dragonfish

Hi and welcome @FierceCritter. Hope I'm not too late to add my 2 cents. The circular kite (inventory #102) looks to be of the style of an AirYo or Lee Sedgwick YFO. It's spars may have gotten separated from the sail. Look for some rods of maybe 1/8" diameter with a total length that is the circumference of the kite and flexible enough to bend into a circle. Those black tabs on the edge of the sail are "loops" that the rods would slide through. This style of kite can be set up as a single line on a "wand" or as a quad line (but not in the same way as a Revolution). Here's a picture of my YFO as a reference. Given that you've selected a few Revolution kites, I would highly recommend keeping a standard sail as well, e.g. inventory # 82, 84, or 86. Vented Revolutions are generally for higher winds. If a person can only have one, I generally recommend a standard sail. Looks like you can probably have at least 2, so I would recommend a standard and a vented. In the list of kites you have selected to keep, the one that says both Vented + Super Ultra Light sounds a bit like an oxymoron. Could very well be some kind of specialty setup, but I can't tell for sure from the size of the picture. I would venture a guess that a standard sail would work better in lower winds than that one though. Happy flying.

FWIW, my EXP came with rods with EXP labels on them, but it is from around 2010. I couldn't say if they had labels or not in 2000.

Oh no, is there a high likelihood of the parking lot being full on the weekends now? I've always been unsure about parking in that big lot outside the gate. Sometimes it seems roped off, sometimes there are cars there. 🤷‍♀️ And sorry, I don't have an answer to your question.

Whoa, @Sardonycus I just realized your Shoreline is the same as my Shoreline (though I haven't been out there much lately). Been following riffclown's build of your kite. Welcome. And I didn't realize there are so many other Shoreline fliers on here too. Hi everyone!

Definitely a Mantis. Check the tail strap on the back side of the spine for more identifying information. Mine is a UL. Black Diamond 3pt lower spreaders, P200 spine, P100 lower leading edge. Sorry, don't want to de-spar the kite to see what the upper leading edge is, but that should be enough to figure out if you have a UL or standard.

Cool mod. Curious, how tight are these T connectors? Does the LE spar slide through them fairly easily? They would seem to need to for assembly/disassembly since you don't have a large opening like on dual line kites for the connectors to move as the spars are inserted/removed.

I appreciate your concern for safety and your efforts to understand the kiteflying culture in your area before diving in. Compared to the local kites, a dual line foil may seem like a massive target, but compared to framed dual lines, they are not. Given your local culture though, I understand why you would want to try something perhaps smaller and less expensive to start with. The principle behind how a fighter kite works and how it can do all that with a single line is that the kite itself is inherently unstable. Most single line kites are designed to be stable, so once the flier puts the kite in the air it stays there. However, fighter kites are not like this. They tend to want to spin or turn. This is especially true when the line is being let out. But, when the line is pulled in and the kite is being pulled on, the kite will fly in a straight line in the direction it is pointing. So, the trick to controlling the kite is knowing when to let line out and when to pull on the line. This is definitely easier said than done. As I said previously, smaller kites tend to move faster, so if you build a smaller version of your local fighter kites, just know that it could be even harder to learn how to control it. Once again, good luck.

Hi and welcome. If you are open to any kind of kite, a soft kite will probably be the easiest for you to manage. They do not have any spars that you need to worry about. Small single line soft kites will easily fit in a backpack. There are also dual line foil kites. These are still frameless, get their structure from the bridle and filling up with air while in flight, and you can control their movement. They come in a variety of sizes as well. I'm not sure if there are commercially made quad line foils that are not power kites, but if you really wanted a quad line, here are instructions to convert a dual line foil into a quad line. You probably don't want to start out with a power kite (sometimes called a traction kite) since they are designed to pull hard enough to pull you around on a buggy or board. If you are not interested in soft kites and want a framed kite, you will need to cut the spars to make them shorter and add connectors. This is something that people have done with the commonly seen framed quad line kites (e.g. Revolution, Djinn, OSKUSA Freilein, etc.). The most common size of these kites have 5 spars of 31 inches, and what you would do is cut each of these in half and attach a ferrule to one side. (I don't know why we call them ferrules, they are more like dowels.) You would end up with 10 spars of 15.5 inches + 2 inches or so for the ferrule (not all 10 spars would have the ferrule), giving you a total length of less than 18 inches (about 45 cm). While I haven't really seen anyone do this with single line or dual line kites, it seems like the same idea would work. It would be more annoying to do on the leading edge of a dual line, since those spars are harder to remove. I would not recommend building a miniature kite, because in general, the smaller the kite the faster it moves and the harder it is to control. Good luck.

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You're going to have a stack done in no time!

I have tried flying a Kaiju on 75' lines as an experiment. One of the festivals I go to, there is next to no wind in the morning and the advertised start time of the festival is usually a little before the wind picks up. So, I was experimenting with what I could fly a routine with in those conditions. Given that I only had 90# line, the 75' lines created a lot of drag. The kite itself was rather floaty, but I could not control it very well because I would lose "tension" in the lines. They were too long (and heavy) so they felt too spongy. Granted, the wind was also not coming from a steady direction, so the kite would get pushed around in ways I didn't want it to and I couldn't give it the direct inputs I wanted to. 50# line probably would have helped, but it's still a lot of length to drag around for a kite that you don't want so much wind that it pulls hard enough. Can it be flown outside on 75' lines? Yes. Will it help a beginner be less frustrated? Not likely.

Ooohhh, I'm drooling now. A little bummed that there's only one purple now, so a good purple fade is not possible anymore. But, I found inspiration elsewhere. Anyone recognize it?

Ooooh, I really like this one, especially when backlit. It's my favorite of all your diamonds so far. Any chance you'd sell it? (And yes, I've still been lurking on this forum, just not posting much lately. Logged in just to come comment on this.)

Welcome! I occasionally fly in Berkeley, usually when there's some event. You've probably heard of the Berkeley Kite Festival that happens in July. The Bay Area Sport Kite League also has a few events there. I fly at Shoreline park in Mountain View more often (although I haven't been flying much lately, other than at events). There are a number of regulars at Shoreline, some of whom are also on this forum.

@CaCondor, welcome to the dark side. Glad you were inspired by the Berkeley Kite Festival, and perfect timing on your post. The Bay Area Sport Kite League (BASKL) is doing a Learn to Fly workshop this Saturday Aug. 11 at Cesar Chavez Park a.k.a. the Berkeley Marina (where the kite festival was). We'll be happy to help you get that quad kite on some lines and off the ground. No kite yet? No problem. We've got a few you can fly. Some of us who were flying quad demos at the festival will be there on Saturday. Maybe you'll get to meet and learn from the very person who made an impression at the festival. We'll be there from 10am to 3pm-ish. Come for the whole day or drop by when you can. No set schedule; we help people as you show up.

Wow! Would love to see some closeups of the artwork. I remember reading your post when you started the project.

I'm in. Wouldn't mind having a kite I can share with new fliers without worry.

Color names don't always seem to be well defined for the purples. Some seem to have multiple common names. I took a picture of Eliot's color sample sheet for purple/pink when I visited to have a reference for deciding the colors for my mesh. There are some with scribbled out names and another name next to it. I'm not going to post it because I don't know if he wants it on the internet. According to this sheet, the dark one is plum and the light one is grape (has lavender scratched out, but I feel it's commonly referred to as lavender anyway). The one that's a bit more red looks more like berry to me, but there's also a color called wine, so it could be that. I'm not sure what the two purples with rectangular grids are; Eliot's sheet doesn't have rectangular grids. Also, the two look the same to me over the computer, and seem pretty close to the current color called purple. Plum is pretty dark, but you can definitely tell it's not black without being backlit. The 3 purples in my Revs (and probably most Revs with a purple fade) are plum, purple, and grape. I can't wait to see what riffclown comes up with too.

Well, I just found out that the field we use at Martinez is currently or soon to be under construction. Leaving this info here so you don't waste your time trying to go there in the near future. Not sure when it will reopen.

Thanks @DavidB. Hopefully I won't need it, but always good to have a backup plan.

@happysuperbutton Cool. Haven't seen you in a while. Be aware parking is metered even on Saturday. Nice try @makatakam, but I'm keeping this one. It's a B-Pro custom colors and part of a matched set. Unobtanium.

Yea, Berkeley vs inland is going to be quite a difference. Unfortunately I'm not too familiar with your area to give you flying location recommendations. I will say the Bay Area Sport Kite League is having an event at the Martinez Marina on June 16. We use the field adjacent to and north of the softball fields. Don't know if that's the field you tried. Don't remember seeing dog poop everywhere on that field, but the winds are not great. We will also be at Crissy Field this Saturday if you feel like making the trek all the way to SF. There should be several dual line fliers you can talk to to get ideas on what kite you might want to get.

Welcome to Kitelife. It will be hard to get one kite that satisfies all wind conditions. That is why we end up with multiple. The good news is we are moving in to the windier part of the year in the bay area, so inland should have some wind, unless you are trying to fly in some city park surrounded by trees/houses. Then it will be hard. (Or if you're talking really inland east bay, then I don't know) I'm afraid I don't have any additional suggestions besides what you've already received (I saw your other thread too). The Kymera sounds like a good deal. Shipping probably won't be Amazon prime fast, but I can't imagine it taking terribly long. What part of the bay area are you in? Do you primarily fly at Berkeley? Do you know about the kite flying area at Shoreline in Mountain View?

Thanks all, and thanks JB and Breezin for the affirmation. Before I saw your two posts, I was starting to feel bad about asking for advice and then deciding to ignore it, since I had decided in the mean time to use the super glue method. I've done it before on a small what looked more like a cut than a tear. Didn't think it would work on larger tears until I found some posts on some kiteboarding forums where they used that method too. Yes, this tear is really clean, so I think it will work. Worst case, it comes apart and I'm back to where I am now. Then I will try the tape. Oh, and the super glue method has one more advantage in that I can get it fixed before an event this weekend, whereas I probably wouldn't be able to acquire repair tape in time.