mark

The factory mark is set at a little more than 23 inches, so you're about 6 inches short. You'll probably be able to stall it, but you might not get full flight out of it, and the canopy is likely to buck and shudder if you try conventional front riser dives.

When the pilot chute is collapsed, how much kill line is there between where it is tied to the base of the handle and where the line disappears inside the bridle?

Leave them alone. Usually the fraying is just in the corners of the crossport, so it starts to appear more rectangular. If you do nothing, the fraying will tangle, which slows down the rate of future fraying. Do not trim the fraying with scissors or hot knife, since this just results in a place to restart the fraying. In an extreme case that the crossport might possibly tear from top seam to bottom seam, but at most this just puts an annoying turn in the canopy. I've seen this with a couple tandem canopies, and the instructors have jumped them for 8 or 10 jumps before realizing there really was a turn in the canopy that might need to be checked out. Save your money and go jump.

Do not change your decision altitude. You should not depend on the Skyhook or any other MARD to open your reserve canopy more quickly. Most of the time they do, but sometimes they don't.

Okay, if you must. Do not attempt to land it.

You're almost there already. The canopy doesn't have to be flaked to get a decent opening, and it will crush into the same space it will fold into. Get a canopy that doesn't need the brakes set, like Icarus tandem canopies. I'm not sure how to handle keeping the bag closed, but we've done some experiments with no-bag deployments (although the fact that we're still using bags tells you those experiments didn't work out well). The lines don't really need to be stowed in rubber bands; for years we just coiled the lines in the container, then put the canopy on top of the coiled lines. For closing the container, I'm imagining a electrically powered tool like a hand drill instead of a crank ("positive leverage device"). I wouldn't worry about getting the loop too tight, because I've seen a mechanical, jumper-activated loop cutter on a parachute -- Sandy Reid has a WW2 Italian device. You wouldn't be pulling the pin with a ripcord or a pilot chute, although you might use pilot chute drag to trip the mechanical cutter. You'd either need to replace the loop at every jump, but that's something the packing machine could just make from a spool of line.

Partial malfunction: Hold the container flaps together with left hand, pull ripcord with right hand. Throw ripcord away. Peel back flaps. Take canopy and big wad of lines, throw down and in the direction of spin. For a really slow malfunction, might have to shake the reserve a couple time before it's interested in opening. I've done this. Total malfunction: Airborne tuck/fetal position. Pull ripcord. Assist canopy into wind if necessary. I've never done this.

The museum's collection is currently housed at Sunpath.

I'm going to guess it's Jeana Yeager's 22' Phantom in a custom Butler container, used in the 1986 Voyager around-the-world nonstop unrefueled flight.

F-111 or F111. It's named after the Aardvark.

The 2015 PRH had several different authors. Jump Shack got that section.

This is a number from Jump Shack/Racer, and is merely asserted without providing without a source or reference. Although the 2015 PRH implies that the same number applies other rigs, there is no way to to know. There is no TSO requirement.

There is no FAA or PIA policy for the old packing data card to go with the reserve canopy. There is just a reference (I think) in Poynter's Parachute Manual about sewing old cards to new ones. I disagree with RiggerRob, because (a) it doesn't matter for the inspection what is written on the data card, and (b) writing extra stuff on the data card creates additional liability for the rigger who records it. But Rob is Canadian and I'm American, so we might have different perspectives, and there might be different legal issues and requirements.

For the FAA: It is not mandatory, just common practice to have the packing data card go with the reserve. No, you do not violate any US regulation by selling a reserve without a packing card. Not all reserves have a place on the canopy label to show repacks and uses.

14 CFR Part 65.131.c: Five required items on an FAA data card: date and place of packing, rigger certificate number and signature, notation of defects found during the inspection. "Work performed" is not a required item. "Major repair" or "alteration" is not a required item. "Locating previous riggers" is not a required item. The inspection shows the equipment is either airworthy, or it is not.

For US equipment, the packing data card is not a maintenance data card. There is no requirement to use the packing data card to track what maintenance has been done on harness or container.

Remedy: start a new card. The packing data card is not a maintenance log. No required information has been lost.

Doesn't matter how thin the lines are. The spreading force is concentrated at exactly the point where the cascade joins the continuous line, and it doesn't seem to matter much whether the lines are held together by carriers in the outer line or by the very last stitch in the bartack.

I'm not sure this correct. Before there were fingertraps, ParaFlite just bartacked one piece of flat-braided dacron B/D cascade directly on top of a piece of flat-braided dacron A/B line. MC4/MC5 (CT6 for Canadians like riggerrob!) were made like that too. I don't recall any issues with the bartack stitches breaking.

Does the course include attention to detail? Asking for a friend.

The TSO is silent with respect to deployment speed. In most cases, skydiving aircraft are flown at less than 150 mph.

UPT, Mirage, and Jumpshack are all C23b manufacturers, i.e. no TSO weight or speed limits. Sunpath Javelins are currently certified for 300 pounds and 170 knots. The newest RI rigs are certified for 325 pounds and 150 knots. PD makes tandem reserves and military reserves certified for much higher weights than typical solo civilian applications. These require more altitude for opening, so other altitudes (opening, malfunction decision, AAD activation) need to be adjusted upward. Tandem reserves are readily available, and PD military reserves occasionally find their way to the civilian market. --Mark

Almost, but not exactly. The OP doesn't say if he is a US citizen. US citizens jumping in the US must jump FAA-approved equipment packed by an FAA-rigger, regardless of where they are resident.

That's actually what he's doing: the "bottom" he's referring to is the bottom of the reserve container, not the bottom/BOC end of the main container.

That's so cool. Can I be on your ash dive?