Carp Kites for Spring!

Several of us almost derailed another thread talking about carp kites, and then we started making them.
This thread is for showing off our carp kites we are making! There are lots of ways to do them, and we are all doing them differently, and we'd love to see how you are making yours!

Carp kites are a Japanese tradition in spring. The carp symbolizes strength and determination.
Some pictures off the net to inspire you:















The basic design is a wind sock, a tube that opens at both ends and fills with air to fly the fish. The materials run from paper and toilet paper tubes, to fabric decorated in lots of ways, to full ripstop nylon kites.
Some basic patterns look like like this





And there are  tutorial videos all over, and blogs about them like this  summer fun: koinobori

https://www.exeter-cathedral.org.uk/news-events/latest-news/story-behind-carp-kites/ wrote:
While Children’s Week in Japan is celebrated with koinobori (carp kites), the cultural significance of carp is linked to an older folklore dating back to ancient China, following the trail of the Yellow River in Hunan.

For as much as five hundred years, golden carp have been said to swim upstream, fighting the river’s current to reach the very edge of a fabled waterfall – The Dragon Gate. The carp will often be set back as they climb against the downward flow, jumping for centuries until their courage and persistence pays off. The brave carp must pass the very top of the waterfall to transform into a great dragon.

The story is tale of diligence and ambition, one to signify that hard work will give its due so long as you have the drive to keep at it. In modern custom it’s seen as symbol of inner strength, and during children’s week, the kites are a wellwish to offer all children the prosperity of the golden carp.

I don't know about you, but I'm in need of strength and determination right now, so I'll be posting my pictures later today!

Come play with us! Make carps, and fly them to remind you to be strong and determined!
Add your carps to this thread, so we can all get inspired
:D  

Alas, I am one of those "several people"! In fact I found the tutorial that Pearl's put the link above for. As with most things, there are "bits missing" that I wished had been clearer in *my* mind - but I'm sure may be perfectly clear in other people's, and my job was made more difficult because I was upcycling cotton from my collection of scraps, so that may have contributed to the little problems I encountered.

Step one: make a pattern

If I were to make a second, I think I would make the narrowest part where the tail starts a little wider and taper the body more gently, but it needs to be hung first to see if it will fly nicely as is.

Step two: choose fabric I like from my bin of cotton

Who says you can't have a plaid fish???

Step three: lots of sewing - more than would have been necessary if I wasn't trying to use scraps, but the website instructions I was following is a sewing heavy method even without the added complication.


Step four: the web says to use spring wire for the mouth opening, and gives good reasons. However, what I had was a box of various old springs to choose material from. There was a spring from the center of an old tape measure - I had to "encourage" it to cooperate with a new life outside the box it had been living in, and because it had a "flat" shape rather than a wire, I did alter the sewing directions a little to give me a little extra room to slide it through. I think it's done the job nicely!


Step five: For hanging, the instructions also say to use a "barrel swivel" which is from fishing tackle. I just happen to have an ex-fisherman friend who has a few left over that he's willing to share. I've got fishing line, which they also recommend. However, I need to figure out a bit more about how to make these work in real life out in the wild domesticated field where I can enjoy it in flight.

If anyone has experience in that area, please speak up! Hints, experience, techniques, equipment, all welcome!

Jay: AWESOME fish!!
I am just using wire, dead clothes hanger, actually.
EDIT: I think I'm shifting to baling wire, easier to work with and the hanger is really overkill.

I have three lines coming off the mouth that are knotted together, and that is then tied to the fishing swivels.
I'm fighting a bit with the angles, of the lines. All t he pics I see their lines meet so the mouth opening sits flat. Mine doesn't fly well like that. I have tweaked it several times, waiting for the wind to come up more so I can get better data, it's light gusts this morning.

But the one I'm flying is cute! I'm headed in to sew up the other 3 :D

Where are some of our members who live in Japan when we need them? I'm sure they could give us lots of hints. Many pictures show 3 lines, the instructions I followed said to use 2 and I'm a bit concerned!

Got things to do now, but will research Airport Socks and how they're operated to see if there are ideas there we can use?

2? Hm. I'd think 3 would be more stable.
Please do research it, I'm curious.

The first 4 mins or so of this video have some lovely carp kites flying in a beautiful part of Japan. It looks to be as if they are all using three lines. I actually think this makes them rotate more in the wind.

Now that we've got carp kites, we need to hang them!

1. The larger better quality ones appear to have 3 strings off the mouth wire, rather than just the two in my instructions. I'm thinking I will do the math and set mine up with three.

2. There are two major ways of hanging carp kites - one is from a "flag pole" which has to have some sort of a "spinner" on the top. I was sent instructions from Japan for this system, but it was based on buying a flag pole and then just having to install the pole. I'm having to start from scratch and don't really want to buy one. However, the second system is a wire run horizontally or at an angle, and install the kite/kites from it which doesn't require a spinner, but may be an issue if the wind is really inconsistent (which mine is!)

3. So I tried looking up home-made wind socks: One fellow just used a pair of hub nuts about 2" apart on a skinny rod pushed into the ground. https://youtu.be/zsBESz0-U2U?t=274
And I looked up *many* pictures until I found this one:

So if anyone has any bright ideas, I'm open to them!

Well, me being me, I went for bent rebar I had around, stuck in the ground, then a good sized binder clip on it, with the fishing swivel looped through it... Cheap, effective, and what I had around. The rebar came from the local burn pit, too bent for anyone else to want them. Hold fish well!
Still working on my pics to add mine. Has been a long few days.
Hm reading that, it doesn't make sense. Let me go take a pic. Will edit it in in a few mins....

How tall is your bent rebar? I was planning to walk around to see what underachieving metal could be pressed into service, but it was cold for here and the outside urgent work took priority.

That said, a friend was here and she brought lace she'd found. She says my first Koi is clearly a boy, and I need a girl because farms need both - right??? Looks like I'll be doing more sewing, and it will be a light blue gingham and pink and flowers and lace from the look of things! I'd *like* to have the first one fly before cutting fabric for a second!

How tall is your bent rebar?

Hm.  I think they are a bit over 6 feet before I stuck them in the ground. Not optimal, but what I had.

And check the next post, finally posting my pictures!!
:D

Carp Kites!!

I'm not as energetic as Jay, sewing them. I went for spray paint on fabric.
I started by drawing a stencil, cutting it out, and taping paper around it to keep the overspray off things.



I made a stencil for my fabric cut outs, and cut out some blue fabric and some white fabric. The blue is a single knit polyester, and I have to admit, I prefer it. The white was a LOT more problem to work with. Yesterday I bought a pale lavender of the same type as the blue.



The spray went on in two layers, an under layer, then the stenciled overlay.





The fabric got the mouth folded to hem it and leave a channel for a piece of wire, then folded and sewn, turned and the top fin sewn
And look what I have! Fishes!!
The neighbor kids across the street (girls, 3 and 5 years old) named them, left to right "Bluey," "Pink Sparkles" and "Purple Sparkles."



One was hung out front from the bent rebar with a binder clip, as mentioned in the posts above. He's visible from the front room window  :D



And he blows in the wind!!



And my favorite shot from the wind sequence pictures I took.... He had rolled so his fin faced me, but he looks like a plane ready for take off!

Ready for take off!

Those are so cool, Pearl and Jay!!

Can't say I know anything about sewing or carp kites except the examples shown look great! Seems like a fun way to welcome spring. You ladies have such talent.

Airport wind socks I know about. They are mounted on a swivel so they always face directly into the wind. The front end is built to always be open & extended to scoop up air properly. The tail end is calibrated so that when it first fully extends the wind is at 15 knots. They are bright orange & located near the end of runways to make them easy to see. Would be more fun to see flying multicolored carp there!

Mike Barkley wrote:Can't say I know anything about sewing or carp kites except the examples shown look great! Seems like a fun way to welcome spring. You ladies have such talent.

Airport wind socks I know about. They are mounted on a swivel so they always face directly into the wind. The front end is built to always be open & extended to scoop up air properly. The tail end is calibrated so that when it first fully extends the wind is at 15 knots. They are bright orange & located near the end of runways to make them easy to see. Would be more fun to see flying multicolored carp there!

Just looked up what wind speed is 15 knots, 17.25 MPH. I'm hoping to calibrate my carp to tell me how strong the wind is, I'm giggling at the concept of calibrating a carp :D

I'm thinking at the moment, the basic positions are "45 degree carp," "full 90 degree carp," and when the wind makes the tail thrash (I deliberately messed with the air flow for it to do that) "full tail carp!" Just a matter of which speeds they match up to.

In my Monty Python voice: "What's the airspeed of a full tail carp?" "Pink or blue?" "I don't know! Aaaugh!!"

If Pearl can use a binder clip, I can use a paper clip!
Years ago - as in 20+ - Hubby bought a bunch of telescoping poles on cheap and was using them to hold out a tarp over a vehicle. Eventually, he upgraded his system, and the poles went into our spare parts collection. He had used doweling and a nail installed in the top to go through the tarp grommet. Perfect for my needs!

First I slipped on an aluminium grommet from an old tarp so that the Koi hardware wouldn't get caught on the slightly rough edge of the top of the pole. Then I used a large paperclip which isn't large enough to slip over the nail head, but does slip around the nail without too much friction. Here's hoping it won't just bend out the next time we have gusty winds! The barrel spinner with attached clip came that way from my fisherman friend.


Other than just looking nice, my goal is to park a few of these in my field to discourage aerial predators. To do so, it's important to be able to move things around regularly. To do that, I take a rebar "stake" and whack it in the ground, and put a pipe over top that holds my "obstacle". If you've never met my Scarecrow Couple, Sally and Sammy, go here: scarecrows They've been moving around my field for over 2 years using this system, so I figure my carp can do the same!



So now that he's all done, we've got dead calm! Snow is in the forecast. We're supposed to get wind west 30 km/h gusting to 50 tomorrow.

Those are amazing carp! I'm motivated to see what I can do.
Monday. Tomorrow is already booked, But I promise to see what I can find in the way of fishy like fabric (or just large scrap) and see what kind of carp I can make.
I love the history and story of it and think a carp kite would be great for this year!
Thank you for sharing your lovely pictures. I'm highly motivated and think I can find a swivel, string, wire, and fabric. I'll let y'all know!

Jay Angler wrote:Now that we've got carp kites, we need to hang them!  So if anyone has any bright ideas, I'm open to them!

Just HAD to go to Amazon to see what they have on hand! Lots of the Koi Carp types are listed, however, they also have Dragon kits as well.

The spring kites probably correspond with the spring spawn when carp are easy to take in the shallows.

Carp kite update!
At this point I have 2 blue ones, using 3 point string, on binder clips on bent rebar flying, one in the front garden, one in the back garden. I also have 2 pinker ones using 2 point wire on sliding tubes that are on straight rebar, both in the back yard, one higher than the other to catch different wind.

So the airspeed of a BLUE carp is
          45 degree carp= 15 mph or more
          90 degree carp= 40 mph
          Full tail carp= 50 mph or more, and WHOO does that tail go! My turbulence modification works well!

The airspeed of the PINK carps has not been determined, but they are much lower. I'm thinking 90 degree carp will end up being about 25 mph.

The binder clips work well as far as holding, the one in the back did not come loose in heavy wind, although it DID pull it's rebar over to about 45 degrees! Admittedly it was in very wet soil, but still, enough force to move a rebar stake did not make the binder clip come loose.
BUT!
The one in the front danced and snarled itself around the rebar until it's too tight to the pole to do so anymore.
BUT !
That made it catch wind better, as it doesn't have to get it's whole body angle up for the mouth to catch the most wind.

The two pink ones are on 2 point wire, held 90 degrees, and they do better. they catch air at lower speeds. The wire is curving downward more than I like though, so on today's list is to tighten them up against the sliding tubes that let them pivot to face the wind.

The windspeed data point cracks me up, my joke above about "What is the windspeed of a full tail carp?" "Blue or Pink?" "I don't know! AUUGH!!" is actually accurate, the windspeed number IS changing if it's a blue or pink carp! I didn't plan it this way, but it's happening as I experiment!  :D  

Jay Angler: THAT is why you saw to put 2 anchor points on a 90 degree pole, it IS more effective for catching the wind.

My sliding tubes on rebar are actually cheap solar stake lights, remove the ground stake, run wire through two points on the tube, hook the carp to it, put the light in tight (glue it maybe? (mine aren't, they haven't come loose yet, but it's only been two days) and drop it over a piece of straight rebar stuck in the ground. This lets the whole thing pivot with the wind direction change. That part is working well, the carp pivots and it's lit at night :D
I'll take pics today.

I'll bet the flying carp at night, glowing and blowing in the wind, are a majestic sight.
I have no more words, lest I break into song or giggles.

I still haven't made my carp and think I have some perfect carpish material for it. I need to get creatin'!

Dammit. I had this all written up, and the computer ate it. I have GOT to buy a new mouse, This one dances all over my screen, triggering all kinds of errors.
Let me try again. Sigh.

I was asked for more info on the way I'm mounting the carps.

So what we have here is 2 wires, at the top and bottom of the mouth, cut SHORT so they attach very close to their pivoting slider. I'm using cheap solar lights as my sliders, they turn easily on a straight rebar post. The idea is hold them at 90 degrees upright, so they catch the wind easily, and both top and bottom turn together. They are working REALLY well!

And now to show them off!

Two carp visible, really close to being Full Tail!

Showing off her colors

Wiggling like a proper carp!

I have mentioned, but not explained, Full Tail Carp and how I did it.
If you look at my fabric cuts you can see that one  side of the tail is straight, and one is curved.

The theory behind it is as the wind comes through the lower body it gets compressed, then that curve increases the turbulence. So when the wind is high enough that the carp is standing straight off the pole (90 degree carp) when it increases just a hair more, the carp suddenly goes rigid, and the tail goes insane! Full Tail Carp!!

The way the PINK ones are mounted, on the solar lights, the windspeed required for each stage is:
45 degree carp = 7-10 MPH
90 degree carp = 20 MPH
Full Tail Carp = 25 MPH

The BLUE carps, which are still mounted with 3 point string on bent rebar require a much higher speed for each stage:
45 degree carp= 15 MPH
90 degree carp= 40 MPH
Full Tail Carp= 50 MPH

In a good wind the blues are flying well, but in lower wind, the pinks fly the best. But after tornado warnings in the night, the next morning the wind was still high enough for this one to get to Full Tail a few times!

This is so cool!
I lived in Japan in the mid 90s and there I was told that families flew one carp for each son they had, so when it came time to think about bringing gifts home to my family I decided to buy my Dad one as he had one son. My parents were living on the hill side overlooking Table Rock Lake and I thought it would be cool to buy one visible from a boat on the lake so I got a 3 meter long one and he set up a flag pole. It flew there from March to October for about 10 years before it was finally in taters.

I love my first Carp Kite attempt, but he's on the heavy side, and doesn't flutter all that much. My goal was to have another thing in the field to distract aerial predators.

I needed to disassemble an old coat as raw materials to fix something for my neighbor. I decided the black and yellow lining might make a much more "fluttery" Koi. At the moment, she's still in the work room as I'm still working on the spinner/holder mechanism, however she agreed to have her picture taken!

Carp kite update:
The other day we had high winds and tornado watches, full tail carps, and one of the carps must have wanted to go upstream to spawn.
He was held on a piece of rebar by a solar light slipped over the top. The kite and light were about 7.5-8 feet off the ground level.
He must have launched high! Taking the weight of a solar stake light with him, he got about 30 feet.
Strength and determination, indeed!

Pearl decided that my black and yellow carp kite should be named Beatrice, because it reminded her of a bee. I decided that I'd try a version of Pearl's mounting system since she'd named her!


I already had the scrap of pipe, so I picked up a cap fitting from the hardware store. However, the pipe was a close fit, so I really had no way to add hardware to hold the chain. Since Beatrice is Canadian, I figured hockey tape would do the trick, and it has done a fine job.

Here's Beatrice learning to fly - her black fins flap really nicely!