After months of not getting to the beach to fly (for reasons like rainy weather, mallaise, lack of time, and even kite breaking weather), I finally made it down to the D River wayside after work tonight. Oh, and it was nearly perfect!
For some background, my new profession has been taking nearly all my time and energy. Being on call all hours of the day and night, every day of the week took it’s toll. After more than a year, my boss made me start splitting the afterhours work with my partner. That freed me up to start taking care of some other work around the new shop, a few chores, and family items that have been taking a back seat (after living in Oregon most all my life, and driving past it more than a dozen times in the last decade, I have finally seen the Sea Lion Caves). Unfortunately all the effort is only getting the bills paid, I’m not getting ahead yet.
Also, this Winter and Spring have been some of the rainiest on record. While I love flying, and will fly in any sort of weather for an audience, I prefer to test new things in fair conditions. And do I have some new things. The best part is that they all worked almost flawlessly.
My newest Cody, a multi-color in the vein of the German flag, came back to me for some repairs and a request to add an all black eagle. I love how this turned out, but I hope to never add applique to a finished kite ever again. It was a long day struggling the whole kite round and round (and making sure that the wrong parts weren’t under the needle). So I needed to test fly it again and get pictures of it flying (the weather didn’t cooperate in the day between finishing the kite the first time and delivery, so I think these are my first pictures of it).
I’ve had growing concerns about the way my Codys get flown. I’ve tried to make them as light as possible, so that they can be used in lighter winds and more often. Unfortunately that leaves the frame a little too flexible for higher winds, and since they are box kites many of my customers believe they should fly in higher and gusty winds. About two years ago I started toying with the idea of adding a second set of spreaders in higher winds.
So, late in the afternoon yesterday, after finishing with the new applique and reframing the multi-color and some other frame adjustments, I grabbed all my gear and headed out with my two younger sons to the D River wayside. It was a gorgeous sunny day and I was excited to get 4 Codys flying together for my first time ever. However, when we got the beach we found the dry sand moving right along the beach, and decided not to break the kites.
Today after a beautiful afternoon rekeying locks for people in Newport, I stopped by the wayside again on my way home and found the winds to be just what I wanted (high, but not too high). So after I stopped home to grab the gear it was back to the beach to pop the kites in the air with my youngest son.
The top kite in the stack was rigged with the double spreader, and despite a problem (a repair I forgot to make) with the rudder sail it was very stable in the strong and not entirely smooth winds.
The next kite was rigged normally, but didn’t throw off the lead kite much.
The next kite I was particularly excited about. It is an older sail that I robbed the frame from for a sail with a more popular color. When I reframed it, used a new technique with an eye toward doubling the spreader. There was a minor issue (again at the rudder sail) that I need to explore, but all told the kite worked out well. It also flew nicely with the stack.
Finally, I got the German Cody on the the line. It flew well, although I wish I’d had more spreaders to firm it up for the pictures.
By this time the sun was headed for the horizon, and Luc was complaining about not having his coat. So, instead of adjusting the flying position of each kite to get good pictures of a nice tight formation, the kites got put away a quickly as possible. Then we were off to get some dinner and shut eye.
I’ll reiterate, what a day.
