How much do you pump up your kite?

[JGTR]

Thanks all again for your thoughts in this! The biggest kook in here (i.e. defever...) appreciates your shared knowledge.

Obviously not judging by your last post. Don't ask a question then slag someone off for replying. Totally valid point about air being lost through the stopper or the possibility of a small leak.

Thanks anthonylanglands for telling everyone what happened, but I didn't see you when it happened?? You must have been standing by the beach, watching me struggle to recover it from the shore dump. oh proper pointless assumption.

He didn't have to be there, you told us what happened:

"Today I went out and got my kite washed up by the shore dump"

OTHERWISE, thanks very much for your comment, antonylanglands. I really do appreciate your time and effort to actually leave 2p worth of your wisdom for me (and all the forum readers). I really do. As it seems to happen in this thread, there are mixed opinions about how much to pump, what the cause can be for the jellyfish aftermath, etc...

Asshole

[southseasailor]

Yeah, just pump her up and leave it alone for a while. Mind you its finding space enough to do this in an average sized house:) I am lucky, at work I got loads of space to do this.

'Stroking the LE like a pervert' LOL!!

Whats the cause of the stall? front stall? ie kite tipping over its front and dropping. Had a classic case of this today, one nice jump but I swung out too far downwind, looked up on landing just in time to see the kite do a classic front stall.

[anthonylanglands]

Yeah listen buddy , you said it got smash in the shorey , i was only repeating what you typed .
And tbh i never could understand where this whole ego thing comes about with people and crashing kites (crashing includes stalls and all other manner of ways of getting the kite to hit the water as far as im concerned) get over it crashing a kite makes you a better kiter not a worse one.

You might think it hard to believe that air escapes out of the value under pressure but i can tell you that it does 110% and anyone who has taught for long enough will tell you the same , whether it be from slamming the kite into the water or from having it caught in the shore dump.

As for Air density in the LE being altered by the difference between the air and water temp , looking at this chart http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/air-t ... d_771.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , im not so sure.( Might happen if you where kiting on a sunny day next to a glacial lake i guess , what Ali said about kites popping on the beach in the sun its a completely different thing)
Oh btw a pretty firm kite that wont bend easily is about 8psi

Besides I dont know where your kiting but im pretty sure its warmer in the water here than it is outside lately.

Anyhow whateva have fun stalling your kite ......

[waverider]

there are mixed opinions about how much to pump, what the cause can be for the jellyfish aftermath, .

Most of those "mixed opinions" are associated to lazy-ness or can't be bothered, you've had some good advise on more than one topic.

Wag more-Bark less.

[defever]

ahem... I err... read what I wrote... err.

That was uncalled for. I am very sorry anthonylanglands. I trolled big time.

I'm back in my box!

...I blame my toothache. Got one nasty tooth out yesterday...

[rakeem15]

How much do I pump my kite up? I keep going until the pipe shoots off the attachment point because of the pressure :).

Puncture-wise, pump it up proper hard and then leave it for at least an hour before checking it.

My previous kite got trashed then repaired. Pumped it up, went for a quick kite to check it, all was well. Left it on the beach, went for lunch, came back and it was soft. Took me a while but eventually spotted that the main inflate valve had ever-so-slightly peeled away from the LE bladder - maybe check this?

Easy to fix, bit of rubber glue, job done.

[Sonnyrider]

I pump mine as hard as I can, double checking "can I fold the LE?"

Depending on which beach I'm at, if I can use my electric pump I will and I set it to 8.5 - 8.9 psi and stand around looking at the people looking at me whilst pumping their kites to not enough - They are thinking either "lazy bastid, or I want one of those"

[waverider]

A bit of history some of you may not know, others will cringe.

At the time of Slingshot Link Slingshot recommended 10 psi and though this recommendation was an attempt to cure some of the problems with that kite that didn't work, Slingshot were the first i'm aware of to draw a line in the sand.

It appears some kites started to blow the bladders, this was blamed on high pressure inflation. Some blamed poor bladder fabric.

Ever since that time I always pumped kites to 10 psi or when my cheap nasty and inaccurate pressure readout thingy told me 10 psi. It's very hard work for me to pump a kite to 10 psi so gradually I backed off to 8 psi. At 6 psi kites are like jelly, you'll be surprised to know that most kites I have launched or landed were like jelly. I stopped commenting on this when I realised the users probably knew they were not pumping hard enough and had a story to validate their reason.

If your kite isn't pumped hard enough the leading edge can deflect so badly then crimp the bladder and it'll damage the bladder. The only exception to this is if you're likely to be smacking your kite into the sea or the beach, pump the centre strut or the two centre struts to five psi so they can collapse and you'll be in with a chance to not cause a front-to-back tear. This has been ongoing advise from one of our leading repair shops, Jonnie Eisler.

I once caused a front-to-back tear, it was expensive. Since that time I always pumped the centre struts to 5 psi though I don't tend to do risky stuff these days that ends up with slam.

I have a weak rectal thingy that holds farts in when i'm in posh company. Because it doesn't doesn't work I fart lot's when i'm pumping and there's always a risk of the unmentionable happening but I still go for 8 psi.