Author: betsy

Don and Kiteboat Project in The Kiteboarder Magazine

12/14/12

Reporter Paul Lang interviewed Don at length about his history as a competitive windsurfer, a sail designer, and a kitesurfing pioneer and asked him about the future of Makani Power and the Kiteboat Project. Read the whole thing at The Kiteboarder.

Don Montague has a long history in kiteboarding and was one of the people involved in very early kite development. While still working at Naish as the head of R&D, he began to play with attaching kites to outrigger canoes and boats. He’s since moved on as founder of Makani Power, a renewable energy company, and is also hard at work developing kites and boats specially made for kite boating. We had a chance to talk to Don about his […more]

Corwin Hardham, 1974-2012

10/29/12

It is with deep sorrow that we must announce that Corwin Hardham, Co-Founder and CEO/CTO of Makani Power, and Advisor to the Kiteboat Project, among other companies, died unexpectedly but peacefully on October 23rd, 2012. He was 38 years old.

Corwin’s clear vision and deep commitment to transformative innovation in clean energy inspired us all. A brilliant engineer and skillful leader, as well as an avid kitesurfer, dancer, and community builder, he showed boundless energy and generosity in all aspects of his life.

Our hearts go out to his family, his close companion Gia Schneider, and his many friends.

Please visit his memorial site at astupendousbadass.com for more information.

Advantages

9/29/12

The advantages of a kiteboat over a traditional sailboat are manifold. As a kite pulls a boat, it does not also heel the boat over or pitch it forward as a sail does. This fact means that a kiteboat does not require large counterbalancing forces which, in opposing the heeling and pitching forces of a sail, create drag and present practical problems. The absence of this behavior means that the only limit on kite size is kite control, since increasing the power made by the kite does not require increasing ballast or beam, for example, which are limiting factors on a sailboat. Kites can fly higher than sails, too, which grants them access to stronger, steadier, higher-altitude winds, […more]

Don and Kiteboat Project on France3

9/24/12

Don and the Kiteboat Project were featured on France3’s Thalassa on Friday, September 21st. The full episode on San Francisco, “San Francisco La Rebelle,” is available online here. The portion featuring the Kiteboat Project, “La Cité des Pionniers,” has been disabled on the Thalassa site, but it’s available on Vimeo using the password “sf.”

K2 Test – Sep 14

9/14/12

We took the boat out again today to practice sailing with the new foils. Performance was great. We also saw the Artemis crew heading back to dock.

K2 Test – Aug 25

8/25/12

We returned to the Bay today, this time with 60 m lines, but we didn’t have much luck with the wind.

 

K2 Test – Aug 22

8/22/12

A late evening test today. We used the new carbon winch, but added a 5th-line spool (to the left of the orange stripe in photo) instead of trying to use the fishing winch for the 5th line. We also added a carbon hood for the winch, and we moved the brake to the outside and back of the chair. We replaced the new single-pole mast with the old A-frame, in order to ensure that we could launch and test the winch. With fewer new changes, we were able to get the kite up fairly easily and to sail around a bit before dusk fell.