Help with Cody

[Bbtech]

I purchsed a bundle of kites at an estate auction recently. Most were old diamond kites, deltas etc. There was one great find. It is a cody and the label on the kite is Greens of Burley, U.K. The kite is about 4 foot high by 6 foot wide and constructed of rip stop nylon and 3/8 wood dowels. Judging from some of the newspapers that were wrapped around some of the kites I am guessing it is from the early 1990's. I managed to get it assembled and I will need to replace some of the tensioning strings. There are no instructions with the kite. I would like to know if anyone can give me an idea of how tight I shoud tension the sails. I guess what I am looking for is something like "as hard as I can pull", or "moderate pull". I am used to flying DC and Rokkaku SLK's so if you could relate it to one of those that might help.

Theron

[hyzakite]

Sounds like a nice classic kite! With the info you're bringing with the kite, it's about a feeling of what's right without snapping or tearing, get to the closest original shape/aerodynamics this cody, there's a dihedral thing going on with the cody kites that I'm not smart at, but there is pictures that can help you make the shape look like what it should flying without breaking pieces.

[Wayne Dowler]

Don't have any first hand experience with this type of kite - but you might try this company on FB

Buffalo Cody Kite Company

They might have some info that can help!

[RobB]

or maybe this might help...

http://www.gombergkites.com/F-CODY.PDF

[Bbtech]

Thanks for the suggestions. I think I will put it together and take it out and see how it flies. It is heavy with all the wood dowels so it will probably take a pretty good wind but there is also lots of sail area so a test flight will probably tell me a lot. I can tweak sail tension after observing it in the air.