Forums > Kitesurfing   Newbies / Tips & Tricks

kite inverted and bridle went over wing tip

Reply
Created by smokeandmirrors > 9 months ago, 2 Jun 2017
smokeandmirrors
11 posts
2 Jun 2017 11:10AM
Thumbs Up

I was trying a transition , carve heelside into toeside and timing was off, light winds, (2012 17m zepher) slacked the lines and inverted kite-no problem normally , relaunch go to shore and fix lines but this time when i tried to relaunch a front bridle line had wrapped around wing tip,i tried unhooking and passing the bar thru center lines but the kite flipped and twisted over, i tried releasing to safety to no avail question is... there a way to fix this on the water or just self rescue like i did and fix the mess onshore, went back out and nailed it thee times in a row

flyingcab
VIC, 942 posts
3 Jun 2017 6:29PM
Thumbs Up

Not sure how the zephyr works, but on some kites you can simply pull on the line that is tangled around the wingtip. This makes the kite flag out and usually unwrap from the wingtip.

KiteBud
WA, 1515 posts
3 Jun 2017 7:56PM
Thumbs Up

Hi smokeandmirrors

Inversions can lead to very different outcomes depending on many factors. From reading your story it seems like you've got a fair bit of experience and tried your best. Remember you won't always be able to solve inversion problems, whether you use the safety system or not.

Long bridles are common on larger kites and they do wrap around the wing tip in such scenarios, which is probably the worst case scenario to be honest. The safety should still work as Ozone uses a single front line, and I've tested it before a few times with a tangled bridle, it still works, not as good, but it still flags the kite enough to perform a self-rescue.

The only way to fix this is to ''untangle'' the bridle from the wing tip, for this you need to SLACK the line that is tangled and also manage to turn the kite around so the bridle can actually fall off from the wing tip. To achieve this you may need to pull some back lines for a few meters, or even the opposite front line. If the tangled bridle is on the safety line, releasing the safety might not actually help you to untangle it as you will put more pressure on that line...but you can still self-rescue.

So really it's about trial and error each time, if I was next to you in the water when this happened I could've probably told you exactly what to do, but it's too hard to tell you exactly what you should've done without witnessing the situation myself.

I will release a new video explaining those techniques at some stage.

Christian

smokeandmirrors
11 posts
4 Jun 2017 2:49AM
Thumbs Up

Thanks for the help, never ending learning process, ,well wind is up now, forecasters missed it again,lol,time to go get my toes wet



Subscribe
Reply

Forums > Kitesurfing   Newbies / Tips & Tricks


"kite inverted and bridle went over wing tip" started by smokeandmirrors