Fast Foil Launching/Relaunching

[Mr Jo Macdonald]

This may not be news for oldtime foilers but I've been practicing a really fast technique of launching and relaunching a foil.
It's great for light wind and also a way of launching safely without being hooked in for stronger stuff.
Wind was 5-6 knots and I was using a Flysurfer mastair 12m. I had to dry the kite after dumpin it in the drink the other night on the way in as the wind died so I decided to give it a go.
Forget hooking in, this will launch the kite in stronger wind, hook in + depower and kite launches but in low wind it just don't wanna know.
Forget pulling the middle blue line to get the kite to stand up too, it's all time wasted in light wind.

Right, with the kite lying flat on its back or sitting on its trailing edge, grab the depower, hold it on to one side of the bar so the kite is fully depowered then give a really good tug on the bar as stepping/swimming back, the kite jumps up and starts climbing. If it tends to stall pump the bar while still holding onto the depower.
I found that long deep pumps were better than short fast ones.

If the kite is going down, let go of the bar and let the leash slow its descent and turn it over so the leading edge is upwards, pull in quick on the leash to keep the kite in the air and as the bar reaches you, grab the depower with one hand and the bar with the other, pull the depower and hold it onto the bar, give a big tug on the bar and the kite will straighten out and start climbing. As the kite goes down slow on the leash it's pretty easy to do this even before it touches down.
I even managed to catch it like this with one tip brushing the beach as it turned back up.
Make sure you've got the bar the right way round, red/white or you can easily steer the kite the wrong way, it doesn't matter if the lines are twisted, just spin the bar when the kite is back up in the air.
When the kite is flying nicely hook in.
Gloves are a good idea when practicing this because grabbing the depower a lot can burn your hands after a while.
Never get caught with yer pants/kite down again.

Anyone tried anything like this with LEIs?

Jo

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Mr Jo Macdonald on 2002-10-27 18:32 ]</font>