Making your own 5-meter lines for indoor flying

This article is by Bruno Teuile, of the Cramayailes club. The last known change on the club’s site dates from 2013. It goes with the indoor 4-line school, restored by QuadKites.org. The text is the author’s, in the first person, translated from French, with paragraphs split for readability.

These lines are for the Revolution Indoor, which needs very slippery lines. The prices, brands and shops mentioned date from the article.

The main problem facing the indoor kiter, apart from learning flying techniques, is making lines. Ready-made, matched 25 or 37 m lines are easy to find in shops, but for our discipline we need no more than 5 m, and they are impossible to find. So you have to make them. This article will try to give a simple method and perhaps spare beginners the mistakes I made myself.

First of all, it sounds silly, but you need line, basically string… Do not count on roast string, it would not work very well. On the market there are currently two brands of lines worth considering:

• Laser Pro Gold (or LPG);
• Vector Lines.

The advantage of Laser Pro is that it comes on 90 m reels. I only found Vector as ready-made 25 m lines. If you choose this solution, you will have to sacrifice the prepared line, but the goal is to make 5 m lines, so no scruples. Advantage: for about twenty euros, you get enough for 4 pairs of lines and a winder (the plastic piece you wind the lines on). In addition, these lines are a pleasant blue and already sleeved at both ends, so you will only have to sleeve the end you cut for two of the lines, the other two being sleeved at both ends (or at one end only if you decide not to sleeve the loops attached to the kite).

Note that other brands exist, but they are not recommended for kite flying, because they stretch too much, and having lines that stretch is never good.

Once the brand is chosen, you have to choose the strength of the lines. It is expressed in kilos and starts at 25 kg, up to… much more. For indoor, we again have two possible choices: 25 kg, or 40 kg (50 kg at Vector Lines).

What is the difference? It is in the diameter of the thread: 25 kg is thinner than 40 kg. On the other hand, it seems obvious, 25 kg can bear less pressure than 40 kg. Depending on how you hit the lines and the pressure you put in the kite, you will have to choose accordingly.

However… on the advice of my kite seller, I had chosen LPG in 25 kg (it was all he had). Alas, not a training session went by without me ending up with knots in the lines, and in most cases the lines ended up in the bin and a new pair served for the next session. Until the day I switched to LPG, still, but in 40 kg: and then, oh miracle, no more knot problems. Simply because the thread is thicker, it is less likely to knot on itself, and if it happens anyway, the knots are much easier to grab and undo.

Besides, there is hardly any difference in line weight between 25 and 40 kg, at least you cannot feel it. So we have our lines; for this article they will be Vector Lines in 50 kg.

Next we need sleeve, in two pieces of different colors. This is important, because it gives a quick visual cue of which is the left line and which is the right line, especially if you take the lines in one hand during maneuvers. With two ends of the same color in your hands, who knows… After 10 minutes of flying it may be obvious, but for me, I find it simpler.

You need to take suitable sleeve: it exists in different inner diameters. Take the smallest available relative to the lines’ diameter, because if it is too large, the lines will float inside and this can cause line-slip problems and change their length (sleeve that bunches up, for example).

You need about 60 cm of each color (2 × 30 cm), or 30 cm of each if you chose not to sleeve the end of the lines attached to the kite.

A very useful little accessory: the line threader. Inserted into the sleeve, it lets us get the line inside. If you do not have one, good luck with what follows… It is however very simple to make from very thin wire. Otherwise, you can find them at Decathlon in the kite section or in any good kite shop. At Decathlon, the sleeves sold with it are too wide for the size of our lines. Besides, this accessory is always sold with enough sleeve to make one line set.

We almost have everything. We only need something to cut (a cutter or similar, but well sharpened so as not to chew the lines), something to heat the ends of the lines and sleeves to make a clean stop (a lighter works fine), two pencils or pens, a door handle or something to hang the lines on while making them, a winder to store the finished lines, a rubber band and 6 m of straight line to work properly. Preferably no cats where you make your lines: they will love playing with you while you work…

We have all our equipment, so we can begin. First, cut your sleeve: 60 cm cut in half, in both colors, will make loops of about fifteen centimeters, enough to work well.

Pull about twelve meters of line (if the line is on a reel) on each side of your anchor point (6 m one side, 6 m the other), that is 5 m of line + 2 × 30 cm for the sleeving, the rest to make the knots. With Vector, 2 × 6 m, with its sleeves already ready.

Cut when you judge you have enough length (take more rather than not enough, otherwise you will have lines that are too short). Even out your lines well, then cut off the excess.

Take a piece of sleeve of each color, then pass each end of line, from the anchor-point side (or the other end for lines already sleeved), into each piece of sleeve. To do this, insert the line threader into a sleeve. At first it goes in easily, then very quickly it gets stuck. Do not panic, this is normal. To keep it moving, use the “pinch-and-slide” technique:

• pinch the sleeve a few centimeters behind the head of the threader and slide the sleeve over it, compressing it;
• pinch the head of the threader and pull on the other end.

Result: the threader moves forward. Just keep going like this until its head comes out at the other end of the sleeve. The threader may pierce the sleeve. This is not serious: pull it back and start moving forward again, carefully.

When the threader has come out at the other end of the sleeve, you have to seal the ends of the sleeve by heating them slightly, so as to melt the fraying threads. With a lighter, lightly heat each end, not too much (otherwise there will not be enough sleeve) but enough to seal the threads. Careful, the threader heats up quickly: do not burn yourself. Also move the threader slightly, otherwise the sleeve threads may weld around it and you will have trouble removing it to pass the line.

Once this is done, take the end of your line and pass it into the head of the threader. Hold the line with one hand and, with the other, pull on the threader at the other end of the sleeve. If all went well, your line comes out at the other end of the sleeve. Do the same for the other line.

All that remains is to make the loops and tie them. The main difficulty is that, as far as possible, both loops must be as equal as possible.

Take one of the sleeves, leaving enough line sticking out. Stretch the sleeve well, as it is slightly elastic (to prevent it from bunching up later). Fold the sleeve in the middle and tie a knot as close to the end as possible. If you are at the anchor point, tighten well. Then tie another knot just behind the sleeve, directly on the line. This knot prevents the line from slipping in the sleeve and making it bunch up, which would change the line’s length: two lines of different lengths are no fun to fly with. Another advantage of this knot: it prevents the lines from catching on each other when they twist and you try to untangle them.

For the second line, do the same, except that you have to tie the knot on the sleeve adjusting it so that the loop is as close as possible to the same size as the first. Cut off the protruding ends of line and seal everything with the flame. Careful: do not burn too close to the line, otherwise you risk weakening it and it will break during a flight, or even before. Also be careful: the end of the thread tends to catch fire quickly, be ready to blow it out.

Phew, one half done. Alas, it was not the hardest, at least I find.

For the other two ends of the lines, you have to work the same way to pass the lines through the sleeves. Be careful not to mix up the colors: the orange sleeve on the line that has the orange loop at the other end, and the green one likewise.

After passing the sleeves comes the big difficulty which, once overcome, will give you well-matched lines: the loops. Start by doing the same as at the other end: relax the sleeves well, then make a first loop without tightening the knot. Do the same with the other line, then take the two pens (or sticks, screwdrivers, anything long and thin), pass your loops around them, and pull hard to tighten the knots.

To finish, tighten both knots well, tie the locking knot directly on the line, then seal the threads by heating.

As the Vectors are already sleeved at one end, I make a green mark and a red mark on each of the lines, so I know which is which when I attach them to the kite.

All that remains is to wind them around the winder. Hook one of the line ends, then, passing a finger between the lines, wind in a figure eight around the winder. To lock the lines, take the rubber band, pass it through the loops, tie a lark’s head knot, then stretch it around the winder and attach it. There you have a nice brand new line set.

To test your lines, start by attaching them to your kite’s attachment points. Pass two fingers through the loop (here, an unsleeved loop), turn your fingers over, hold the loop formed this way and pass it around the attachment point: this is a lark’s head knot. Tighten.

Once both lines are attached, take the two free ends on a single finger and fly an Over the Top. If they are well matched, the OTT will end perfectly in front of you, without the kite turning right or left. Congratulations, you have made your first line set; many should follow…

If you do not want to sleeve the end of the lines that goes onto the attachment points, make a small loop at the end of the main loop of the line. That way, to undo the lark’s head knot, instead of getting frustrated trying to grab the little end of line, you just pull on the small loop that sticks out and the knot undoes itself.

Another tip: always attach the same color on the same side of the kite. This saves you from wondering when you change hands.

That concludes this article, hoping it helped you make beautiful lines…