French Box Kite: down into Lake Ontario
by Tim Sly
(Toronto, Canada)
A home-made yellow 2M (6'6") span modified French military box flew reliably and extremely well. With a NW wind blowing from the land I flew it up and over the shore of Lake Ontario, which is one of Canada's great lakes - inland seas.
Reached the end of 150M line way out over the water. Then the wind dropped. No way to avoid it heading into the water.
Then I realized that the same aerodynamic forces that keeps the kite in the air also act to create drag in the water. It took almost an hour and a half to slowly winch the kite to the shore. It got me thinking about the possibility of a 'dissolvable' link in the bridle to at least allow collapsed 'streamlined' retrieval in water.
Comments for French Box Kite: down into Lake Ontario
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I'm referring to Simplest Dowel Kites, my popular kite-making download. It's a printable PDF file. Make a diamond, delta or sled. Each kite is capable of flying hundreds of feet up for hours on end.
Could you do me just a small favor though?
Please sign up for my free monthly publication, "Tethered Flying". No other emails will be sent, and your details are safe with me. You need to be at least 16 years old. There's...
- A huge "photo of the month" (linked from a much smaller one in the email of course)
- 3 "tips of the month" (1 for beginners, 1 for parents and 1 for more experienced kite-fliers)
- A "flight report of the month" (selected from my own flying logs and illustrated with a photo)
