Did you use GE Clear Silicone All Purpose Sealant? Or did you use the Advanced Silicone 2 Sealant? Supposedly the Silicone 2 has 5X stronger adhesion and 40% more flexibility. Did you wash/clean the kite seams before applying? It would be interesting to see how long it will hold up. I am going to test my 12m Soul to see it if needs a seam coating.
Nice video. I did it once on a old FS speed3, using seamgrip on seams obly . Hours and hours !
But kite was too old probably and the result was a bit deceiving.
Maybe one day i will paint the seams of my 18m like you did. What is your preference betwenn silicone or other gluing material ?
I honestly have no idea which is the best glue, sealant, I used something called "100% silicone" I can't remember if it's type 1 or type 2, but I think it wasn't the best choice so if you have an idea of silicone or PU or anything else go with your feeling, I think my choice wasn't the greatest. However, the results were fantastic and I'm now enjoying the kite. I didn't wash anything too lazy. My advice is if you are enjoying your kite right now don't touch it. This sort of thing is a last resort, not a tune up to an already working kite.
I do think we need to test our kites more. The way people "fix" kites right now is randomly apply stuff to the surface of the kite all over and then fly it, repeat. What we need to do is find out exactly where the kite is leaking air and fix that spot. It's like the guy at home replacing random things on a car hoping this will be the thing that fixes it instead of the mechanic who tests everything until he finds the problem and fixes only that.
When I have time I'm going to dunk the kite again and do another test for leaks. Before the kite barely held air and it was quite difficult as it would almost completely deflate before I dunked it. Now the kite holds a lot more air so it will be a lot easier to test. It might be a while though since it flies decent right now and I don't have the motivation to test it.
Went back and checked it was in fact GE silicone 2.
Looks like my 12m Soul is in need of seam sealing. When landing after my session today, the kite deflated almost 50% within a few minutes. I did a porosity/leak test on one seam and it was not good. I am going to test some GE Supreme Silicone (window and door) on the seam to see how well it seals and, if it does, do all the seams that leaking.
Maybe even better to put a small strip of tape over the seams if you want to prevent air leaking out at those locations. Highly doubt any coating can cover a 1mm wide gap that you get when there is tension on the seams, it's just 2 pieces of cloth held together by a single row of stitching.
Maybe even better to put a small strip of tape over the seams if you want to prevent air leaking out at those locations. Highly doubt any coating can cover a 1mm wide gap that you get when there is tension on the seams, it's just 2 pieces of cloth held together by a single row of stitching.
the reason the goo works is that the seam itself does NOT leak. There is no air coming out of the seam. If you take a close look at the bubbles, all the bubbles are coming out of the needle holes which get larger as time goes by. So you need to plug those tiny little holes where the thread goes, but the seam itself is ok. Of course it's too hard to goo only the needle holes so in practice this means you good about 1 inch right on the seam.
I don't have a video showing exactly where the air comes out, I might make one sometime, when I feel like dunking my soul again and get a close up shot of the bubbles.
Fill up your own foil kite, dunk it and then watch where the air comes out you'll see what I mean.
Also mind that a wet kite won't leak any air through the cloth, even when it is totally porous. It's the same effect as trapping air in porous cotton cloth like pant and t-shirts: the film of water makes it airtight. So a wet test isn't the best way to find out where a foilkite leaks the most air when flying.
Also mind that a wet kite won't leak any air through the cloth, even when it is totally porous. It's the same effect as trapping air in porous cotton cloth like pant and t-shirts: the film of water makes it airtight. So a wet test isn't the best way to find out where a foilkite leaks the most air when flying.
my t-shirts aren't air tight when they are wet. I'm not sure how else to test the kite but I'm open to suggestions.