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godric

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Everything posted by godric

  1. From http://kitelife.com/forum/index.php?act=mo...;module=gallery, clicking on the link to the Members Gallery (http://kitelife.com/forum/index.php?automodule=gallery&cmd=sc&op=user) yields the title bar "406 Not Acceptable" and page text "Not Acceptable An appropriate representation of the requested resource /forum/index.php could not be found on this server. Apache/1.3.37 Server at www.kitelife.com Port 80" I thought the pix were pretty acceptable, last time I looked at them ...
  2. godric

    The worst day flying ...

    ...is better than the best day in the office
  3. The link from http://kitelife.com/forum/index.php?act=idx to "Current" points to http://www.kitelife.com/archives/current, which generates a 404 error. It should point to http://www.kitelife.com/archives/current.htm, which redirects to the actual current issue. It's been that way for a while, and can wait until John gets back from Berck ...
  4. Okay, I was out of the country when all this happened, but yippee! Somehow this is always the kite to which my daughter gravitates every time we go to an indoor event. Not to mention her old man ...
  5. Further details at http://aka.kite.org/cal_dtl.php?event_no=2931 . I'm kinda disappointed that they're holding it on the municipal beach -- on the upside, it'll be very visible to passers-by (and there should be a lot of those), but there's only about one good quadrant for wind on that beach (directly onshore to about 60 degrees toward the yacht harbor). Moving out of Monterey Bay onto the Pacific Ocean beaches up what the locals call the North Coast gets you into some humongous winds sometimes, but even when they're light they're cleaner than the winds on the north end of the bay. Unfortunately, you could hold a festival with hundreds of flyers out there and nobody would see it. All told, the visibility-to-passers-by issue will win the day, and it should. Figure on relatively turbulent air (winds coming around the Coconut Grove, or around the municipal wharf), enjoy the sun and the sand, and wow the locals. I've flown a time or two on 4th Avenue Beach during some of our wintertime visits to see my folks, and have never failed to meet some folks who have no idea what a stunt kite is.
  6. In addition to the other references, you might try these folks: http://www.8ung.at/skylines/sl/micro/start.html. They have a distributor in the USA. More info at http://www.8ung.at/skylines/sl/micro/sources.html. Please accept the condolences of this forum for your loss, and our best wishes for this and other phases of your healing.
  7. I can identify -- I tried to fly at a beach in California recently, and missed the sweet spot by about 300 yards (as the crow flies -- more like a mile and a half as I would have had to travel to get there). The breeze was offshore, and coming off the top of the cliff behind me, and I was in a hole, wind-wise. I'm betting, though, that the forum has a lot of members who live at the beach and who could direct us inlanders to some clean wind. If only we knew who they were, and where to find them ...
  8. Judging from the map, everybody but AudioRob is an inland dweller, and the Northwest US valleys are hotbeds of kiting! Guess all the beach flyers must be out flying in that gorgeous clean wind, and not sitting around at the computer wishing the wind would either (1) start blowing or (2) pick a direction in which to blow ...
  9. Apparently not yet -- I'm still being greeted as Guest and prompted to log in on every visit. I use Firefox, so it's no major deal (I can tell it to remember passwords, regardless of what the site does, so getting logged in is a two-click process), but the cookie handling should still probably get fixed at some point. I can provide a list of the current cookies, their contents and expiration dates, if you're interested. Thanks again for all you do!
  10. godric

    Lincoln City

    [FX: more intensive Web search than last time, discovering http://members.aol.com/goodheavens/dbl_lark.html] Yep, that's me, being a knothead ... Okay, Ronda, I now see the difference between the Prusik, which is a Lark's Head done twice, and a Double Lark's Head, which I'd never seen before. I'll have to tie that one a time or two and think about the situations in which I might use it. Thanks for the correction!
  11. godric

    Lincoln City

    Howdy, Kitepilot -- Ronda uses the falconer's knot to tie down a single-line kite that has been hand-launched, so one hand is occupied hanging on to the line. The requirement is for a knot that can be tied with one hand, which is secure but easily released, and the falconer's knot fills the bill. Thanks for the info on the San Diego Jam knot -- I'm a fan of knots, but my repertoire has shrunk instead of growing in the last few years! The double larkshead sure looks like a Prusik to me. I was introduced to them in different contexts (the Prusik was commonly used by mountain climbers for ascending ropes in the days before Jumar ascenders became common), but the slip-and-hold feature remains the primary aspect of the knot in both that application and kiting. Ronda noticed toward the end of the day Saturday, after hauling buckets of sand up from the beach that morning, that nobody had tied the tent down to the buckets! Maybe I'll show her the tautline hitch, so she can facilitate that process with her otherwise able and willing crew.
  12. godric

    Lincoln City

    The drive down from Portland was beautiful, with fall foliage and looming clouds, but the rain got to the festival before I did. I caught a little bit of the last demo, after which the clouds started to really open up, so there was no chance to do any flying. Had fun helping a bunch of the Lincoln City crew and the kite folks who were involved in various aspects of stashing gear out of the wet. Took my soaked self over to the local kite shop for some little items that I needed, then my somewhat drier self to the casino for dinner with a bunch of the kite folks. Despite the weird ambience of the casino, it was a lovely conversation with some delightful people. Ronda, thanks for teaching the falconer's knot to all of us at the table -- I owe you a knot, next time our paths cross! The fishermen have a saying that "the catching was awful, but the fishing was great" -- I'd modify that for Saturday afternoon/evening to say that "the flying was awful, but the festival was great!"
  13. Live and learn ... I used the "show me my last ten posts" feature, saw that there was no information below my username, and replied on that basis. I now see that the view from within the forum is different than the view in a search-result window.
  14. Well, let's see -- I don't really care that much about a .sig block, but the bit to the left of the posting wouldn't be bad to have filled in a bit. Proud supporter of the work that I am, it should show up somewhere! (followup) -- wow, you're quick -- it was there as soon as I posted! Once again, you're answering faster than I can request; thanks again for all you do! Fair skies, good winds -- -- Paul
  15. I missed that part of the story -- what happened to the arch?
  16. [picture in my head: Paul holding a kite in one hand and the handlebars in the other, following the gusts through the urban canyons of Portland, right up to the point where he goes under the bridge or, more likely, under the light-rail power cable] I'll just jot a quick note to my wife about posting the photos, probably in the form of a poll: "Doesn't Paul look natural?"
  17. Great festival. We were only able to get there for parts of Saturday and Sunday, but (in no particular order) ... John, great reprise of the dogstake Red Riding Hood routine! Moon, great music and great ballet to go with it! Golly, some of those young guys are amazing flyers already! Had a great chat with Willy Hendrickson just at dusk, as he was flying his SUL Genesis in next-to-no wind, doing slow-motion fade-flacks and axels. A little guy of about 10 came up and wanted his autograph, and Willy signed his kite bag for him. Must be something about the hypnotic motion of a kite in the air that makes kite folks friendly ... That dye-sublimation print material in the Quantum Pro that Mark was flying is absolutely gorgeous. I'm amazed and delighted that someone has come up with a way to make that happen, and look forward to more of that as time goes on! Bold move on Penny's part to incorporate a brand-new kite into her pirate routine! Loved those light-but-steady winds -- stalls were easy, I finally nailed several axels in a row (even a couple of double axels with one tug of the line) and got lots better at landings. I grew up at the beach and never thought much about it, but for the first time in many years I'm questioning my move to the valley! Fair skies, good winds -- -- Paul
  18. All I get to do this year is a quick day trip on Saturday. Y'all paint the sky for me, and I'll be along around lunchtime. Good winds -- -- Paul
  19. Prism's "Freestyle Pilot" DVD is better edited and easier to navigate than Dodd's, and includes a sequence in which the kite is augered into the water, then slowly pulled up, launched, axeled and flown away. Makes me laugh out loud every time I see it (okay, so I'm easily amused ...). Both Mark Reed and Dodd Gross make this point repeatedly: learn to stall, learn to move while stalled (side slides, landings, etc.), then work on other stuff. So, although I've been playing a bit with axels, turtles, lazy Susans, fade-flacs and the like, I now spend some time every time I fly on snap stalls, side slides, landings and launches, on the theory that the Mysteries of the Axel Initiated With the Left Hand will be revealed to me once these maneuvers achieve second-nature status. John will probably also wander by in a while and point out from his ballet background that you need to be able to put the kite where you want it in the sky, going at the speed you want, in the direction you want, any time you want, before any of the slack-line stuff will begin to make sense. Good winds -- -- Paul
  20. Howdy, Cyenobite -- Sure, you can stake out your handles, then walk over to the kite and tip it slightly away from the wind with the lines just taut. The wind will then tend to drive it into the ground, rather than launching it; once you grab the handles and take a step back it'll go right up. Or you can do what I do (I've never felt the need for stakes) -- just lay the kite on its back with the nose away from you, then loosely hold the lines, again tipping the kite up slightly from the ground, on your way back to the handles. As long as the kite is tipped away from the wind it won't launch itself. Oh, and you don't need to untwist the lines on your way back to the kite -- you can typically fly with at least a dozen twists. Once the kite is airborne, just fly a half-dozen tight circles in one direction -- if that makes it better, keep it up; if it makes it worse, fly a dozen circles in the other direction, then continue as needed until the lines are untwisted. Good winds -- -- Paul
  21. Yep, it's got a working skeleton again -- thanks! Still having some trouble pancaking it, but I got in a bit of a ballet workout and a few tricks on the way home. It's been kinda funny having a car these last few days -- I've just left the kite bag in the car and found some opportunity to fly almost every day. Now I just need to find a way to strap the kite bag onto my recumbent bicycle ...
  22. ikky68, Thanks for your reply! >The Elixir is very touchy in the pancake. That is, the flic-flac trick is >not the easiest to perform on this kite. Compared to my Phoenix (which is about all I have to compare it to), it's a dream: you can work almost in slow motion instead of jamming and popping. To clarify, by the way: I borrowed the Elixir, and own a Phoenix and an Obsession (plus a few cheap kites for passers-by to fly). My observation was that it's very hard to get either of my kites into a pancake: they want to dive for the ground as soon as I point them away from me at the top of the window, or if I do get them level I can't pop them all the way back to a fade, so they just dive again. The Elixir was pretty well-behaved: when I threw slack at it it pancaked beyond level to nose-up, which gave me some more momentum to work with when I tugged it into a fade. Managed to break the Obsession again on Sunday -- once again it was on the ground, with a wrap that I couldn't see, and tugging on the line was enough to snap a spar. Ah, well, time to go visit The Kite Shoppe! Agreed on the statement that weights aren't a cure-all. I'm going to try moving the tow points up a bit to see if that gives me more direct control over the nose of the kite. Good winds -- -- Paul
  23. Coupla questions come to mind -- first, what make and model of kite are we talking about? And second, how much wind has been available for your first flights? There are numerous smaller kites out there (48" is considered more or less middle-sized for a stunt kite) that need a lot of wind to fly well, and some that don't fly well in any amount of wind without at least a bit of tweaking by the likes of some of the folks whom you'll meet if you hang around here for a while. Then again, I think Al Washington could probably make a brick fly, and look cool doing it ! Good winds -- -- Paul
  24. I asked this as part of another post in another section of the forum where it's arguably off-topic, so I'll move just this part of it here ... Here's a question for you knowledgeable kite designers: what is it about the Elixir, for example, that makes it so much more prone to go beyond horizontal to nose-up in a Pancake? It makes it so much easier to do those easy fade-flacs that I associate with Mark Reed's flying style -- when I point the Phoenix away from me at the top of the window it wants to start digging post holes unless I throw it a huge amount of slack (double arm length and quick sprint), and even then it pancakes more or less level, which makes it harder to get enough momentum to come all the way back to a fade. I've played with the weight that comes with it, attaching it to the base of the spine, and it definitely affects Turtles and Lazy Susans; the effect on pancakes is a little less dramatic. Is this something I can affect positively with weights and bridle adjustments, or is this related more to sail / spine height and wing design? Good winds -- -- Paul
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