How To Make A Barn Door Kite
Step-by-Step - Page 1 of 3
The MBK Dowel Barn Door
This set of instructions on how to make a Barn Door kite assumes you know absolutely nothing about kite making. You might already have some
of the simple tools and materials required.
Anything you don't have is easily bought. If not exactly what I used, then at least something pretty similar!
The Dowel Barn Door is a fairly large tail-less design based on the
traditional American kite. However, it will still fit into nearly all road vehicles, ready to fly.
Either just in front of the rear seat, or flat in the trunk (boot).
This kite is good in light to moderate winds,
and easily copes with gusty inland air. If the breeze strength is a bit too much for the Dowel Diamond or Rokkaku, it's time to pull out the Barn Door.
Setting up on the flying field is just a matter of attaching the bow-line toggle to put some curve into the horizontal spar. Then the flying line is attached to the bridle.
At this point you are ready to launch! The method of attachment is illustrated further down this page.
When
you have successfully made and flown the Dowel Diamond, move up to this Barn Door for more of a challenge!
Making The MBK Dowel Barn Door Kite is a handy e-book of printable step-by-step instructions. It's a PDF file download.
I have chosen to make '1 Dowel Length' equal to 120cm for every kite in
the Dowel series. If you are in North America, 48" of 3/16" dowel is
close enough to 120cm of 5mm dowel. This will result in a kite with
similar flying characteristics to my original.
How To Make A Barn Door Kite
Cutting The Sail
Now's the time to read up on the kite making tools and materials required for making a Dowel Barn Door, if you haven't already.
The template shown above represents one side of the kite sail. You will now transfer these measurements to the sail plastic as follows...
- Firstly, take a large bag that will fit the entire Template shape within one side, and lay it flat on the floor.
- Mark dots on the plastic which correspond to the corners of the Template. There is no need to use a T-square, or an extra-long ruler since any small errors in position will be duplicated on the other side of the sail.
- Using the marking pen, rule lines between the dots, as in the photo. For lines longer than the ruler, just add a few extra dots using one of the dowel spars as a ruler! Then it's easy to connect the dots with a ruler. It's probably best not to rule the whole line with the dowel, since it bends easily.
- Flip the plastic bag over, and trace over all the black lines using your marker pen and ruler.
- Cut
out a rectangular section of the bag containing the kite sail, open it
out and lay it flat on the floor - you can now see the complete sail outline, as in the photo.
When doing the following, most of the width of the tape should be inside the kite's outline. Use a single length of tape for each line. Hold it out straight, touch it down to the plastic at one end, then at the other end, dab it down in the middle, then press down all along its length.
- Lay clear sticking tape along all the lines, letting it overlap at the corners.
- With scissors, cut along all the black lines. This will leave most of the width of the sticking tape inside the sail outline.
Try the Making The MBK Dowel Barn Door Kite PDF, if you prefer to work offline or from printouts. A little more convenient than working from live Web pages, you might find :-)
Need winders, reels, flying line?
We earn a small commission if you click the following link and buy something. The item does not cost you any more, since we are an "affiliate" of Amazon.
Click here to buy anything you need. Just use the Search box in there if you need different weights or lengths of line, for example.
P.S. Keep an eye out for books by kite author Glenn Davison, a prominent kite person in the USA.
What's New!
-
The Dowel Rokkaku Kite
Oct 17, 18 06:00 AM
This previously published page is a flight report featuring the 1.2m (4ft) span Dowel Rokkaku kite. Read how the kite performs in light winds and thermals...
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Wind Speeds
Light air
1-5 km/h
1-3 mph
1-3 knots
Beaufort 1
Light breeze
6–11 km/h
4–7 mph
4–6 knots
Beaufort 2
Gentle breeze
12–19 km/h
8–12 mph
7–10 knots
Beaufort 3
Moderate breeze
20–28 km/h
13–18 mph
11–16 knots
Beaufort 4
Fresh breeze
29–38 km/h
19–24 mph
17–21 knots
Beaufort 5
Strong breeze
39–49 km/h
25–31 mph
22–27 knots
Beaufort 6
High Wind
50-61 km/h
32-38 mph
28-33 knots
Beaufort 7
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