self-launch & self-land best practices

[Willy T]

All right guru’s let’s hear it. There are a few different approaches to these maneuvers posted online. I’m curious to learn the consensus of bay area kiters.

What’s the best way to self-launch and land? Do you use different techniques for narrow or wide beaches? On-shore vs cross-shore wind? Ect…

[CdoG]

Yup..

but lately a static line is my favorite...

[friggin old guy]

I fly Revs/Octanes.....but I think any 4 line hybrid with decent depower will work the same.

Generally you should be paranoid when you're doing a self launch. It's pretty easy really but I'm always worried about getting a line wrapped on the bar or bridle just when I'm powering up. Happened a couple times and almost wasn't pretty. Also, there's nobody that's going to tell you that your lines are wrong or you've got a bridle wrap, so make sure you've double checked everything before you try it.

Until you get some practice, probably better not to do it unless conditions are ripe, ie sideshore and you're launching towards the water. Walk your lines til you're to where you would normally have somebody launch the kite for you, then walk just a bit more up until you get the kite to roll and start to gently fill.......keep the line tension on it, and walk (or RUN) back so that you're in normal launch position relative to the kite and coax it up......

The hybrids have enough depower that you can generally get away with this even if it powers up a little bit hot downwind, just make sure you're letting the bar all the way out and steer it to the side of the window. Be ready to punch out. Make sure you have wide open spaces in terms of hard objects/people to the lee, both for your own protection and other people's.

Landing just bring it down fairly hard in the same area that you would if somebody were catching it for you, but grab and pull both center flying lines a bit before it hits the ground so that you can get the leading edge to ground, be ready to gank the flying line on the side of the kite you want to pull towards you hard so that it doesn't roll back up. Run like hell to secure your kite before it relaunches, preferably walking up the flying line to keep it from relaunching, but you'll see a lot of people skip that once its down ok. Hard to do if you're overpowered.

Definitely better to do some practice with a friend there ready to grab your kite and even more preferable to watch somebody do it that has your same kite. Eventually you'll find yourself in a situation where you have to do either a self launch or land by yourself, so it's good to know how to do, but it's always safer to have somebody lend a hand.

That's especially true it you're on a narrow beach (which a lot of times means a bluff causing super flukey winds) or onshore conditions, which means hard objects somewhere close by. Some places are easier to land than others.....if you can drop the kite into the shadow of a bush or some other object, that's a lot less stressful.

I'm sure somebody will chime in about launching/landing by using your chickenloop hooked or clipped onto something, but I read this as a question about how to do it without any aids at all.

Here's a Caution video that's pretty good on self landing:

http://www.cautionkites.com/vid/vid.index.tut.sland.php

Don't blame me if you mess up. I'm just saying this is what I learned by asking others to show me the technique and then observing.....don't be afraid to ask, as this is one skill that learning by trial and error is probably....an error.

[kingfisher]

I ride the old 06 vegas still and just set my kite at the edge of the window like I'm going to launch normal , but then I fold the lower wing tip and hold it with a sand bag. run to the bar and walk back till I tension the lines and the sand bag will slide right off and and I'm gone. I also been riding a 09 vegas and I use the same method but I don't fold the wing tip I just put the sand bag right behind the leading edge and the last lower strut and it'll just slide off when the kite gets powered. When I self land I bring it down at the edge of the window and put the 5th line hard and that drops the leading edge. But at the spot were I ride anyone can self land as there is a 20 high hedge that everyone drops there kite behind. (big wind shadow) :mrgreen:

[WindMuch]

I agree with Friggin' Old Guy (John) that you should be scared anytime you self-launch or self-land your kite. And don't take what I say below as anything other than personal opinion. I don't know what I'm doing, but do self-launch and self land my Naish Cults and Slingshot Rally kites pretty regularly.

Nat Lincoln from Edge Kiteboarding showed me the self-landing technique last winter in La Ventana - where there is plenty of room for error. Have someone experienced show you the tricks - particularly someone who flies your brand/model of kites. Make sure there's enough room to punch out if anything goes funky. Someone standing upwind of your kite, ready to grab it if things get ugly seems like a good idea when learning.

I think the self-landing technique depends a lot on what types of kites you fly and how/where the lines connect to the bar.

For example, if the "Y" for the front lines is reachable from the bar, it's easier to grab the upper front line and give it a yank, when the kite is at the edge of the window about 5 - 10 feet off the ground. This tends to pull the leading edge down as shown in the Caution video John mentions above.

I was at Berkeley the other day and the tide was super low so there was plenty of beach. I was practicing self-launches and landings and someone (Robert?) with a North Vegas came in and asked me how to self-land. We played around with it a bit and couldn't get the kite to flip into a face down orientation on the beach, due to the fact that there is only one center line at the bar and the "Y" to the leading edge on those kites is way up the single front line. Pulling on that single line put equal force on all 3 front lines on that kite model, pulling the entire leading edge towards the kiter, rather than flipping the kite face-down on the beach.

Maybe if you post what kind of kites you're flying, someone with experience with that model can chime in and offer an opinion (or even a lesson).

Kirk out

[CdoG]

I used to use a sand bag on my 08 vegas to launch
and just drop it on to its face from 10 to 15 feet up and pull the steering line that was closed to me down wind as i moved down wind to land...


now this seems a bit safer to me
http://vimeo.com/15760527[/video]

[TomAUSTRIA]

I use this technique with my OR Rise kites:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PxsbXG5rFY[/video]

Usually works, but obviously you need lots of space in case something goes wrong.

[Willy T]

Yup..

but lately a static line is my favorite...

what's that?

[CdoG]

Yup..

but lately a static line is my favorite...

what's that?

thats the line, hooked to my truck in the video above

you could also hook it to a very big sand bag
or a fence post or one of them lawn screw's

[jbirdmarin]

I self launch and land regularly at a very narrow and obstacle-ridden spot so have tried a number of techniques. The "walk around" in that last vid is pretty fail-proof, but real estate is kind of important. But even at a narrow launch, you can get away with it by positioning the kite as much into the wind as possible (w/o it taking off), then yanking the far steering line and it will launch per above.

One safety feature to remember when self landing, is if it is bouncing on the ground and you fear something will go wrong, just grab a handful of inner lines and the kite will depower. It won't land, but you can hold it like that for as long as you want w/o much going on.