Description:
The
SUTTON FLOWFORM is
a soft kite well
known by kapers for its easy launch, good pull, and stability.
Its line angle is small, which makes the Picavet suspension
efficient with this kite.
However,
when wind blows over force 4, the Flowform is listing and
leaning downside. It then needs a tail. A long fuzzy tail
or a drogue is necessary. In such conditions, the line angle
is lessened, and the pull is lesser than it could be expected.
As
for most of soft kites, when there are eddy winds and whirls,
it is very likely to happen that whirls will push aside
and close a side cell, which will end with a dive to the
ground.
Tailless stability
The modifications I have done on this kite makes it
now absolutely stable flying tailless. Even Gerard Clement,
the Berk's festival organizer noticed its great stability
and compared it to Peter Lynn's Pilot kite during a kite
session together on a Normandy beach when wind was blowing
force 5 with some gales up to force 6.
Between
5 and 10 m/s winds, the pull ranges between 4 to 10 Kg.
|
|
Modifications:
After
years spent testing my original Flowform, and observing
lot of others, I turned able to predict behaviour of such
soft kites and anticipate the moment when they will slide
aside, turn upside down, and dive to ground.
Then
I started considering modifications that would avoid it,
and keep stable flight in all wind conditions without a
tail. After two years, the Flowform stayed in the wind's
eye, but it was wobbling and wriggling continuously. This
is useless for Kap. Some years after, I reconsidered it
and applied some former ideas that I didn't implemented
before. Three months later, the solution was there.
Modifications
are:
change
a part of clothe on side keels
remove
a part of clothe of the trailing sleeves
added
an inner rib in the trailing sleeves
slightly
shorten the middle bridle.
The
modifications are detailed in the following
page. It needs some sewing work, but it really worths it!
-
|
