Re: outdoor throw launches
| Subject | Re: outdoor throw launches |
| From | abw@peritas.com (Andy Wardley) |
| Date | 19 Jun 1997 09:39:20 +0100 |
| Newsgroups | rec.kites |
Jason Ross wrote:
> Has anybody else played around with taking the indoor throw launches and
> using them outside when there's wind and your playing with short lines?
Yep, I started doing it about a year ago after Curtiss Mitchell and Jeff Howard showed me the move indoors at Wildwood.
Phil Tolley wrote:
> Jason, I'm sure I saw Paul Hankin doing them at Basingstoke with what
> looked like an Inner Space in 20+ mph
Yeah, Paul and I fly together every now and then and he got the idea from watching me. Difference is, Paul gets pleasure out of flying an indoor kite in ballistic winds. Weirdo... :-)
To do the rotating throw, start by holding the right leading edge of the kite in your right hand, holding it up by the upper spreader vinyl. Hold the kite up at eye level, with the belly of the kite facing down and the nose pointing out to your left. With a flick of your right hand, spin the kite (your hand moves left, making the kite spin clockwise when viewed from above) around and away from you. While the kite is doing the Flat Spin, walk back, take up the slack in the lines, and you're off!
Some things to watch out for:
- Don't try and throw the kite too far out. Concentrate on spinning the
kite and let the wind carry it, and your legs carry you back, to get
distance from the kite.
- When you spin the kite, throw it down towards the ground slightly. Start with your right hand in front and to the right of your eye level and throw the kite down so that your hand ends up just below shoulder level on your left side. Throwing it down slightly like this makes the left wingtip lift up as it spins and avoid snagging the lines. After the initial throw, the kite flattens out and Flat Spins nicely.
The Inner Space does this beautifully on 20' lines in light winds and, as you might expect, performs it excellently indoors as well. It takes a little more practice to do this with "normal" outdoor kites on longer lines, but I can now get it off almost every time with a Box on 40' lines.
The nicest outdoor kite I've ever done this on is the Ultralight Stranger. The way bendy leading edge means that the lines hardly ever snag and you can hit it off every time. Andy Preston has some video footage of me doing this with an Icky Stranger and I believe it's going to make it into his next video. I think we decided it was called a "Frisbee". Look out for it!
Another cool throw-out trick is reserved for higher wind days. Grab the trick line of your kite with both hands, each roughly in the middle of the line between tail and tip. Hold it face down with the nose pointing away from you and then lift the kite up above head height and just let go. The kite should drift off away on the wind until the lines tension and off you go. This is "The Crucifix". In high wind, the kite really rips out and you have to be ready for the moment when the lines tension and the kite flies straight into the ground!
Alternatively, if you throw the kite up quite hard and fast, it will flip onto its back with the nose pointing towards you (the Fade position) and fly away like that. I call this the "Conveyer Belt".
Also, if you let one hand go first and give a little sideways "twist" with the other, you can get the kite to spin around in either belly down or belly up position as it drifts out. This doesn't have a name yet. Answers on a postcard, please.
In case it's not clear, you need to hold onto your handles while you're throwing the kite, reading to fly off. Either keep one handle in each hand or hold both in one hand and then grab it when you throw. I've got some really cool finger straps that loop over your two smallest fingers. You can let go of the straps, grab the kite, throw it out again and the straps remain attached to your hands. Also great for people like me who tend to let go of their straps by accident.
The Crap ASCII Art diagram below shows one of the straps. From the view shown below, you would insert the little finger and ring finger of your right hand, palm up, into the two loops of the strap. You can grab onto the strap section on the right (the lines attach to the ',' on the right as we look at it) or just let go and the strap stays fixed where it is!
___________, \_/ \_/
Oh I love that Crap ASCII Art!
The straps are originally from HQ, although they're a little small for people with big fingers. I took some normal finger straps and sewed a couple of loops in to make my own custom version. Well worth a look.
Enjoy as always.
A