HI
Thanks for the praise but the rebuild is only engineering and time, although for the effort I could have built a kit from scratch, would have cost a bit more but.
As for the test flying they are a proven design and it is built to plan, nearly, all the important parts are. So we will cross check everything and take little steps. It seems, I think that if the test is going to go pear shaped it tends to be on take off or landing so the chute is not much help. I might take a EM pack anyway but getting out of the cockpit could be fun. In my youth, in the military, Your avatar looks intriguing but can't read the sign. I have done 600+ jumps both tethered and free fall in the days when we changed from round to para-vane had some quit interesting times with bad deploys and rope overs they seem to work a lot better now days. So what am I saying, the test flight shouldn't be too much of an issue if the preparation is right and well planned. Hope so anyway.
Cheers
David