came across this product - they add a couple of inflatable tubes - blocks to a foil kite - I think a long one down the main air intake and a couple on the leading edge....they claim it helps prevent bowties and stops the kite sink
ing when down a long time.
I've had very few swims the last few years and have managed to fix bowties ......have a look
Logically, simplifying bridles would be the next step.
It would be great material to post 3 month from now. Hopefully smiling would be somewhat easier by then
Local Beach: Brancaster Norfolk 46 miles- just need a hard beach
Favorite Beaches: mablephorpe , cleephorpes uk-just need a hard beach
Style: landboarding with a petzl work harness
Gear: old blades and old flysurfer's , ckb/dex carbon landboards, modified airdeck and a home made snow board with barrel wheels ,soul's , spd5's. over 30ish old blades all set up to go ,i like a bit of old skool
pumping a foil up ,how would you self land it ? no back stalling i take it , 5th line ?, but a great safety feature for kite surfers if ya swimming is dodgy just need a mate to land it
it looks like only one rib and a few bits in the leading edge so the kite behaves like a foil- so will still reverse launch - might be worth giving a go for those light wind hydrofoil days
I use thin plastic bags in my Peak 4 sometimes. I cannot relaunch that kite in waves or light wind and do not feel safe riding it at sea with strong currents or offshore wind.
It allows the kite a chance to relaunch, or at least float pretty much forever and be rescued or swim out.
I just use 2 white thin binbags, blow them up so they stay in the leading edge of the open cells. Then tie them down do they won't litter if they come out. Takes about a minute to do, and I can still land the kite harmonica style.
Foil kites are light, you dont need a lot of floatation to add some safety.
Here's a video of me filling the entire kite with water, and still floating on top of it to swim out.
Ever heard of the windtools mosquito kites - from back then , probably 20 years ago? You could add tube floats back then. What a monster it was...
I loved those things, except as a two line kite, they flew better and relaunched just fine without the tubes installed. I had a 9.5 and 7.5 meter, and I learned on them.
I had the 9.4 and 5.5. That 9.4 was a beast. The bags were a great invention and using condoms as air intake valves was interesting and worked very well. Loved those kites in their time.
These users thanked the author loco4viento for the post:
The Gin Marabou leading edge and sides are self inflating. They have designed the air intake to go one way. this is key for the kite to relaunch
It’ relaunche´s faster then a a traditional LEI kite, and it delivers all of the advantages of a traditional Foil kite.