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riffclown

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Now THAT'S funny! 🤣
It is kinda funny, but but it is starting to feel like tempting me with kites is my kite friends new challenge. Eric was dangling glider candy under my nose on mother's day of all the days to tempt. JB's new sail is not gonna help my temptation levels either when it comes out.



Arg, I like a lite kite bag.

Sent from my [device_name] using http://KiteLife mobile app

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On 5/19/2018 at 8:27 PM, ACrop said:

Very very nice. I think this is my favorite of yours. Didn't you do a red leading edge on a different one? That might be nice on this one. Great color and pattern use.

Sent from my [device_name] using http://KiteLife mobile app
 

Looks like I'll be able to line up the pattern this time and not have a center strip or center panel.. Pattern will finally be continuous across the entire sail. Red LE isn't happening. I don't have enough fo another LE in red and they no longer have the Red Dacron.. Only White and Black..

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Here's the quick look.  The camber will be taken out and replaced by the curve of the leading edge.. All in all my first success at a complete pattern of shape across the sail. Kite intentionally had a very deep belly to give me room to play with.. I think I finally have my pattern of choice..

20180520_204449.jpg

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14 hours ago, riffclown said:

@kevmort PC31 is a polyester/polycarbonate fabric also trademarked as Icarex.. It's is more water resistant than Nylon and seems to be lighter.. IT's the fabric of choice for high end kites. We refer to it as PC31, Icarex or commonly Poly. http://icarexpolyester.com/

 

@ACrop They are all PC31 but some are scaps from older runs that may simply be different dye lots. From the front one almost looks black but turns oberjin (eggplant) when backlit. 

Two very similar purples, a lavender, an Eggplant and a purple wine are the pieces I have..

These all came as scrap pieces so I don't know the proper color names.. FWIW, some of these are the much older Icarex that had a rectangular grid instead of the square grid we are more familiar with.

20180520_123955.jpg

20180520_124146.jpg

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. 

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7 hours ago, Breezin said:

Very nice . Another one that gives me the illusion of movement sitting still. I'd put a dort in the middle. 

Thank You.. No Dorts

5 hours ago, makatakam said:

Two dorts for twice the fun!

Not a fan of dorts as design elements.. Thought I'd use diamonds instead..

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one of the panels backlit.. The color progressions turned out even better than I expected.. Gray tones are dark to light from the outside.. Purples are Light to dark from the outside with middle accents of all the purples.. Tried to use just enough variety to offset the shortage of some of the purple tints..

20180524_125722.jpg

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On 5/19/2018 at 7:45 PM, riffclown said:

Second Panel is basted.. Ready to design the center and start sewing..

20180519_193916.jpg

Amazing work buddy! About 1 year ago I built a kite based on the same pattern, except mine was arranged differently, have a look!

14047311_1584019155228290_5909479305524690129_o.jpg

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On 5/20/2018 at 8:40 PM, riffclown said:

Looks like I'll be able to line up the pattern this time and not have a center strip or center panel.. Pattern will finally be continuous across the entire sail. Red LE isn't happening. I don't have enough fo another LE in red and they no longer have the Red Dacron.. Only White and Black..

You can get red dacron from here --- https://www.sailrite.com/Dacron-Sailcloth-4oz-Red-36

I most use white dacron on my leading edges but have switched over to black for my upcoming major quad project.

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1 hour ago, riffclown said:

Busy day today.

Scrapestry was started from scratch and LE's finished for all 4 Diamond's kites..  I'm hoping all four current projects  will make it to the Rogallo Kite Festival in 2 weeks..

20180603_215157.jpg

A lot of folks ask what the purpose of the mesh on the top leading edge is on quad kites and why is it even there ... I found out its purpose through experimentation and learned a valuable lesson. I built two identical kites, one with screen mesh venting at the top leading edge...this is the normal setup and one kite with out it ... they both fly fine no problems however, something really horrific begins to happen as the wind picks up on the kite that has no mesh at the leading edge... you can fly the normal kite with the mesh in strong winds just fine, you may have to adjust it but you can certainly fly it ... however, on the kite that did not have the mesh and the sail was connected directly to the rod sleeve, this kite ... loved to brake the rods ... I spent one month testing it flying it in strong winds ... I ended up replacing the outer rods at least 4 times because they would crack at the connection points and it only happened with that kite so then, I did further research and this is what I found out ... the mesh screen that sits in between the sail and the rod sleeve actually reduces the load and shock on the rod which greatly reduces the loads in flight. So for a light wind kite, no mesh is fine but if you plan on flying in strong winds ... you better brace yourself because that rod is going to be under a lot of stress with no mesh at the leading edge. It is easy to say it is not needed until you start flying the kite in varying wind conditions ... also having no leading edge mesh makes the kite much quicker and more responsive ... sometimes a little too responsive that can best be described as "jerky flying"

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