Tuesday 31 July 2012

Club Day. The Birds of Prey version. Volume 1, Issue 3

Today was a rousing success, at least in my opinion.  Today, the Birds of Prey Club made kites.  They didn't fly worth a hoot, but it gave us a wonderful opportunity to look at the design we used and think about the modifications we would make so that the next time out, they would soar in the wind.  And we had to do some division, measurement, and learned a wee bit about geometry.

Our design was based on the instructions from How to Make and Eagle Kite, which seemed a fitting type of kite for the club to make.  All of us along the way make some tweaks:
  • My husband and I made the frames in advance, and we used simple hardwood dowels from the hardware store instead of bamboo.  
  • We decided to affix the plastic bag to our frame using both masking tape and glue.  This was decided when it seemed that we would have to hold the plastic in place for a while, and we just didn't have the time or patience for that.
  • The boys designed the heads, wings and tails freestyle - they didn't care to simply attach triangles to the kite - they wanted to make wings that looked like wings and tails that looked like tails.  And the heads had to be detailed.  We had two bald eagles and a great horned owl in the end.  These were attached with glue and invisible tape.
  • We may not have been exact on our measurements when we spaced the ribbon sections on the kite tail.









Here's what we talked about that we would do differently next time:
  • We would make the ribbon sections longer so they would be easier to tie on.  We would also double-knot the ribbons to the tail so they would stay on.
  • We would make sure that we didn't skimp on the ribbons on the tail.
  • We would make sure the string ball was tied tightly to the bridle.
  • We ran into our neighbour, Pierre, as we were leaving the park.  It turns out Pierre has built many a kite in his day.  He suggested we add an anchor on either side of the short dowel to help the kite stay level.
We learned that it was okay that some of the decorative wings and tails we attached were okay if they hung over top of the kite frame - the wind did curl them a bit, but they stayed on.

Looking forward to our last Birds of Prey Club meeting of the summer!

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