Category: Droppers and ferries

Kite day coming…

Though I’ve not referred to it here much, there is a kite day this coming Sunday at Fergusson Park for Matariki.  I’m not usually much for kite days, as I’m not overly social (!) at the best of times.

There is a predominance of massive (nothing wrong with that…) ‘kites’ that hang from a pilot kite, rather than fly on their own and finally – made by other people.  I think I’m good evidence that you don’t need to know how to sew to make kites – just don’t look too close at the stitching!

But this will be the first I’ve been to when I’m only bringing soft kites.  No sticks (apart from several that are part of the kite messenger).

3 parafoils
4 panflutes
6 parasleds
9 reels of line
1 picavet rig with camera
1 static dropper rig
3 misc droppers
1 ferry with dropper bag
hammer and stakes
1 set of night lights

I’m not counting the silver flowform yet – it hasn’t flown properly.  And the one bit of wind that it could/should have used makes me think the aerofoil shape is not right – and I am in the process of putting some ‘darts’ into the foils near the leading edge, trying to give it more lift than it currently has.

Semi-success with the ferry…

Thursday I met up with Averil at the waterfront after she had an appointment in town.  Though the wind was not ideal, we managed to fly the blue parafoil and some mixed results with the ferry and dropping things.

Tauranga Harbour and a pretty sharp southerly wind.

I had carried all the kite gear there from home on my ebike.  edbikes.co.nz  I’m making my EdBike work for its money…

The kite was biasing to the left, to the point that it would lose the air into the openings at the top – and then collapse to the ground!  So I did a bit of line trimming.  By the end of the session, it was pretty stable.

The ferry is something of a hassle to set up and work with in the wind.  But I launched it up probably a dozen times.  “Ideal” would be the ferry goes up, hits the stopper, drops whatever, and returns down the line.  I did get that a few times – but also had real issued with the trigger point on the kite getting caught up into the wire that runs through the polystyrene ball that is the stopper.  I don’t think it really needs that ball – I’m going to replace it with a piece of pool noodle.

The sail on the ferry probably could do with a bit of tail of its own.  It has a tendency to swing about, and even start wrapping around the line.  But I’d say the stopper issue above was more significant – get that fixed and all might be well…

Preparing to launch the ferry.

I had reasonable success with just sending the ferry up, letting it trip, and fall back down the line.  I did that on its own a few times to confirm that it could function well on its own.  Now just to get a better way of carrying the payload, I think.

A ‘less than successful’ attempt, with the ferry catching on the stopper, then bringing the kite down.  Second video has a more positive attempt, with the ferry rising and falling as it should…

Sidetracked: I made a kite ferry…

Looking up the kite line. The release mechanism is at the lower left. The two strings attach to the sail – and when they are released (when the ferry gets to the stopper), the sail flaps loosely, allowing the ferry to come back down the line. Maybe too fast, but we’ll see…

I’ve put the silver flowform aside, as my initial sewing was pretty abysmal.  I think I’ve got the tension, etc, right now…

So yesterday and today I used what scraps of materials I could find to make a kite ferry…

I think about dropping things from kites (an admirable pastime!) in three categories.

  • A simple dropper. Elastic/rubber creates the tension – when you jerk on the line, the two pieces separate, allowing the ring to drop away. But then you have to pull it in again if you want to drop something else…

    A simple dropper.  The ‘payload’ is attached to the kite line and raised up into the sky.  It is dropped by some (unspecified) mechanism.  Kenny Noble and I tried to perfect a knot that could tie a plastic parachute to the kite line, and then release it with a series of tugs.  Not always successful, and really at the bottom of the hierarchy in my mind!  I’ve made one device that uses rubber bands as resistance, allowing it (sometimes) to drop the payload when it is pulled – but it is pretty fine tuning to keep it from extending and prematurely dropping.

  • Next would be a kite messenger.  In this case, the device (along with the payload) runs up the kite line on its own.  When it hits a ‘stopper’ on the line, it releases the payload.  But the messenger doesn’t have any way of coming back down the line.
  • The release area. When the front of the ferry hits the stopper, it pushed a fibreglass rod back through the main rod. And the items held by that rod drop away. And one of them holds the lines that hold the wing against the wind . And it can then slide back down the line.

    Then comes the pinnacle, in my opinion – the kite ferry.  This is a device that will climb the kite line, hit a stopper, drop its payload – but then change configuration so it can slide back down the line.  Though I’m dropping various junk, the longer term plan is to use this device to drop fishing hooks – allowing Averil to ‘cast’ her fishing line much further out than she would otherwise be able.

This is the second substantial messenger I have made.  The first was over-built, but did sometimes, periodically, occasionally work.  I’ve not persevered with it over the last year much.

Last thing to do is to work out an effective stopper – maybe a polystyrene ball?  I have had mixed results making the ‘disk’ type stopper.  They have worked, but I’m hoping for something more workable.

And my final design feature relates to my wanting to be able to break the device apart, roll it up and carry it easily.  I think this one might be a winner, eventually.