Hey guys I need your help. I have a problem with the bladder on my 2013 NRG, it started losing air pressure after my least session. Doing an ear test, I was able to find the air leak, its close to the very tip of the wingtip (see pictures).
Interestingly, after pulling out the tip of the leading edge bladder and packing it back in, the leak stopped leaking without any additional work - seems to have self healed somehow. It now holds firm air pressure for 1+ hour without loss and the audible air leak is gone. Still, it has a nipple that clearly means its a problem.
My Liquid Force kite came with a self repair kit that includes a small bladder patch and some type of adhesive. The small patch has a light sandpaper backing with a 3 sentence intrusction print that says lightly rough up the bladder, apply patch, and bam you're done.
I was considering applying that in lieu of ironing the bladder.
Should I use the patch, iron it, do nothing and see if problem re-emerges? Right now I am leaning towards the stick on patch since the bladder is holding on its own - I've taken it back out, re-inflated, put it back in, re-inflated like that (so I can see how it does under pressure inside of the LE), etc and the leak just isn't there anymore altho you can visually see the nipple.
On a side note, pumping, deflating, and re-pumping a 16m kite is exhausting work - I really need an electric pump lol.