Gorgo said..
I assume you're talking about holes in the canopy and not in the bladders.
I use spinnaker repair tape. It's about $12-15 a roll from any sailing shop. I generally use black tape. Transparent looks crap and matching colours is almost impossible.
If you want to keep flying your kite you can use duct tape or any old sticky tape to avoid the risk of the holes developing into a split.
Repair as described by the earlier posts.
I use metho and a cotton swab to clean the area.
I usually go through my change collection and pick a couple of coins to use as templates for the patches. Usually a 20 cent and a 10 cent work well. The trick is to have different sizes so the edges don't line up. That makes a hard edge 3 layers thick.
Better than a hair dryer is a glass or metal bottle filled with hot water. Not boiling but quite hot. Apply the patches then lay the fabric on a resilient surface (blanket, towel, book) then roll the patches with the bottle. The heat will set the glue and the rolling will press it down and smooth it out.
transparant looks better unless you can match the canopy material
spinnaker and le material is knob imho, too thick and not enough elasticity, ive repaired heaps and have had more issues especially adhesion with these types of tape, they leave too much of an edge, a back to back tearaid repair is bomb proof, im currently riding a 9 vegas with a slice in the le( repaired with type a clear), 25 plus sessions in above 25 knts and its as good as the day i did it, type a is a fantastic material, if you do a repair as i described ill assure youll not have an issue, if its a slight L shaped tear you can re- aline the tear on the reverse with a piece of standard tape whilst you place your preferered patch, another handy hint is to use the reverse side of masking tape (sticky side) and dab around the area, this removes ingressed salt etc and is handy if you dont have alcohol swabs, then apply your tape, and a flat surface is great to assist with a pro job
