ColoColo said..Gorgo said..
Clean the area to be taped with metho. Tape it with 50mm spinnaker tape. Tape it both sides. Round the corners. It will be stronger than the original.
If you have access to a sewing machine you could oversew the tape at the trailing edge. It's not really necessary. Use polyester thread.
Yeah right...
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience. Most helpful.
"...It will be stronger than the original. ..." That's what the professionals tell me. Who am I to argue?
I have never had a taped repair fail in almost 25 years of doing them. I used to oversew the edges to stop any chance of peeling off and collecting sand. I don't do that any more. I did two full length splits to my kite, similar to the ones above. I taped them and they've been fine for at least 50 hours of use. For the trailing edge I wrap the tape over the edge and sew it to make it a little neater and, hopefully, stronger. The fabric you're sticking to is different to the sail cloth and it makes sense to nail the tape down a bit.
PS. I forgot to mention I like to heat set the tape. I put a blanket on a table and spread the kite on it. I use a metal water bottle filled with hot water as an iron and roll it over the tape. It works a treat and gets rid of any bubbles and wrinkles in the tape. I got that tip from a professional skipper from an around the world racing yacht. I can't claim credit for making it up.
