This page created and maintained by Tom Tinney. littlekites.com 2014 |
This train was made using 101 of my three-inch sun and moon kites. This is the first time I'd tried making a kite train, miniature or otherwise. It was at least 101 times of saying to myself, "I hope this flies". Just like a full size kite train, they are all flown on one line. The flying line is "SPIDERWIRE", a Spectra fused micro-filament fishing line. The five kites on the end are about two feet apart, and the rest are about 18 inches apart. That makes the train about 150 feet long. The picture and movie were taken the first day I flew this, before I shortened the tails on the kites. The train flew great, even with the tails getting tangled on the next kite up the line. After shortening the tails to about 16 inches, the whole thing looked like a millipede and still flew great! At the W.S.I.K.F., in Long Beach, Washington, Monday features arches and trains. The Lilac City Windchasers (mostly from Spokane, Washington) are well known for their kite trains, and were giving me a good-natured ribbing for "hogging all the wind" with this. The judges were kinder. I was given a ribbon for "Most Unique Train" on Monday, and a second place in the "Kahuna Class" Trains, Arches and Centipedes on handcrafted day. Not bad for a bunch of tissue, bamboo, and way too much time on my hands. I placed this kite for auction at the World Kite Museum's fund-raiser. I won't say how much it went for, but Charlie M'Clary took most of it home, to San Diego |
This is a short movie clip of the train in flight. |