How do manufacturers calculate the sq. footage of a canopy?
There are several methods used. We take the length of the rib from the tip of the nose to tip of tail in a straight line. We then measure the width of all the cells across the bottom skins. Multiplying the two gives us the wing area. This is slightly different from the official PIA method, which differs only in that the width of all the cells is measured across the top surfaces 6″ behind the nose, before multipying by the length. (Our canopies measure slightly larger using this method.) Other manufacturers may use an estimated inflated shape, which yields a measurement similar to our method. At least one manufacturer measures the total area of the top surface. Our canopies would measure huge using this method. There are advantages and disadvantages to each method. For example, the total top surface method would result in a canopy packing very small for its advertised size, and would infact be smaller when inflated than the same advertised size coming from most other manufacturers. None
