Spence Watson

July 11, 2012

Just for the hell of it, I put together a 5 stack of B2s. Here's video from its second flight:

June 13, 2012

I'd agree on 90#. I do not actually own any outdoor line sets other than 90#. Some people use 50# when the wind is really light. As far as 150# goes, I've been pulled down the beach and had the bridle break before breaking a 90# line set. Now days, because of the presence of the Xtra Vent, 150# line is unnecessary unless you are in some sort of tropical storm.

As for what works for team flying, there's not really any particular reason for standardization. 90# is the all around standard for rev flying in general, so any teams end up using that weight any way. Would there be an issue of people on a team are using different weight line? Not unless it is an extreme difference, no.

June 4, 2012

Thanks. I've only ever broken one spar (must not be flying enough, huh?) and had difficulty figuring out the specs for a replacement. I do see on the Kymera listing at The Kite Shoppe that it says the spars are Sky Shark, but doesn't specifiy beyond that. How am I to know what type of spars I'll need before I buy a kite? Or even after I buy, is the information printed on the spar (like this)?

Yes, any Skyshark rods are printed exactly like that. The stock rods in the Kymera are P300. If you ever break anything on pretty much any dual line, Theresa from The Kite Shoppe is very knowledgeable about the specs for a bunch of kites, and can guide you through the process of repair.

Anyway, I think I am settled on the Kymera.* (I wonder when lime will be back in stock? I've already got red and blue in my kite bag.) I do need to pick up a line set (the Quantum's is 85' of 150#), and that will get me even further over my preferred budget. The Kite Shoppe recommends 120' of 90#. I see they sell exclusively LPG line. What would be the difference if I bought, say, ITW's 200' of 90# and made a set about 100' long (and cut/sleeved it myself) at around half the cost? Is it not pre-stretched? How would losing 20' of line affect flight?

Sorry, I 'm just full of questions.

The line sets from The Kite Shoppe are great. The lines that I use are 85' and 120' 90lb LPG. Laser Pro is a great line, and that's all I ever use. Granted, LPG is very much the standard for quad line flying, as is my focus, and as I understand it, the benefits of LPG are not as important on dual line, and some even prefer Shanti, which is another fine brand.

Theresa's process for making line sets is great. Every set is pre-stretched and perfectly equal. I am unfamiliar with Kent's (ITW) process, but I'm pretty sure he pre-stretches and all that as well, and I've never heard a single complaint about his lines.

As far as cutting down a 200' line set to make a 100' line set, just remember that some of the line will be used up when tying new loops and the like. So, a 200' line set would not be cut down into two 100' line sets, but maybe more like 100' and 90' or something. This is perfectly do-able, and my only concern is whether or not you are flying alone. If you are ever wanting to fly with someone else, you will want your lines to be close in length. 120' is the team standard for quad line, and I think the most common lengths for dual line are ~120' and ~85'.

* Edit: I dunno, the Silver Fox is looking pretty good now. And it conforms to my budget better. Gosh, I'm so indecisive. Wait a min...yes, yes I am. The simple answer is to buy both. j/k

So, the 2.5 vented has the same lower wind speed range (because of the "channelled tunnel", I presume)? What's the downside to a vented kite, then?

Sorry, I don't know enough to be able to answer this bit.

May 31, 2012

awesome video spence, I really like the way you guys make them dance like that, I hope to be that good someday. I was wondering how well the kymera holds up to hard hits like when your learning? I have bought kites at the store since I was little and was never able to fly them I had a dozen plastic stunt kites that never left the ground lol, but this last weekend I was at the coast camping and went to see the wizard in cannon beach, I ended up buying an air vantage kite for $30 and took it to the sand and I had a blast flying it. the kite seemed to actually perform well for a cheap kite, but I have no comparison, I did crash quite a few times and it held up well in the sand so thats where I'm at as far as buying an expensive kimera and wasting it learning what might you recomend? also I see a few videos posted of flying at p.i.r. is that a good local spot for some good wind?

Well, if it's any consolation, I learned on a Kymera. I had flown dual lines a bit about 5 or 6 years ago, but had abandoned them in favor of revs, so I wasn't completely learning from scratch, but I was never very proficient with a dualie back then anyway. In the one year that I have been flying my Kymera, I think I have broken one bottom spreader, shattered a wing tip, and had the ferule slip, making me think I broke it. The bottom spreader broke right at the center T, and I don't really have much of an explanation for it. The wing tip shattering could have been prevented. The kite comes with vinyl end caps to use when flying over hard surfaces. I didn't use them while flying in a very rocky field, so the arrow knock broke off. And the ferule slipping happens with any kite with a feruled leading edge.

I've not been flying dual line for a terribly long time, so there's only so much input I can give, but it took me getting my hands on a decent kite for me to really get interested in dual line.

As far as p.i.r. (Delta Park West) goes....... eh. It's close, it's accessible, and there's a decent bit of space of slightly maintained lawn. The wind is intermittent at most times. It's not Long Beach, I can tell you that, but as far as local spots goes, it's probably got the best wind for a place of its size. I usually go to Frenchman's bar, near the Port of Vancouver. The wind is usually nicer there, but it's a smaller place, and it isn't very accessible for those that take the Tram to Delta.

May 31, 2012

Hehe, I'll make that Kymera endorsement. It's the only dual line that I own, and I love it. I've been flying dual line for just under a year, and I've been able to get most tricks down. Half axels, cascades, insanes, yo-yos.. etc. I have not made any adjustments to mine, and they should fly well out of the bag. It isn't the lightest kite, but I've run 360s with it on more than a few occasions. I see the price at $225 at TKS

Here's a video of John and I playing with the Kymera yesterday:

May 24, 2012

One of my favorites is something that I've seen Paul de Bakker do in many occasions with the skate. If you fly the kite with the nose pointed straight up and the sail loaded, give a small tug, then release, to get the kite to reach an apex, then glide toward you for a catch

May 19, 2012

You may benefit from checking out the Randy G video tutorials. Here's one that is very similar to the trick you are describing:

May 18, 2012

Glad to see you here! Welcome to Kitelife!

May 10, 2012

Heya Hoodoo, sorry to say I've never heard of that model... Any idea who makes it?

And... Cost, framing, sail material?

Looking at the url where that picture came from, it's a discontinued kite by New Tech. Price is shown as $159 for the Maxima, and $164 for the Vortex.

The info is found on the bottom of this page:

http://www.foreverfl...om/newtech.html

I also found an old Kite Lines article in our archive that talks a decent bit about it. The segment begins on page 14 of the Kite Lines issue found here:

http://www.kitelife....mmer-fall-1995/

From what I can tell, the Maxima and Vortex are the same kite, with a different panel layout. Sounds like a big kite that pulls. Wind range from 4-25mph-ish. Sounds like a sturdy build too.

April 11, 2012

I totally encourage it. WSIKF is where I first picked up a stunt kite, and I've been back every year since. It's a huge beach, and a huge festival with a lot going on. The only thing to know is that this festival is quite popular, and the hotels have a tendency to run out of rooms, so best to book your reservations early.

Welcome to KiteLife

April 7, 2012

Hi there,

I'm originally from Spokane and moved to Vancouver, WA last year.

The only kite group I am aware of is the Lilac City Wind Chasers club in Spokane. Unfortunately, information about them is kind of slim. They have no web site or anything.

Outside of the club, there are two Rev fliers in Spokane, and I think there is one in Kennewick. One of the guys in Spokane flies mainly Rev outdoors, and the other flies revs indoors. The guy in Kennewick is a pretty good Rev flier and a heck of a guy, but I haven't seen him in some time. I'm not aware of many other kite fliers in the area. I've bumped into a dual line flyer or two here and there, but never got any contacts or anything.

Send me a PM and I can get you some phone numbers and/or e-mail addresses.

March 30, 2012

Hi Spence...

Sorry it took so long to get back to you... I don't see the Kitelife page anymore because it doesn't come up in the browser I use normally. You're right, I use IE8, I have to because primarily I am a business user. IE8 is the only acceptable browser for most corporate applications. This isn't personal opinion, either, my experience in IT is the last 25 years, small & medium business, and I am responsible for dozens of private domains (.local) and a couple thousand workstations. Very few of them have any browser but IE8 on them. This is for the purpose of stability and compatibility. It's too bad that you guys chose to exclude what is still the most popular browser, but I figure that you must publish & test from an Apple platform anyway.

I'll miss visiting Kitelife, and pop in once in a while when I'm on the right machine & remember...

~Rob.

Hi Rob,

I'm sorry that you are having difficulty with the site, and know that I'm trying to do all I can to get it working for you.

So far, I have tested in 4 versions of Internet Explorer (IE6.0, IE7.0, IE8.0, & IE9.0) and have been unable to replicate any issue that you have described.

Are you having the same issues with a similar setup at home, or is this an issue that is only apparent at your work?

What portions of the site are you unable to access? Is it the entire Kitelife.com domain or just the Magazine side (i.e. kitelife.com vs kitelife.com/forum)?

While a decent amount of our work is done from an Apple platform, I work entirely on Windows. Our team is actively working between two operating systems, three browsers, as well as two browsers in the iOS mobile platform. Exclusion of any browser is certainly not intentional.

Thanks

March 25, 2012

I've got it JB, when (not if) you come to Australia it would be "The iQuad Inverted Tour".

We will fly all our routines upsidedown beginning and ending in an inverted hover at the top of the window.

March 19, 2012

Hey John... The new site looks pretty nice, but doesn't work in IE. I get a blank page, and the typical 'error on page' in the lower left. The error details are... Webpage error details User Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; Tablet PC 2.0; BOIE9;ENUS) Timestamp: Fri, 16 Mar 2012 11:32:27 UTC Message: HTML Parsing Error: Unable to modify the parent container element before the child element is closed (KB927917) Line: 0 Char: 0 Code: 0 URI: http://kitelife.com/forum/ Message: 'null' is null or not an object Line: 227 Char: 3 Code: 0 URI: http://kitelife.com/forum/public/js/ips.board.js Also noticed after I signed in, I got an error 404 in my Firefox browser. No big thing, I just clicked on 'Index' and the forum came up. ~Rob.

Sorry for the delay. Just returned home from the West Coast Rev Clinic where internet access on my laptop was quite limited.

I checked through the site in IE9 and found no issues. I checked any urls that were in your last post, and had no issues, with the exception to the .js file, which wouldn't be used as a web page anway.

I also tested signing in, and had no issue with 404 errors.

If you are using an old version of IE, I wouldnt be surprised if there were some issues. IE is bad enough when using an updated version. If this is the case, I would strongly recommend upgrading to Internet Explorer 9, or switching to another browser like FireFox or Chrome.

Can you post a specific link to where you are finding these issues and/or the process that you undertook for these issues to occur?

All feedback is greatly appreciated.

Thanks

March 13, 2012

Spence - I think he means Kitemail and some of us used it regularly!! There was a navigation link on the old home page!! There were no new free accounts, only paid ones, but without the home page link, I can't get to my account!! Help!!!

You should still be able to login to your Kitemail account through this link: http://readmail.kitemail.com.

As far as adding a link to Kitelife, I'll look into it and keep you posted.

March 12, 2012

PS What happened to the E-Mail?

Hope it hasn't disappeared.

D

Not sure what you are referring to... If you're looking for e-mail article submissions, you can always use the contatct page, or e-mail to staff[at]kitelife[dot]com

If you are referring to KiteMail, I think that was discontinued some time ago

March 10, 2012

The new Kitelife.com is now live. There are some issues, and we are aware of them. Bare with us as we get everything sorted. Feel free to post your thoughts, criticisms, or problems. Some issues may take a bit to resolve, but we are striving to get the site up to 100%.

We also have archived a few years worth of old issues, and will be in the process of archiving the remaining issues for the next few months.

In addition to the archived content, we have a fair amount of new articles posted as well, so please, enjoy the site

If you are logged into the forum, you should be automatically logged into the new site. Users have the ability to comment and rate articles, so please feel free to do so.

Thanks,

Watty

March 6, 2012

Hello

I am planning on building a fairly large size single line kite. I want to have a stained glass kite.

Planning on a clear mylar or something that will allow light to shine through.

As for the color "Stained part" I'm thinking of a transparent self adhesive film of some type. this is in the early planning stage. Any suggestion or links would be appreciated.

Here's some mylar shown on Kitebuilder.com:

http://www.kitebuilder.com/catalog/index.php/cPath/24_174

Not sure what to do for coloring it.... The first idea that comes to mind would be to use a sharpie or some other colored perminant marker.

March 1, 2012

I'm Jim, very new to the forum and though not a quad newbie, I wonder at times!...I've got a bag full of dusty kites! I've flown so infrequently that my skills are thin! Though I've knocked (or crashed!) the dust off of most of them now in the last month! This forum and the REV forum are super resources...had nothing like this (no kidding) when I bought my first air machine in 94.

I have 3 Rev's...two identical 1.5's (bought for stacking) from 95, and a Rev II from about the same time...when I say I wonder about being a newbie...I've flown my Rev's set up incorrectly for 17 years! I just learned about 3 weeks ago that the vertical spars are to be installed on the back side of the sail...hmmm, ok, though I can't hover in all the clock positions, I can hover in most and reading about spar installation it was said that these babies are more stable with them installed correctly...so I'm stoked to see if I really have any skill! Ok, enough blah blah blah...

Hi Jim! Welcome to the forum

My first question for the collective is regarding the usable wind range for a stock Rev 1.5...I realize that is a two part question when you have to consider line weight...so, lemme rephrase...hypothetically, I've got 300# line, what's the Rev's wind limit?

As Jeepster already mentioned, 300# is extremely heavy for a rev. 150# is more the standard as a heavy line (used for high wind or stacks) and 90# is the standard for flying normally. Remember that there are four lines, so if the kite is pulling 1200 lbs (300x4) then you have many other problems other than line strength.

That said, I imagine you could fly a rev with 300# line in five mph if you practice enough. Ideally, I think you would want around 7-10 considering the line weight.

I'd imagine that's spare strength based...on a more advanced line of thinking, frame replacement/augmentation...thoughts and suggestions are invited...I like to stack my 1.5's and wonder if I'm close to over stressing the lead kite...

I'm not much of a stacking guy, but Jeepster sounds like he's got this about right.

on the softer side of things, I've got 50' 50# line, how light a breeze would you expect a 1.5 to fly reasonably?
Thanks!

With this line set, you could fly without any wind if you practice enough. The kite could easily be flown in 3-6 mph.

Bare in mind my numbers are from the stand point of flying a single rev. There shouldn't be much of a difference when going to a stack, but like I said, I'm not much of a stacking guy.

February 23, 2012

Will get things corrected soon..as for the logo, it appears weird here or error from me when i converted into .png/jpg for flickr.

This might be because of transperency? Jpg doesnt support images with transparency, and will apply a solid background. For a finished logo, we would certainly want a .png with transparency. Works much better for the new site, which doesn't have a solid white background. If you have an on black version though, you'll want that black background for display on the forum. Perhaps something you already knew, but worth pointing out for its own sake.

February 19, 2012

Yes, there's a pretty significant difference between the two. The wala is built with a curved spine, and a tight sail. The Skate is build with a streight spine and looser sail. You will alos notice that there is a significant difference in the shape of the sale. In flight, I found the Wala to be a bit more agile, but didn't have quite as nice of a glide as the skate.

February 18, 2012

Awesome submissions so far! Keep it coming!

February 3, 2012

I'll get the ball rolling and put in a few submissions. I have 3 designs with on-white and on-black versions of each.

Because of my position within KiteLife, I will withdraw myself from the competition to provide a more fair and balanced contest for the rest.

December 28, 2011

Looking forward to it! This will mark one year since I moved to Vancouver

December 25, 2011

Aye, Chrome all the way. Provides a decent amount of add-ons and can be customized to my liking, it is sleek, compact, simple, and fast.

Definitely the fastest web browser out there, and that's the kicker for me. And it's nice not to deal with excessive tool bars like in IE or Firefox. I wanna see the web page, not five different web search tool bars. My only complaint, is that it is not the most stable of browsers. Chrome itself doesn't crash too much, but the flash plugin seems to be having issues lately.

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Posts posted by Spence Watson