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Successful mast-based launch of the V3 kite

Formal Metadata

Title
Successful mast-based launch of the V3 kite
Subtitle
Video recorded on 2 August 2012 with a GoPro camera mounted on the leading edge tube
Title of Series
Number of Parts
15
Author
Contributors
License
CC Attribution 4.0 International:
You are free to use, adapt and copy, distribute and transmit the work or content in adapted or unchanged form for any legal purpose as long as the work is attributed to the author in the manner specified by the author or licensor.
Identifiers
Publisher
Release Date2020
LanguageOriginal sound, no spoken text
Producer
Production Year2012
Production PlaceFormer naval airfield Valkenburg, Leiden, Netherlands

Content Metadata

Subject Area
Genre
Abstract
The video recording shows a successful launch of the TU Delft V3 kite from an upside-down hanging position on 2 August 2012 at the former airfield Valkenburg, Leiden, Netherlands. The GoPro camera is taped to the rear side of the leading edge tube of the wing, between the two center struts, looking at the kite control unit. During the upswing of the kite, the kite control unit remains in the line of sight between video camera and mast head. At 7 s into the video, the ground station appears at the top of the field of view. Also clearly visible is the tether running from the mast head to the ground station. At 10 s into the video, the tether suddenly disengages from the mast head, which leads to a strong dynamic perturbation of the tensile system. Playing the video in slow motion reveals that the disengaged tether moves within 1 s towards a new equilibrium shape, which is the straight line connecting ground station and kite. This rapid straigthening of the tether yanks the kite control unit upwards, into the line of sight between video camera and ground station. In contrast to the previous flight, the perturbation does not lead to a breaking of the weak link, just below the kite control unit, but instead, the kite accelerates and, while reeling out the tether, performs a crosswind sweep past the ground surface, before climbing to higher altitude. The kite is then operated in several crosswind flight maneuvers and reel in phases before landing sideways in the hands of the ground crew, at the side of the wind wind window. This launch was also covered by a regular photo camera and by a second GoPro video camera that was placed on the ground next to the launch mast. Unfortunately, the data recording did not work properly. Because the time of the GoPro video camera was incorrectly set, the time information of the photographic footage was used for synchronization, knowing from the previous test flight that this footage runs 2:21 min ahead of the correct time. The creation date of the video was set to the launch time 19:26:29.50 such that the tether disengages from the mast head about 10 s later, at 19:26:39.50.
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