anybody here ever flown a 5m 2line peter lynn peel ? jjust picked one up and was curious if anybody has any experience with them...?

Pretty wicked kite, I would be careful with it until you get use to it.

any tips for flight..?

• Light winds for initial flights
  
• Launch to the side of the wind window
  
• Padded straps would probably be a good thing to look at (if it didn't come with them)
  
• Safety gear (elbow pads and knee pads to start)
  
• See if you can find someone to fly with or at least let people know where you are.
  

ATB,
Sam

Do not put the control loops around your wrists. It can be difficult to jettison your kite when you are being dragged by your wrists.
Five meters can be a lot kite on two lines, be careful.
S

thanks guys, i have thought about most of these things. am waiting on a set of lines for this beast and a boost of courage. this thing is about 16' across, pretty intimidating....

If you use a ground stake be sure and only put one power line on it. If you forget and put both the kite can launch itself just sitting there on the ground. Just remember that you do not have as much control with a two line verses a four line kite with brakes.

Susan (npw goddess)

A 5m 2 line kite sounds like an extremely dangerous kite. No brakes and no safety ... Be careful!

(hijack alert) So is there any way to mod the peel to a quad?

dont believe so... it has some kinda funky cross bridle, but all the leads are across the leading edge. how do you upload pics to this site

I have a 10m Ultra light Peel. It's a wonderful kite. I have had it since '94 and it has served me well. For safety I fly with a set of Peter Lynn Safety Handles. See the images at the lower left here: http://www.virtualkitestore.com/kites.html

I have no idea where you would find them now. I have two pair but I am loath to part with them as they have saved my arse a couple times and I still fly my old dual line power kites--like that big Peel.

For rigging, I use really long leaders to collect the cross bridles on each side. This reduces the change the knot on the end of the leaders will get tangled in the cross bridles--a good thing. I think my leaders are about 25% of wing span.

If you get some safety handles, you'll need leaders at your end of the lines so keep the safety handles from cutting the loops. The handles are metal and a bit sharp.

As for flying them, launching a Peel is the tricky part. The best unassisted method is to lay the kite out flat, straight down wind from the handles and put sand all along the trailing edge. Snap the kite off the ground fast and it won't fold. This might seem dangerous, but inflation issues keep the kite from reaching full power immediately after take off. Those same issues make the straight-on wind desirable for a preventing bowties.

I've never flown the smaller ones, but as for the 10m, in the air the wind window is quite broad. While my 10m is slow to turn, I understand the smaller ones are much faster. In their day the Peels were the bomb, so I think you could have some fun if you can make peace with the kite.

As for safety, I rarely fly dual line power kites without my safety handles and back strap. Only if the wind is very smooth or light will I risk it. I have had to release the 10m under duress and I was glad I could. It's a beast if it gets the better of you, but the safety handles assure that you can release the load, the kite will collapse in air and what you have released is completely soft so it is little threat to people or objects downwind. Reinflation chances are quite low due to the high aspect ratio and cross bridle. In other words you'll have a mess of line and kite when you recover it. ;-)

If you tire of the Peel send me a U2U. I'd love to have one that size.

Philip

Quote:

Originally posted by cheezycheese how do you upload pics to this site

• You can post it in an appropriate section of the Gallery and reference it in an "img" tag.
  
• You can host it on Picasa, Webshots, your own webspace, etc. and reference it.
  
• If you are into low effort, you can use something like www.tinypic.com.
  

ATB,
Sam

you guys are GREAT...! thanks for all the advice

heres's a pic...
http://www.powerkiteforum.com/gallery_image.php?action=view&...

Is this your first kite?

philip thanks for the tips. i will definitely be looking for a pair of those handles. not exactly sure how to hook up my flying lines the bridles have these little chain links on the ends, do your ultralights have the same thing? as you can see the bridle is a mess, this is how i received it. gonna take some time to straighten things out....

no, i have a 4m beamer IV, and a couple of stylus p.3's. i am still relatively new to this.

good to hear you have other kites and some flying experience. I was really worried if this was your first kite. Have fun and let us know how it goes

yeah that kite looks like it has quite high AR! it looks like it will have lots more speed/power and very different flight characteristics than the beamer.

those two line safety handles sound like they would work very well.

pbS-P-A-M-L-I-N-K-s comment about safe hot launching is good, but he flies the 10, which will fly in much lower winds and is larger = slower inflation. a 5 in higher winds (and much smaller) might inflate a lot more quickly!

if you end up keeping it, adding brakes is not so tough a job, can even be done by hand given some patience!

Quote:

philip thanks for the tips. i will definitely be looking for a pair of those handles. not exactly sure how to hook up my flying lines the bridles have these little chain links on the ends, do your ultralights have the same thing? as you can see the bridle is a mess, this is how i received it. gonna take some time to straighten things out....

The bridles can be a mess, yes. Once you get them straightened out take the two ends that you attach to the flying lines and tie them to the kite. Some people tie one to a corner on each side, but I I tie both of them together to the same corner. On the dual line cross bridled foils I built a I stitched a small loop of 300# line on the back right corner for just this purpose. It's an easy retrofit if you have a sewing machine.

I'll see if I can take some good pics this weekend so you can see what the bridle is supposed to look like, how I did the leaders, and how I do the tie off.

As for untangling the mess you might have, that is an exercise for the student. I can do it very quickly but it's something you just have to learn for yourself...unless you pack and unpack the kite very rigorously and never bowtie it. ;-)

Philip

I'm late to this thread but can get you those handles, I'm pretty sure. they are still on the PL Dealer price list and I think they have them. I just had a shipment leave The Netherlands yesterday. Check with Dakitez; he was putting together an order and it may not have left yet.

AAPL0011 Quick Release Handles $61.00

They are made of stainless, I'm pretty sure.

As promised, here are some pics of dual-line cross bridled foils. One is a PL Peel the other two are home built Sputniks the bridles are functionally the same. See http://www.flickr.com/photos/pbchase/sets/72157622114578362/

I really recommend bridle leaders and the stitched on tie off loop. FYI, I measured my bridle leaders the shortest is 4 feet on the 3m kite and 6 feet one the 10m kite. At these lengths the knots on the ends of the bridle leaders never snag in the other bridle lines.

Philip

first off i wanna say thanks again for all the support you folks have showed me and my PEEL. Philip in the photo with the kite fully laid out, are those the leaders you speak of or are they attached to the ends of those lines? the bridles on mine have been 'braided' i guess to avoid tangles, but they seem to have wrapped in and out of itself :dunno::dunno:. i will post some pics. my flying lines will arrive tmw, so i guess i will attempt to unravel my mess
then.
Angus thank you for the info on the handles, i will have to wait a week or two. (made a few impulse purchases over the wknd...)but i really want these!!

As to what's a leader and what's not, I annotated this photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pbchase/3847172342/in/set-72157...

Some folks like to chain bridles and it helps a bit, but there's nothing quite like tying off the ends to the kite. Other tricks are to leave the hanging out as you fold the kite. Otherwise they can still fall into the bridles you weren't able to chain.

If you've never chained a rope before you might want to practice a bit with some spare rope or an extension cord. There's a video of how to do it--and undo it--at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJ2Nlrm8AAY

Before you unhook the end of the chain do your best to untangle the chain from the individual bridle lines. Then untie the chain and hope the best. If the bridles don't look symmetric when you spread them out ask those nice you ladies from that photo you pointed us to to each hold one side of the bridle by their attachment points so you can trace lines and figure out which bridle attachment point needs to be passed between which lines. Don't do it on a hot day in the sun lest tempers flare.

I did some searching to see if anyone ever uploaded a video of this procedure, but found nothing. That said I did find a very good text description by Andrew Beattie. I pretty sure Andrew was the first person I ever saw untangle a cross bridle. He's also the guy that talked me into buying my Peel for which I am eternally grateful. It's a good article: http://www.kites.tug.com/Archive/kites/potpourri/untangling

Philip

philip, i got my lines. i believe the bridle is free of tangle, it looks to be in order. now how do I make up a leader....? or where can i buy a pair as im not too talented with a needle....

Phillip, I'd love to fly one of these monsters next time we get together somewhere. You are like a time machine, having equipment and knowledge that others know nothing about. Very cool indeed.

The 10m Peel is a lot of fun. We used to fly it on short lines in 2 MPH of wind and try to do 360s. It's quite a work out. The other trick was to play limbo under the flying lines as the pilot tried to hit you. It's a low wind game of course, but a good test of flying skill.

I'm happy to share my toys--just remind me on the field and we'll pull out the relics. My kite bag is a time capsule from 1998. Dual line kites were still cool and that kite surfing thing was in its infancy.

Did I mention my first child was born in 1999? Kids have a way of changing what you do with your free time. Susan and I were reviewing the best picture list the other day trying to decide what to rent for the evening (the kids were at grandma's) and we realized we'd seen most of the best pictures and the nominees right up to the time our daughter was born. I always suspected that, but had not seen it so clearly stated in writing.