Launching Newer Kites

[Guest]

My old Naish AR-5's would launch very easily on the edge of the window. I now have a couple of newer kites (OR Bronco and F-One) and I find especially in light air that they drift back into the window instead of flying up the side of the window to neutral. Someone suggested that I choke down on the de-power strap a bit. I tried it and it seemed to work. This seems counter-intuitive because I thought I needed more power, not less. Is it common for new high-aspect kites to need to be depowered a bit to get them to launch correctly in light wind?

Ed

[toyflish]

I had these problems when I was teaching with brandnew North Buster . Their sail didn't stick on the water like used ones do . So they are right leeward from you and don't move anywhere. After some days that was gone.

Kai

[Ozone Kites AUS]

It sounds like your front lines are a bit long or have stretched. Also you and about a zillion other newer kiters need to understand what happens when you tighten the depower strap.
It is all about the angle of attack, of the kite to the wind. If you lower the angle of attack, by shortening or tightening of the depower strap, then the kites angle to wind is less, and more air slides under the kite making it have less power, and it flies faster, and more to the edge of the window.
Sheeting in, or lengthening the depower strap is the opposite, when the angle of attack is increased too far the kite is sitting at an angle to the wind that allows equal amounts of air to slide over both LE and TE of the kite - this would be a stalled kite, and if the kite goes backwards then more air is passing over the LE, driving the kite backwards.

The easiest way to SEE this as seeing things helps males understand. Get some wooden dowel, 2 pieces approx the same length as the spars (or end struts) in your kite. Drill a hole in the middle of them, screw them loosely to a wall, so they can rotate. Get some scrap line approx enough to make 4 equal length lines, approx 4 to 5M long. Connect the lines the the bar, and connect one to each end of the dowels, as if they were the line connection points on your kite. Put a harness on, hook the chicken loop up to the hook in a way it cannot fall off.
Move the bar in and out and observe what happens to the dowels, this is what happens to the tips of your kite when it is flying, and you can see that the angle of attack of the LE changes as you move the bar in and out.
So if you put horizontal lines on the wall, that represent the wind, you can see the the dowels rotate and their angle to the horizontal lines change.
The closer the dowels get to being paralell, the less power the kite has, and the faster it flies, closer to the edge of the wind window.
I hope that helps, anyone is wellcome to add to or edit this to make an even better explanation about the Black art of kite tuning!

I am going to make a model for my shop based on this post, I will send pics when I am happy with it. Another version could be used outdoors to check optimum line lengths, sheeting length, etc?

My old Naish AR-5's would launch very easily on the edge of the window. I now have a couple of newer kites (OR Bronco and F-One) and I find especially in light air that they drift back into the window instead of flying up the side of the window to neutral. Someone suggested that I choke down on the de-power strap a bit. I tried it and it seemed to work. This seems counter-intuitive because I thought I needed more power, not less. Is it common for new high-aspect kites to need to be depowered a bit to get them to launch correctly in light wind?

Ed

[WILCO]

I had it also, when converting from a 2001 BT 9.4 (back-line flyer) to a SS Fuel 2003 13m (front-line flyer). It's just that the newer kites, fly more onto the front lines and are still able to beeing steered...where as the old back-line flyer's only respond well to steering inputs when you pull the back-lines tight. So that's what you're trying to do with your new kite also, but it will only "choke" the kite, so just depower a bit and it flies off

[Youtch]

Thanks Kitepower, you're the king!!!

Pity that you're school is so far away...

This is exactly the kind of difficulties I faced when I first flew the Storm II.
I thought like Milco, as if I had lost all my skills flying kite.

I was oversheeting in to give power to the kite which make it stalled. Now I try to minimize the pressure on the bar and it tends to fly better.

I'm happy to see that my questions about new high AR profile got finally addressed thanks to you Wilco.

[kiteboarder@pacbell.net]

"ed2572" wrote:
I now have a couple of newer kites (OR Bronco and F-One) and I find especially in light air that they drift back into the window instead ...

If you really do mean launching (off land, not RElaunching off water) then the trick is to watch the unsanded tip as you step back & start to tension its lines. If that (upper) tip tries to move downwind it means you're standing too far downwind, & need to step upwind a bit. If that tip tries to move upwind, take a step downwind until it wants to go straight up, THEN pull back & launch.