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Which kite company could break the speed record?

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philmont
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Which kite company could break the speed record?

Postby philmont » Wed Nov 16, 2022 8:57 pm

What do you think?
Last edited by philmont on Fri Nov 18, 2022 4:41 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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bragnouff
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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby bragnouff » Wed Nov 16, 2022 10:01 pm

philmont wrote:
Wed Nov 16, 2022 8:57 pm
The French Synchro project and the Swiss SP80 project are going at this, but it looks like their main effort is in protecting the pilot in a pod. Seems a little off base and very expensive.
You can't blame Syroco and SP80 for wanting to preserve the life of their pilots. It's not like for the Space race adventure of the 60s where they could use dogs or monkeys in the pilot seats of something completely automated... The pilot's life is priceless! There's also something important about those pods, and it's aerodynamics. If you follow the Luderitz speed challenge, many mention the drag from pilot and equipment as a limiting factor. Hence Erik Beale (1st>40) coming up with some contraptions like profiled helmet and body kit, to increase the aerodynamics of the pilot.

To answer your question, I'd say none. It has drifted away from kitesurfing as you know it. Of course the kites used in those 2 speed record ventures are subcontracted to kite companies, and SP80 is working with GIN, while Syroco is quite likely to team up with F-One to produce their kite, for historical reasons, and geographical practicalities.

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby tkaraszewski » Wed Nov 16, 2022 10:04 pm

It's not a pursuit that very many are interested in. I believe Alex Caizergues is still the fastest at about 58 knots on f-one kites.

Formula kite racing designs are for windward/leeward courses and so a hydrofoil that has the top possible reaching speed isn't useful if it can't go upwind well as well.

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby Matty V » Wed Nov 16, 2022 11:38 pm

The kite isn’t the issue, it’s water state and the soft squishy bit controlling it all.

As for the comments about safety and the enclosed canopy, I think the OP has zero idea what crashing at those projected speeds would do to the human body with no protection or your head sticking out of a fusealarge. An F50 helmet and impact vest. Are not going to stop you snapping your spine or breaking your neck.

Fully enclosed canopies and crash Structures are the only way you can do it and hope to have some survivability.

Cavitating super cavitating, foils at the standard thing that people throw around, saying that they’re the key to going faster, and having a stable platform and grip, but that isn’t what sail rocket used for what is SP80 are looking at using. They used base ventilated foils where the entirety of one side is enclosed in a pocket of air. Maintaining that pocket is what is so incredibly hard as well as having the required power to get the foil working in that state in the first place

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby bragnouff » Thu Nov 17, 2022 2:27 am

philmont wrote:
Thu Nov 17, 2022 1:36 am
Kiters, windsurfers and SailGP racers are crashing at close to 60 knots and they tend to survive.
just to rebound on that particular line. There are probably less than 10 kiters and windsurfers in the world to have ever reached a VMax of 60kts. (F50s haven't yet). Amongst them, maybe one or two did have a crash at that speed. OK they survived, but that is still statistically irrelevant to define a trend... The risk is real. And the cockpit is probably the easiest part of the watercraft to design. There's a huge legacy of cockpit designs that can be tapped into. Also, if that allows all the controls to be conveniently positioned for an optimal comfort of operation, while reducing aerodynamic drag, it totally makes sense to use a cockpit.

Profiled body armour and helmets don't really make sense on a Olympic race where riders do a mix of upwind/downwind starboard and port legs. What you may optimize in one particular part will become detrimental on the rest of the course. There might be some gains, but not extremely significant. It's different on a speed run where you know which direction to optimize (allowing the use of half booms, for instance).
Tactics and racing skills matter much more on an Olympic course than a slightly higher top speed.


Chasing the speed records requires a solid investment in terms of money, time, and dedication (at least 2 out of 3) and the rewards aren't that much, except for a short lived glory and fame. So no surprise the kite companies aren't focused too much on that direction, while there's more money to be made elsewhere.

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby Matty V » Thu Nov 17, 2022 1:45 pm

Sail rocket did not use a super cavatating foil. I don’t know how clear that needs to be made to the OP

I will challenge the idea that people don’t get hurt crashing at speed and also do wonder what speed the op is crashing at to get their conclusions

The other Confusion is the use of hydrofoils because sail rocket sp80 and Syroco are using them in traction not in lift to directly oppose the power source

Kiters aren’t. F50 aren’t

I have spoken at length with Benoit and Paul and both are adamant on safety and the enclosed cockpit

Testing aero reduction on kite racers as pointed out isn’t practical because of the movement and direction changes while racing, speed skiers are doing slalom are they.. also the speed kite racers are going in the grand scheme of things isn’t very quick

It’s a shame you have decided we are naysayers and don’t appreciate what is being said I would point out that probably five years ago, a small, very crazy Frenchman. Hit a vmax of over 67 knots on the canal at luderitz using conventional surface board and a 6 m inflatable kite. The issue was sustained wind speed and water state.
Some of us have been speed sailing a long time, and it might just be worth listening rather than wild theorisation, because I can assure you the practicalities and considerations of sailing at 50 kn are very different to tapping away behind a computer.


I just re-read your last post and I’m done with this now saying that you should be able to go fast without much more effort? Wtf. That’s saying oh go on just try a bit harder…

Talking about how Daniela needs to get Mike to build her something crazy when he hasn’t built race foils for her for the last two years and the speed is that racers go? in the mid 30s, that’s not very very fast.I am not being a dick but it just isn’t A lot of the assumptions you are making are bordering on insulting rather than inquisitive.

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby Baptiste_FR » Thu Nov 17, 2022 2:43 pm

tkaraszewski wrote:
Wed Nov 16, 2022 10:04 pm
It's not a pursuit that very many are interested in. I believe Alex Caizergues is still the fastest at about 58 knots on f-one kites.
Yes Alex Caizergues is still the record holder with 57.97 knots average on 500 meters, it's 107.4 km/h.

The video of the record : still very impressive to watch !

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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby tkaraszewski » Thu Nov 17, 2022 6:22 pm

philmont wrote: Mike Zajicek would take his magic planer to a kite race board and together they would prove me wrong. I doubt it though. I suspect Daniela would ekk out a few more knots and start beating, not just most of the boys as she does now, but all the boys during the St Francis Thursday night races in San Fransisco. I am really, really missing those post race beer drinking discussions in that magnificent dining room in the St Francis Yacht club right now. I wonder if Chip Wasson and Johnny Heineken would buy me another beer to shut me up or because they agree with me. I wouldn’t mind either way.
You're a few years out-of-date, here, but good name-dropping I guess.

Regardless, the idea that Daniela would "eek out a few more knots" is pretty ridiculous. Aero bike gear saves a few seconds per mile. But the bike and rider are the entirety of the system interacting with the air in cycling. There's no 15sq m sail in the air creating drag. The amount of drag that is attributable to the rider as a percentage of overall drag is *much* lower in kiting (or any sort of sailing) than in bike racing or skiing because of, you know, the sails.

Never mind that you don't need to be able to swim in time trial bike gear.

Do you have any experience racing kites? This line tells me no:
philmont wrote: My own experience crashing at high speed when foiling, usually when the hydrofoil and the kite build apparent wind really fast and I wonder how I am going to slow down and everything just wants to go faster
Absolute top speed does not matter very much in windward/leeward racing (formula kite, SailGP, or otherwise) because you spend more time going upwind than downwind. It's a net loss to be one knot faster downwind and one knot slower upwind, you need to optimize for upwind in W/L racing. The idea that W/L racing classes should care about speed sailing records is just not applicable.

As to the original question: whichever kite company Alex Caizergues wants to work with because he's pretty much the only one who cares about this record. If anyone wants to do this, it's going to be about whether the people can, not about whether the kites can.
Last edited by tkaraszewski on Thu Nov 17, 2022 6:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?

Postby bragnouff » Fri Nov 18, 2022 12:45 am

philmont wrote:
Thu Nov 17, 2022 7:06 am

I realize this conversation is getting pulled too far away from my original question, namely “Which kite company could set the world sailing speed record?” So far only nay sayers and segue-ers have responded. I would like to hear from anyone that doesn’t immediately dismiss the possibility and at least considers which company in the kite surfing community is capable of getting past 65.43 knots and if so what this company is doing now that could be used to push past this barrier and into the future.
I did answer that question with "none", because this is gone far beyond what kitesurfing does, and into the territory of specific ventures, targeting only that record. So it's essentially Syrocco, SP80 (and SailRocket before them), none of them being kite companies. And by the way, any such venture has to rely on investment partners to stay afloat for long enough to succeed, it's a tough world...

Kitesurfers could get a speed record if they could afford a lengthy stay at one of the few speed record capable locations, waiting for the once in a few years perfect conditions to align, and with the official timing crew being there and operational at that moment. That was the meaning of time, money and dedication. And it did not happen, because there is not that much spare budget to invest in there, when there is no promised return on that investment.

You seem to be fixated on the idea that kitefoiling as-we-know-it is the perfect platform to get that record, that it's just a matter of having better hydrofoils. That's the part that is being challenged. And even then, those magical foils wouldn't come from a kite company. Armstrong Foils that you initially mentioned as a potential inventor of such a foil is not a kite company. Maybe you needed a better wording in your question.

At the end of the day, this is an open forum, and questioning your very strongly pre made ideas is totally fair game. Naysayers that explain why they say Nay is completely legit, even if that pisses you off.
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Re: C

Postby ham-er » Sat Nov 19, 2022 10:17 am

philmont wrote:
Wed Nov 16, 2022 8:57 pm
C
What happened here?
Account got hacked?


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