Passively Autonomous Parafoil Loops under a Pilot Kite
Video: 6M parafoil looping under the original kPower Delta.
Test Rig: 1 M looping foil with NTK's Kayakite. Demonstrating persistent recovery in turbulant winds.
Endured 3 weeks of continuous testing in a multitude of wind conditions from light to strong, smooth to turbulent. Both the pilot kite and the looping parafoil exhihited a strong tendancy to self-relaunch.
Rather than as torque, power is extracted orthogonally to the tether using a variety of different single stroke kite engines (see below).
​Test rig shown pumping air into a cylinder with simple PTO set roughly perpendicular to the tether.
This Single Stroke Kite Engine is built around a one way sprag (the bicycle freewheel) and uses a spring return to reset itself after being pulled out by the kite. Input to the generator is smoothed out by the concrete flywheel.
High Speed Load Motion. Demonstration test uses a spring loaded retractable dog leash on each side. As the rotating kite pulls on one side, the opposite side is retracting.