Spring Breeze

Spring means kites. Kites, yay! Everybody go get your kites... or make them, as you please.

This pattern is the best one I’ve found so far for a small, quick build that flies well. It’s a great choice for a fast project with kids. Unfortunately, the original gif file by Jeremy Carson (1987) is older than most of the net itself, low-res, and badly deteriorating.

A friend of mine from down the road in Towa village, showing off a couple of kites we made from pages of a calendar.

Using Carson’s original measurements, I’ve rebuilt the file in Illustrator, giving the kite a blank face so that you can decorate it on your own. (Click for full sized file.)

OR, here’s one I already decorated with part of the coat of arms of the Czech Republic, for no reason better than that I really like that lion.

Heraldry symbols are COOL.

Build Notes:
The file prints on letter size paper. Please note that you don’t need special lightweight paper to get this model to fly well – regular weight printer paper works best. I suggest bamboo skewers, available in most grocery stores wherever the toothpicks are, for the spars. Use regular cotton or polyester sewing thread for the line (NOT serious kite line, because it’s too heavy), and don’t skimp on the length of the tails. This kite needs heavy rear drag to stabilize.

Flight Notes:
Once you’ve built it, you might think your kite’s sail area looks pretty small compared to the weight of the paper, the spars, the glue, and the huge twin tails you’ve rigged it with... BUT, don’t worry! She flies very well... provided you have steady wind. This kite will dance for gusts, but like most small kites, it doesn’t launch easily in on-off winds. Still, it doesn’t take much to get her airborne. Launch in steady winds, minimum 8 mph. If you have steady winds above 12 mph, you should be able to launch without any running. (Serious kite flyers hate running starts, did you know that?) Optimum wind speed is 12-15mph, maximum is 18 or thereabouts.

Advanced:
I’ve never had to add wing tassels or mini tails to my builds, but Jeremy suggested it in the original instructions, so it’s likely worth a shot if you have a balance issue. If your kite takes some altitude and then suddenly starts spinning around in a tight circle, it’s because the winds are simply too strong for the sail to cope with at that altitude, and the balance can’t be fixed. You just need a bigger kite.

Kites!

They came, they flew, they got the family out of the house. (In January, which, retrospectively, might not have been the best for our health, but it was worth it.)

A Paul Gunther butterfly....


...and a "small" delta-coyne. (Only in the world of kites and passenger jets does five feet of wing mean "small.")

A note to any other Missouri kite fliers fighting with variable winds; delta coynes. Seriously. They’re unshakable, and they’ll climb up on anything from 5 to 25 mph, easy. We launched Tiny from a standing takeoff, no assistant, to 150 feet in 40 seconds.

We're gonna need a longer line.

A Time for Kites

When it's early January and a pleasant 71 degrees Fahrenheit outside, it becomes a time for kites. I went out to Faust Park on Sunday with the family and enjoyed the wind with "Yasui," my uber-cheap, half-tailed, 40 feet of single-line Edo kite. He's flown in the sea breeze off the eastern coast of Japan, and he did fairly well in the skies over middle America, but a paper kite only lives so long.

So now it's a time for new kites.

We've got a pair on order from Into the Wind, but until they arrive, I'm enjoying myself over at the Kite Plan Base.

(Highly recommend that there Kite Plan Base.)