Forecast said something like 15 dropping to 10. I'm 200 pounds, the snow is deep, and I own 1 kite: a 4 square meter slingshot foil with a sometimes alarming propensity for tangling. I also am the proud owner of a monkey that won't leave my back. The monkey likes moving under kite power, so off we went... (oooh oooh, aaah aaah.... maybe it will blow more than 15...)
Got to the lake at about 12:45 pm. Unwisely chose the north end of the lake to launch (smack forehead: 90 degrees from wind good place to launch, 0 degrees bad... 90 degrees good, 0 bad). Pulled gear, and new harness out. Put on harness, tried to sort out wonderful DaKine "Patent Pending" cinch mechanism. Must look up the patent one day to see how to correctly run the belt strap, because it sure isn't intuitive. Laid kite out, applied liberal amounts of snow to keep it there. Unwound kite lines, did some detangling (much easier in daylight, I must admit). Guy approaches from shore. "Are you going to, uhh... like drag yourself around with that?" "That's the plan, if the wind agrees with me, I might make it a way, yes." "Oh, good- I have a bunch of people visiting from Beijing, and they'd love to see this!" "I bet they've never seen a frozen lake, or people driving on it, eh?" "No, they're quite impressed." So I did my best to give a good show. I really did. But it quickly becomes apparent that I'm in a "not quite enough wind" area. My newfound friend comes to my rescue and helps launch the kite... quite skillfully, I might add.
I'd *like* to say that I tore off into the misty haze of a nukin' snow-mist. I'd really *LOVE* to say that I did that. Alas, the reality was closer to: get moving about 150 yards, then realize that the super-cool waist harness was not cooperating very much, and even distracting me to the point that I dropped the kite in a most unceremonious manner. Oh well. Try to sort out the waist harness, sort of work it out... relaunch kite, and take off. By now, the Chinese people are probably back someplace warm, and shaking their heads over the clueless westerner who doesn't know how to fly a kite.
Okay, so I actually moved today, and a day where you move under the wind's power isn't a bad one (even if you did get chapped lips that cracked so badly that you were doing a pretty good vampire imitation by the end of the day.) But I have a couple of *issues* with how I moved.
1. It was mostly downwind. That ain't cool. I've sailed upwind enough in my life to know that unless you can at least get 15 degrees up from a beam reach, you're pretty much screwed when it comes to getting somewhere. Not that I want to use a kite to get somewhere, it's just that I don't want to use it exclusively for getting nowhere.
2. It wasn't exactly pretty, or even. I flew the sine-pattern, or S-curve, but it seemed like I had to fly the kite more downwind that I wanted to in order to avoid stalling it at the edge of the wind window. Even when I thought I had the kite where it was supposed to be, it pulled extremely unevenly.
3. I think I need a bigger kite. I know I need a bigger kite, with depower. Am I going to shred a tube kite on the snow? How are we coming with sheetable foils (particularly ones that stay inflated on water.
Awaiting the gurus responses. I would really love to come out to Minnetonka and see everybody and learn, but the next two weekends are fully booked (next weekend: Black River Falls in WI; any recommendations for lakes?) (The weekend after: Daytona, FL for work, and I am *so* all over kitesurfing lessons!)
James
Stillwater
...and occasionally seen kneeling down detangling kites on WBL
WBL On Saturday
Moderator: MK
again, your stories are a great read.
A few pointers
Never fly on the upwind side of the lake. There is a 1:10 ratio obstacle:clean wind. Therefore if you have a 50 foot tree the wind is disturbed for a least 500 ft. I think it is bad further out than that. Side shore is best. The great aspect of winter is you can walk out as far as you need to. Even if it is a sideshore wind, give yourself some room, the wind can get squirly as it runs along the shore as well.
You need power to stay upwind. If you are having to fly the kite deep in the window to generate power, you physically cannot go upwind. When powered you should only need to fly the kite at about 45 degrees or more off the wind. Unless you are turning down wind and my take the kite through the powerzone, as you depower it (by heading with the wind). If you are properly powered the sine wave is used on the first few strokes to keep the kite back in the window and not fly out to the edge. Once moving accross the snow your motion keeps the kite back in the window. If you are getting too much power, edge hard slow down and the kite moves forward. Power is your friend.
For comparisons, we had the students yesterday on B6 (foil), 11m, and 15m tubes. I think at least the 15 was needed to stay upwind. The tubes are about double the size of comparable foils. So a 6m foil equals a 10-12m tube in power. There were times yesterday where the wind would back off for 1/2 hour and nothing would fly.
The new depowering foils are nice though I would not even consider using them for water around here. Some will work on water though you need big wide beaches and better launch sites.
Tube kites are fine this time of year. When the snow melts and freezes and gets sharp then you need to protect your leading edge. There are many ways to do this. If you are considering water and don't want two kite quivers, then go tubes.
If you can swing an hour lesson, with me or anyone, you may save yourself some frustration. If you do take a lesson with me, you can try a few kites for different types/sizes and see which you like. Also feel free to continue with questions here. There will also be considerable demos available at the Kitefreeze. I'm pretty sure Ozone will be here.
The tough thing about big ones is that they don't give you that much more. In a wind that is a bit puffy, say 12mph dropping to 6-8mph. A big kite is heavy and may drop at the 6-8mph. Whereas a smaller one is faster and can be sinewaved during the lulls and are more efficient when it is up. Not saying anything against the Warrior. From what I have heard that is a great kite, just a viewpoint about large kites in general.
Hope this helps.
I'm not a guru, but one opinion. Maybe others will chirp in.
A few pointers
Never fly on the upwind side of the lake. There is a 1:10 ratio obstacle:clean wind. Therefore if you have a 50 foot tree the wind is disturbed for a least 500 ft. I think it is bad further out than that. Side shore is best. The great aspect of winter is you can walk out as far as you need to. Even if it is a sideshore wind, give yourself some room, the wind can get squirly as it runs along the shore as well.
You need power to stay upwind. If you are having to fly the kite deep in the window to generate power, you physically cannot go upwind. When powered you should only need to fly the kite at about 45 degrees or more off the wind. Unless you are turning down wind and my take the kite through the powerzone, as you depower it (by heading with the wind). If you are properly powered the sine wave is used on the first few strokes to keep the kite back in the window and not fly out to the edge. Once moving accross the snow your motion keeps the kite back in the window. If you are getting too much power, edge hard slow down and the kite moves forward. Power is your friend.
For comparisons, we had the students yesterday on B6 (foil), 11m, and 15m tubes. I think at least the 15 was needed to stay upwind. The tubes are about double the size of comparable foils. So a 6m foil equals a 10-12m tube in power. There were times yesterday where the wind would back off for 1/2 hour and nothing would fly.
The new depowering foils are nice though I would not even consider using them for water around here. Some will work on water though you need big wide beaches and better launch sites.
Tube kites are fine this time of year. When the snow melts and freezes and gets sharp then you need to protect your leading edge. There are many ways to do this. If you are considering water and don't want two kite quivers, then go tubes.
If you can swing an hour lesson, with me or anyone, you may save yourself some frustration. If you do take a lesson with me, you can try a few kites for different types/sizes and see which you like. Also feel free to continue with questions here. There will also be considerable demos available at the Kitefreeze. I'm pretty sure Ozone will be here.
The tough thing about big ones is that they don't give you that much more. In a wind that is a bit puffy, say 12mph dropping to 6-8mph. A big kite is heavy and may drop at the 6-8mph. Whereas a smaller one is faster and can be sinewaved during the lulls and are more efficient when it is up. Not saying anything against the Warrior. From what I have heard that is a great kite, just a viewpoint about large kites in general.
Hope this helps.
I'm not a guru, but one opinion. Maybe others will chirp in.
Tighe
Thank you...
Tighe,
Thanks so much for the response. Things are starting to 'gel' in my mind.
-In retrospect, I should have thought about the upwind side of the lake being bad. I sailed on Minnetonka for a while, and am well aware of the "shore effect." We once used it to turn an upwind leg into one tack instead of nine, and did rather well in a race as a result. On many other occasions, we got skunked close-in to an upwind shore. [I hate it when you find those lulls and everybody else sails around you... it may be that your sole purpose in life is to serve as a warning to others...
]
-The power vs. position in the window thing is something I never connected before. It sounds like the "effective wind window"- the part of the window that you can use to actually do useful work- shrinks as you get underpowered. The part of the window that you want to stay away from because you will get blown downwind grows as you get overpowered. The solution to sailing in overpowered conditions is pointing, the solution to being underpowered is going downwind. This explains my long walk/ski on Saturday. Hey, at least my calves hurt. Helps a little bit for preseason marathon training.
-Thanks for explaining about the sine wave to get going, versus what you need for steady-state sailing once you get moving. On the ice about a month ago (before we got dumped on), I found that I needed very little to get going, and the kite did the "locking-in" thing, I headed upwind a bit, everything seemed to be working well, and the kite needed very little input to keep me moving. I figured that was apparent wind helping me out. Now I know that I might have to work it to get off the line, but can let the kite settle down after that. If I need to get the kite forward more, I edge towards the wind. If I find myself underpowered, I steer myself downwind, and sine the kite to get it going.
-There's nothing like going out, getting a data point, and hearing how others at the same time. That others, on the same day, were able to control 36 square meters of LEI stacked, and beginners were doing fine on 15m of LEI... that gives me a much better understanding of what to expect and what works in what conditions.
Cool. Thanks again, Tighe. I'm definitely in for a lesson (or nine!)... now the only question is logistics. The next few weeks look busy, to say the least.
Cheers,
James
Stillwater
Thanks so much for the response. Things are starting to 'gel' in my mind.
-In retrospect, I should have thought about the upwind side of the lake being bad. I sailed on Minnetonka for a while, and am well aware of the "shore effect." We once used it to turn an upwind leg into one tack instead of nine, and did rather well in a race as a result. On many other occasions, we got skunked close-in to an upwind shore. [I hate it when you find those lulls and everybody else sails around you... it may be that your sole purpose in life is to serve as a warning to others...
]-The power vs. position in the window thing is something I never connected before. It sounds like the "effective wind window"- the part of the window that you can use to actually do useful work- shrinks as you get underpowered. The part of the window that you want to stay away from because you will get blown downwind grows as you get overpowered. The solution to sailing in overpowered conditions is pointing, the solution to being underpowered is going downwind. This explains my long walk/ski on Saturday. Hey, at least my calves hurt. Helps a little bit for preseason marathon training.
-Thanks for explaining about the sine wave to get going, versus what you need for steady-state sailing once you get moving. On the ice about a month ago (before we got dumped on), I found that I needed very little to get going, and the kite did the "locking-in" thing, I headed upwind a bit, everything seemed to be working well, and the kite needed very little input to keep me moving. I figured that was apparent wind helping me out. Now I know that I might have to work it to get off the line, but can let the kite settle down after that. If I need to get the kite forward more, I edge towards the wind. If I find myself underpowered, I steer myself downwind, and sine the kite to get it going.
-There's nothing like going out, getting a data point, and hearing how others at the same time. That others, on the same day, were able to control 36 square meters of LEI stacked, and beginners were doing fine on 15m of LEI... that gives me a much better understanding of what to expect and what works in what conditions.
Cool. Thanks again, Tighe. I'm definitely in for a lesson (or nine!)... now the only question is logistics. The next few weeks look busy, to say the least.
Cheers,
James
Stillwater