Cutting the boot down to size - harnesses are always custom
fitted

My shoulders were suffering from the first few flights with the
Covert and lengthening the shoulder straps was just not solving the problem. For
one thing, the shoulder covering was in the way, restricting how much difference
the shoulder strap adjustment made.

Gerolf offered his advise and he and I hung in my harness without the fiberglass
boot. It is not possible to fly it that way but it showed the possibility of say
creating a new boot out of Styrofoam that was shorter than the standard boot. My
feet have plenty of room up and down at the boot plate so I knew that I could
easily handle a shorter boot.

Reducing the boot length would get me further back in the harness which would
provide the back and shoulder support that I'm supposed to have when the
shoulder straps are at their normal length. By lengthening the straps I was
getting too far out in front of the back plate and losing its support.

Finally, I decided to cut the fiberglass boot box about two and a half inches in
from the foot plate and then put the two sections back together. With Rod
Flockhart's help I was able to use a hack saw blade (not a complete hack saw) to
slice the boot and then fit it back together, compressed by two and a half
inches, very nicely. The only issue was would it fit back in the boot area as
far back as I wanted. I didn't trim down the boot plate, for example.

It didn't go back quite as far as it would if I had completely removed the
smaller section, the end section, that I had cut off, but I was able to squash
it down a ways. Harnesses that use foam boots (like the Moyes Matrix) allow the
pilot to have a very easy way of making this adjustment, just shave/slice off
some foam. But then you lose all this valuable storage space.

After my adjustments I flew the harness today and the problem with my shoulders
went away. We'll see how it goes for the next few weeks, but so far I'm very
happy with how the harness feels and how it is working. Every harness needs
custom work, and it is finally great to get a harness that was actually made for
me and then actually fits, with a little customization. (It's never been the
case before.)