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Wear Strips


beach

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The Standard B Series Pros will all have these strips on them.

They are not on Mids or Vented.

I haven't had my revs long enough to know, so forgive the daft question .... Do the venteds not suffer the same problem or is it just a pain to put wear strips on the venteds?

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I haven't had my revs long enough to know, so forgive the daft question .... Do the venteds not suffer the same problem or is it just a pain to put wear strips on the venteds?

The mesh on the Mid Vents and Full vents absorb the vibration and scuff during flight.

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  • 9 months later...

At the WCRC 2012, JB pointed these wear patterns out to me, on one of his older kites. OK, I said to myself - "Self, we don't fly but a fraction of the time that John does. AND, we to not yank and spank our kite around the air, like the pros." For instance, doing clock work I don't move much faster than a real clock. ;):P :P Slowly start the spin, slowly stop the spin somewhere in the correct quadrant - some of you older fliers might know what I mean.

Then I looked at the sail of my standard B full sail kite. There they were - the "stretch marks" obviously working to become little slits. As JB explained, it is not the rubbing against the vertical spar, it is the stretching and releasing of the fabric along the axis of the vertical spar. I don't know which fabrics are most susceptible to this wear mechanism, but apparently recent standard B's are. I don't see any sign of these "stretch marks" on my EXP, or older Rev I or Rev II (solid color) sails - are those rip-stop nylon? (They feel like soft fabric compared to the newer 1.5 sails.)

He suggested "Insignia Tape", used on sailboat sails for insignias, applied to the sail to reinforce the sail along the stretch/release axis - i.e. beneath the vertical spar axis. It is available at a number of online kite stores.

Of course, the other solution is to repopulate your kite bag with B-Pros!

(If you dream IT three nights in a row, IT becomes reality. :w00t::wacko::bones:)

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I tried using some polyethylene tape that I had lieing around and gave it a try. The tape doesn't have too much adhesive on it so I figure that after flying it on the beach it will probably pick up some sand. Gives me some piece of mind that the b series has some wear and tear protection! I put the tape only on the back of the kite and carefully unrolled a piece long enough for the length of the area then lightly adjusted the tape until I got the angle that I wanted before pressing firmly with my thumb along the tape.

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  • 1 year later...

I stand to be corrected, but I believe they are already on the Zen and I know that (for a fee) Bazzer will put them on the mid and vent as well when he's making them.

Once again, I stand to be corrected, but I do believe you can see them on JB's mid vent ;)

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this is spider silk thickness adhesive, used instead of sewing

An entire kite made with no stitching. The material is designed to bond two pieces of metal together. On a kite the fabric next to the adhesive bond will fail first, not the seam itself. We used to make a low wind kite called the Ryv1.6 and it was a no-sew project (all straight lines). I used several of these kites to a couple thousand hours each, until you could blow smoke rings thru the fabric!

Go onto KiteBuilderDOTcom and ask about no-sew projects or 9460 bonding. They can send you specifics about how best to use this product and where it's commercially available.

Just so you know, .... it's not a faster construction method than sewing

It could easily reinforce an existing sail with a light weight wear strip. Lay the tape out in a straight line on the material selected, icarex, nylon, signature cloth, polyester, whatever. The wear strip material should be cut to exact size, hot cut if possible.

First you "bond" onto the wear strip, then peel the release tape, apply to your sail and bond again, but turn the sail over so you can watch the front side. A craft iron with a teflon coated & shaped foot is an excellent acquisition for this method of construction

Lay some books on your bonding efforts overnight or carefully iron the wear strip from the opposite side so you can visually witness the transfer bonding (it will get smooth-er if you've laid it out correctly)

you can peel this stuff up if you make a mistake, but you'd better practice on a scrap first and HURRY-up if it's the live job on your kite.

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