Tail is also providing stability through its weight. By the way, does anybody know or have thought about a kite flying stable at nadir (opposite of zenith) that could be used as a stabilizing tail ? Should I start a topic on this subject ? Maybe in Autozenith kite ? Auto-zenith kite
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I bought a mini single line pocket parafoil. Weight of the kite without the tail, approximately 20 grams, and 45 grams with the tail. Flight elevation angle: approximately 45 degrees.
I then replaced the original tail with a 3m/0.5m rectangle with a bar at each end, the whole thing weighing 125 grams without the 20 gram kite: photo below.
The kite was flying at an elevation angle of only 10 degrees and was very unstable, as the tail kept moving.
But stability wasn’t the first thing I was looking for. I was trying to see if it was possible to get extra traction with the tail. So I installed a line for the tail, and pulled: the elevation angle then went from 10 degrees to 0 degrees, with a very strong pull during few seconds, but no stability, even less than when the tail was hanging.
For stability, several sections are maybe better if we want an overall higher area tail.
That sounds like a good idea to me. It seems to me that would reduce the kite’s degrees of freedom, forcing it to always point up, as long as the tension on the tail line was high enough. But @Rodread has some experience with this and disagrees?