Sliding Weather Instrument Fixed to Tether (SWIFT)

­BACKGROUND

Kite Popper Line Climber is a manually deployed and uncontrollable sail. Kite popper can travel up the kite line to a stopping point (or bridle point) where the line connects to the kite, then “pop” closed and slide back down the line. The user needs to thread the kite through the popper, open its sail, and watch as the wind carries it all the way up to a kite. When it reaches the kite, it will collapse (with the help of an elastic band) and slide back down to the user to send the popper up to the kite again

SUMMARY OF TECHNOLOGY

SWIFT is designed as a climbing system to collect weather data along a tether line. The tether line can be connected to a kite, weather balloon, hot air balloon, or drone. Kite Popper was the design inspiration, and this concept is focusing on a remote controlled mechanically system to open and close the sail/fabric of the SWIFT to make it slide up or down along the tether. Opening the sail during descent can stop or slow down the descending rate unlike the commercial kite popper line climber, without any automated control. The size of the SWIFT can be scaled up or down to fit the payload needs/capacity by changing the size of the fabric area. The current working model has an area of 0.67m² however this is scalable.

Fig 1. Swift deployed and rising up toward the kite.

POTENTIAL AREAS OF APPLICATION

• Low altitude weather collection system

MAIN ADVANTAGES

• A sail can carry sensors and bring it up to altitude along a tether
• Remotely controlled to ascent or descent

STAGE OF DEVELOPMENT

• There is a Working Model for this technology.