Isotropic kite

Dave Santos posted this file on Yahoo forum some years ago: isotropic
an expected advantage can be avoiding rotating to face the wind direction, acting on the bridle.

Last days I experimented this ugly round parachute as a kite. But a parachute without holes is perhaps not as stable as a parasail with slots for what I saw, or the altitude was too low to avoid turbulence. A kite lifter like Peter Lynn’s single skin pilot-kite would perhaps be better than a parachute if it is quite round in order to face any wind directions without rotating, but losing also some stability (?). For this I prefer avoid implementing tails or cones.
This parachute was realized using XF-film. The wind speed was 6 to 12 m/s.
Photos and a video:


https://forum.awesystems.info/uploads/default/original/1X/d25422ddf38d00058eb39170993b061d36af3f9b.mp4

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I am not quite sure of it. Parasails contain drive and turn slots for lift and steering left and right. For my use slots could be useless, excepted for some variants.

I’d like to add to this topic that there are other methods by which to make an isotropic kite
(Kite which takes wind from any direction)
a single line kite already does, but it’s land use is huge on it’s own, and the chance of it colliding in urbulence is high. But by being stayed by with wide topnet network formation, as in the video below, you have stability, seperation and isotropic behavior from single line kites…

You see the simulated effect of a changing wind field in this video.

Other isotropic network forms were also proposed

Still more exist where a tensile ring (or fractal ring array) is flown or tethered such that a kite (or kite net) can be flown with a rotary anchoring set, held on the tensile ring forms… The rotary anchoring set e.g. turns with the kite and wind

Kites with a wide spread rotary anchors could be set and added to the inside the ring forms of a


Or the triangle patches themselves could maybe be set as lift surfaces.

The video I put on my initial post shows a chaotic motion due to the turbulence close to the ground, but without major crash, with the possibility to take-off after a minor crash. Lines can act on the kite deformation in order to steer it. As it scales up, this single kite should keep its unity. The question of the unity of the network remains as to the possibility of a control with different winds on the same sector.

Some videos of istropic kites are linked.

Santos’ isotropic kite below:


Lee Sedgwick and his UFO below:

Video of the oscillating parachute.

Nice to see such a simple arrangement tested
Thanks Pierre

I guess there will be ways to extract the pulses of energy available at the anchoring
I shouldn’t think the output will be stable nor powerful or easy to coordinate

I saw this arrangement today


It reminded me of this post even though your anchors are fixed location here.
This simple linear relationship between intersections from moving points may have an interesting application
Yet again though I doubt it will be powerful

Thanks @Rodread.

My video is not quite new but I rather envisaged yo-yo use. Here another use is evoked as an oscillating parachute (in Dave Santos’ style) could act at each anchor on its respective generator via its respective winch or hydraulic accumulator, and by short strokes. Returns are made by springs according to the parachute moves. The generators will not work quite at the same time because the parachute does not pull all of them simultaneously. I think such a system could scale without requiring any automated control, but rather by stochastic playing on numerous anchors regulating chaos.

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I doubt also, because the motion of the kite is limited. The kite moves little and only based on random turbulence near the ground. Another (not too good) possibility is to use an unstable kite like my parachute. So there can be no substantial wind energy collected.

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I dont see the huge benefit as most kites will align nose into wind inherently. The only benefit otherwise is having a «divergent» bridle, meaning that the bridle is fastened to a larger ground area rather than a single point.

A huge disadvantage is that most airfoils have a front and aft and they are not symmetric. So by doing this, you are getting less lift per wing area.

The main claimed advantages of isotropic kite networks are dense, safe and stable deployment in all conditions. Shared load line efficiency. And a further claim is the advantage of combining the work output of multiple kites on a large single generator. Sounds worthwhile investigating.

The forms of kite network which enable Isotropic action are varied.
The kites (Often referred to as kixels (kite-pixels)) on the network are either
set aspect e.g. tied to the network and unable to rotate relative to the network
or
themselves isotropic. e.g. the kixels either mount via a standard single bridle point on a thrust bearing able to rotate with respect to the net
OR
the kixels are able to rotate within a cell (a net hole) within the network. For this the kixels have their ends mobile tethered to net holes via a clamping pulley trolley set.

For many Isotropic network forms (especially where the net is not tight over a valley or the kixels are fixed) all of the bridling would actively have to be altered to reshape the whole net surface as a lifting body.

You can see videos of basic designs of these types in the post above

For a really brave use of isotropic kite network
How about travelling on a kite bridge?