Sometimes you get caught out with more rag out than you should have up. Yesterday I saw a squall coming in and stayed out a bit long trying to gauge how strong it was going to blow. As you can see below it went from a leisurely 12-10 knots up to 35 knots with lightening and all sorts of fun. As I was out with a 17m Dyno at the time by the time it got to about 25 knots I was pretty keen to get her landed.


A 17m kite can be pretty hard to self land when the wind gets up even if you have a fifth line. So I thought I'd share my experiences in case someone new gets stuck in the same situation. Note that you are much better coming in as soon as you see the dark clouds with ragged edges or staying out with the kite fully depowered and at the edge of the window but if, for whatever reason, you get caught out you can try below. It might not work for you depending on where you try and land so give it a shot when the wind is lighter first to see how your kite will react.

1. There is a good chance by this point you will be fully trimmed/depowered before coming to the beach. If not, do this before coming in.
2. Pick a spot on the beach where you have a ton of room down wind of where you are going to land. Ideally find somewhere behind a dune or trees that creates a wind shadow.
3. Be ready to eject, if you have your secondary safety on you may want to unhook it from your harness, NOT the kite. Big kite in big wind is not something you want to be spun around and dragged behind.
4. Rest the kite on the ground with it's wing tip. Make sure the kite is happy to sit there, let it bounce forward or back to the right spot before continuing.
5. With one hand on your detached leash, unhook or release your primary safety. As quickly as you can pull in on your flagging line. If you're lucky the kite will just flip over and land itself at this point. In my experience once it's over 20 knots this never happens, it will usually just flip onto it's back and fly in the air if you hold it by the front lines. Awkward sitting on the beach ensures while the squall passes or someone feels sorry for you and helps you out.
6. Move up the flagging line until you get to the bar, if you are out of downwind room you will need to pull the line towards you. It is almost certain your kite will be flying upside down at this point. If you have gloves on you could potentially recover the kite just by travelling up the centre line.
7. With the kite directly downwind from you grab the steering lines and apply gently pressure to them. This should force the kite to the ground upside down. It's important you keep the wind at your back, if you get too much wind on one side the kite will try and loop and possibly give you a rope cut on your hands.
8. Walk up the lines until you are close enough to grab the bridle, if your kite has one. My bridle is made from much thicker lines and no danger of cutting me.
9. Once you have the bridle the rest is pretty self evident.

As always, this works for me, it might not for you. This is desperation type stuff if you get caught in a squall with no other option. Squalls by their very nature are short lived so you are almost always better off weathering it out to sea if you can, or even better see it coming and land early.

Good post Dl33ta!

The majority of people I see attempting to self-land still do it without being disconnected from the chicken loop or activating the safety system, which automatically results in them getting dragged down the beach if/when they fail, which is scary in strong winds when overpowered!


If I may offer some advice regarding 5. '' If you're lucky the kite will just flip over and land itself at this point ".

Even in very strong winds (35 knots) you can self-land bow/delta kites quite easily if you pay attention to the advice in my self-landing video:





1. You have to walk upwind after unhooking from the chicken loop. (video 3:15 - 3:45). The stronger the wind, the further upwind I recommend you walk. This will stabilize the kite to the ground and have more leading edge surface area in contact with the ground. If your kite is only resting on it's wing tip, there is a very low chance of success, but if it looks anything close to what you see on those images it's hard to fail!





2. You have to pre-tension the 5th line a fair bit before the ''final pull'' This is done whilst walking upwind. Again, the stronger the wind the more you have to pre-tension that fifth line. This will also contribute to resting more surface area of the leading edge down.

3. The final pull of the already tensioned 5th line needs to be quite aggressive, especially in strong winds.


If you pay close attention to those details you will greatly increase your chances of success in strong winds. In the video above, the wind was blowing 30-35 knots on the 5th line self-landing, and we shot this 5-6 times at least (you can even see a student doing it successfully for the first time). I've never had issues self-landing kites directly to the safe position, no matter the wind strength or kite size. It does take a bit of practice but if you pay attention to those tips it should be a piece of cake!

Hope this helps!

Christian

Dl33ta said..

Sometimes you get caught out with more rag out than you should have up. Yesterday I saw a squall coming in and stayed out a bit long trying to gauge how strong it was going to blow. As you can see below it went from a leisurely 12-10 knots up to 35 knots with lightening and all sorts of fun. As I was out with a 17m Dyno at the time by the time it got to about 25 knots I was pretty keen to get her landed.


A 17m kite can be pretty hard to self land when the wind gets up even if you have a fifth line. So I thought I'd share my experiences in case someone new gets stuck in the same situation. Note that you are much better coming in as soon as you see the dark clouds with ragged edges or staying out with the kite fully depowered and at the edge of the window but if, for whatever reason, you get caught out you can try below. It might not work for you depending on where you try and land so give it a shot when the wind is lighter first to see how your kite will react.

1. There is a good chance by this point you will be fully trimmed/depowered before coming to the beach. If not, do this before coming in.
2. Pick a spot on the beach where you have a ton of room down wind of where you are going to land. Ideally find somewhere behind a dune or trees that creates a wind shadow.
3. Be ready to eject, if you have your secondary safety on you may want to unhook it from your harness, NOT the kite. Big kite in big wind is not something you want to be spun around and dragged behind.
4. Rest the kite on the ground with it's wing tip. Make sure the kite is happy to sit there, let it bounce forward or back to the right spot before continuing.
5. With one hand on your detached leash, unhook or release your primary safety. As quickly as you can pull in on your flagging line. If you're lucky the kite will just flip over and land itself at this point. In my experience once it's over 20 knots this never happens, it will usually just flip onto it's back and fly in the air if you hold it by the front lines. Awkward sitting on the beach ensures while the squall passes or someone feels sorry for you and helps you out.
6. Move up the flagging line until you get to the bar, if you are out of downwind room you will need to pull the line towards you. It is almost certain your kite will be flying upside down at this point. If you have gloves on you could potentially recover the kite just by travelling up the centre line.
7. With the kite directly downwind from you grab the steering lines and apply gently pressure to them. This should force the kite to the ground upside down. It's important you keep the wind at your back, if you get too much wind on one side the kite will try and loop and possibly give you a rope cut on your hands.
8. Walk up the lines until you are close enough to grab the bridle, if your kite has one. My bridle is made from much thicker lines and no danger of cutting me.
9. Once you have the bridle the rest is pretty self evident.

As always, this works for me, it might not for you. This is desperation type stuff if you get caught in a squall with no other option. Squalls by their very nature are short lived so you are almost always better off weathering it out to sea if you can, or even better see it coming and land early.

Here's another tip... Don"t kite in Melbourne unless you're into Russian Roulette. Come up to the tropics and enjoy real kiting weather and conditions.

Another piece of advice. If you a stupidly over powered pull the safety in the water before you get to land.

Gilly3 said..

^^^^^

No. Plummet does it on purpose. It's not a mistake.