First foil kite flight. Wingtips keep folding and tangling?

[norcom]

After a couple of hours I was finally able to get my Ozone R1 17m in the air today. This was my second attempt flying a foil kite. Spent an hour and a half yesterday without any success before the wind picked up and I rigged a tube.

Today the wind was around 6-10mph; avg about 7mph for a few hours. I was able to get it to launch and fly a few times and then one of the wingtips would fold or catch on some bridle lines and I would not be able to recover it. I tried shaking the bars left/right, pulling on the front lines, sheeting out, pulling the steering lines but once the tip was tangled up the kite came down. One time it did manage to recover only to get tangled up twenty seconds later. This happen on EVERY attempt. It looked like the kite was filled up when it was flying, it felt powered up! I would be flying it around in the window and bam, the tip just folds and catches some bridle lines.

Any thoughts on what I was doing wrong? I'm guessing maybe the kite wasn't completely inflated and thus the tips didn't have enough pressure? Wind was extremely light. Most times I had to do a direct downwind launch just to get it in the air.

Also, the little velcro in the middle of the trailing edge that Ozone uses to hold the bridle system when packing up kept catching bridle lines and closing itself. Not sure if I want to cut it off or keep it open while flying?

[Kamikuza]

What's that in metric? 5 knots? You'll need some skill to fly in that light wind.

A delicate touch on the bar to keep tension on the lines but not choke he kite is what you need, and in 5 knots you'll have to actively fly the kite.

[windrider1]

The very high aspect ratio kites do tip tuck sometimes. The flysurfer sonic does this on launch sometimes But once u get the kite opepend up or moving its good. this can be annoying especially when launching at the top of its windrange but alot of tension on the bck lines at launch resolves it. I believe ozone and flysurfer both hve videos on how to launch these types of kites. And if its your first foil thts wasnt a good idea because thts a kite for an experience foil kite flyer. A lower aspect kite might have be a better choice.

[foilholio]

It could be a tuning problem, the more aggressively cambered the more likely the tips will fold and the harder they are to unfold. You could try moving the knot on the C pulley line ,with Z under it, 2cm at a time up towards the kite or the front lines. This will loosen Z giving more negative camber or reflex and may limit B a bit depowered making the kite sit back more and be more stable. Just make sure you compare both sides so the changes are symmetrical. Having said that tip collapsing and bridle catching is a normal everyday thing for foil kites, some do it more like the higher performance race kites such as your R1 and some hardly at all. Some untuck easy and some don't. Some catch bridles easy and are hard to unstuck and some don't at all. You may as you found have something that catches the bridles, not a very good design, and you may want to cut that bit off like you asked.

Generally to untuck a tip you want to back stall the kite into the window, having a bar with backstall setup is great to do this or to back stall before the kite flies out of the window and then collapses. You can also use the rear leaders like Rob Whittall shows in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUhznfdatmw . The biggest problem to handling foils especially the high performance ones is they fly out of the window, this is actually why they are so high performance in the first place and desirable for this trait. You will want to keep some rear line tension to prevent them doing this. Shorten your rear lines or lengthen your trim or fronts lines so you can do this with just sheeting the bar in. This is what I call backstall on the bar. Some lesser performing foils like the A15 tend not to overfly, but still the trim state of the mixer is a large influence. Even then for the more user friendly foils using backstall during normal riding is of great help. You can drop the kite in and out of the window to generate power instead of turning it thru the window, you can shut the power off in the middle of the window by backstalling it, you can position the kite directly downwind like a sail, you can position the kite as deep as you like to make it more stable or drift better, you can even fly the kite backwards generating power in reverse like on a wave!

[norcom]

Thanks for the suggestions!

I've actually watched that Ozone video many times. Even before the R1 was released. I guess I should have watched it as a reminder before launching today but once there's a breeze I'm just hurrying to the beach. I did skip through the video two days ago but I was only looking for the launch sections to remind myself of how to do that. And I watched it last night but only skipped to the how to pack up section (that was another issues yesterday because of the battens). I guess I should have watched the section on what to do AFTER it's in the air. Third time's a charm?

I see what you mean by pulling the brake handle while shaking. I didn't try that. I did install a brake handle on my Cabrinha race bar and tuned the bar prior to putting it on the R1. The R1 is brand new, so I'm hoping it's tuned as I'm not ready to modify the bridle. The few times I had it flying, I felt VERY powered up. And we're talking 7mph (6 knots). I was impressed with the power compared to my Boost 18m for similar conditions. Granted the flying didn't last long.

I'll keep practicing. The one thing we have lots of here is light wind.

[foilholio]

Don't be afraid to make small changes on the kite. It's just a knot and you can easily move it back, maybe use a measuring tape so you know where it should be and you can make more accurate changes.

There is some more videos but I don't remember them off hand. If you get a stuck bridle on the tip, really violently pull in and out on the bar or the leader, can get it loose.


It doesn't perchance tuck to one side more than the other? Even though you have a new kite it could have defects in it and this would be a sign. Often in the sewing the layers of fabric slowly fall out of alignment, I believe its called registration or something. Well if you can imagine the more cells the more sewing the more chance for errors to multiply in their effect. The result is slowly cell by cell the wing gets twisted. It could also happen that both are twisted near equally in or out. In being more likely to collapse, out less likely. Some parafoils are made from one tip to another, while others are made in multiple parts which is more accurate I am told.

[plummet]

Is this tip tucking while launching?

Or have you fully inflated the kite have it in the air and get tip pucking when flying?

[norcom]

Is this tip tucking while launching?

Or have you fully inflated the kite have it in the air and get tip pucking when flying?

Both? While launching I've had the tip catch and not recover and I've had it launched, in the air, moving it around the window. It felt powered and looked inflated all through. Then while moving it around in the window one of the tips would tuck and catch on some bridle lines.

I think the wind was just too light and I did something wrong. I was worried that it wouldn't stay in the air so I kept trying to move it through the window. Maybe it needed more pressure built up before it could go?

[Mossy 757]

Before you change anything about your bridle tuning, make sure you measure and document the original lengths of everything you're changing. If you need to go back to how it was before, it will be a LOT easier than trying to guess, remember, or check the other side. Some times the kite will fly well and not even match the factory line diagram, so looking at how it behaves and then documenting your measurements is key. If you change too many things on a foil kite at once you won't be able to tell what worked or what made the problem worse. It's just like science, make small incremental steps and DOCUMENT EVERYTHING.

[foilholio]

Good advice. Best to make a "backup" before you change something.

Mossy how have you found the bridle measurements differ from the line plans? I have done a lot of measuring of flysurfers and they all shrink with no possibility of being restretched to the line plan length again, but they can be restretched to be shrunk by the same amount or all even. I am actually going to work out a way ,and make post about it, how to measure a few bridles and use that to calculate adjustments at the mixer to compensate for the bridle changes on the kite. It should make restretching largely unnecessary. I already know lengthening/adjusting Z accounts for most of the bridle problems. It became rather obvious when I saw 20cm shrink on some Z lines.

Norcom launching all foils the tips won't be stable till the kite is fully inflated. You want to hold it on the ground or well downwind until it is 70to90% inflated. This is why I think side of the window launches are just a waste of time, you need to spend heaps of time preinflating and the kite often ends up downwind anyway. I think inflatable riders cant understand how foils can be "hot" launched, it's because they just have so very little pull until inflated or while backstalled and they don't spike with power like an inflatable.