.

I recently discovered bama recovery and I couldn’t be happier! His work is amazing. I had been using topflite for all of my other builds because I couldn’t get over the price of the same size chute from the other guys. That is, until I went ahead and bought one from Bama... I don’t think I’ll go back to cheaper chutes except on the really small stuff. His prices are incredible for the amount of work he puts in. His service is awesome too. I can’t say enough! Hope you guys will all check out his stuff.

DeepOvertone said:

I recently discovered bama recovery and I couldn’t be happier! His work is amazing. I had been using topflite for all of my other builds because I couldn’t get over the price of the same size chute from the other guys. That is, until I went ahead and bought one from Bama... I don’t think I’ll go back to cheaper chutes except on the really small stuff. His prices are incredible for the amount of work he puts in. His service is awesome too. I can’t say enough! Hope you guys will all check out his stuff.

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Link?

8thPaladin said:

Link?

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Here ya go! Pretty good outfit. They go to several launches in Florida. He’s repaired one of my SkyAngle chutes for free.
https://www.bamachutes.com

I've used fruity, and rocket man. love them both and each has their place.

If you're getting Fruity chutes... you probably need it. If you don't need it... you're wondering why anyone would.

RocketFeller said:

Check out Bama recovery. He does excellent work and his service is great.

I needed two polyconical parachutes for NXRS and BJ made and shipped them to me in less than a week. I got numerous compliments, the ‘chutes are beautiful and the attention to detail is amazing.

The six foot parachute was for a eight pound rocket and the five foot for a seven pound rocket (very gentle descent on both). Both parachutes totaled $99 with free shipping.

This flight resulted in my rocket hanging from the flag at the end of the flight line.
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I’m looking at Bama Recovery for one of my projects. Can you tell me, is the star on the orange chute white? Or is it the color on his site that is labeled “silver”? It looks like is has a bit of a silvery sheen to it. BJ has recommended silver for one of the colors in my project, and I’m curious how silvery it really is.

I’ve used Top Flight type chutes for many of my rockets, and they are definitely the most affordable for a given descent rate. But I’ve found that the flat chutes (so-called “parasheets”) tend to oscillate and swing a lot. For some rockets, that’s an issue, and for others it’s not. I replaced the chute on my Warlock due to repeated fin damage. What I ultimately decided is that the damage was not due to a fast descent — it was due to the rocket swinging hard into the ground. I replaced the flat TF-style chute with a hemispherical chute with a spill hole from Spherachutes, and it comes down stable and steady — no swinging. I have another rocket that uses a Spherachute, and it’s the same thing — nice and steady. So that’s one reason you might invest in an upgrade. Spherachutes are more expensive than a comparable flat chute, but it’s a reasonable price, and not as high as some super-premium chutes.

I met Buddy Michelson (not sure of the spelling) at LDRS 37, and I’m planning on upgrading another flat chute to a Rocketman chute sometime soon. He says the design results in very stable descents, and I like the idea of a chute with only 4 lines. To me, these seem like a robust and very functional item that can take some abuse, not so much designed to look really cool as to work well. They seem pretty affordable to me.

Now I’m looking at Bama for 2 projects where I want a snazzy-looking chute specifically to look good. BJ looks like he is making the most customizable and cool-looking chutes I’ve seen. The prices are more than a basic chute, but I’m actually surprised they don’t cost more. I hope he’s making some money on these!

ThirstyBarbarian said:

I’m looking at Bama Recovery for one of my projects. Can you tell me, is the star on the orange chute white? Or is it the color on his site that is labeled “silver”? It looks like is has a bit of a silvery sheen to it. BJ has recommended silver for one of the colors in my project, and I’m curious how silvery it really is.

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I believe that it was called grey, but it definitely has a silvery sheen. It may actually be what he calls Silver, I can ask.

The donut chutes look interesting. How do you determine what size you need?

RocketFeller said:

I believe that it was called grey, but it definitely has a silvery sheen. It may actually be what he calls Silver, I can ask.

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Ok, it’s not super important. I think he is going to send me a pic of the silver material outside in the sun so I can get a better idea of it. Thanks!

captbk said:

The donut chutes look interesting. How do you determine what size you need?

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He has some descent rate charts on the Graphs page. Check out the one for annular chutes. https://www.bamachutes.com/graphs.html