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Weekly Update: Week 2

This week's lab session was dedicated to research. We did not have our materials, thus we could not start building prototypes just yet. Instead we looked into background information. We found many sites that gave us key information on how and why a kite flies.  We also looked into technical kite terminology. This information helped us to understand why certain kite shapes acts the way they do.

Through research, we found that the most successful indoor kites are based off of the Delta wing shape. This style of kite features a triangular shape. This shape allows the kite adjust to changes in wind. Figure 1 shows a an example of a Delta Kite.



Figure 1: Example of Delta kite
http://intothewind.com/delta-kites


This shape maybe useful in our kite design. Our design is inspired by a flying bird. The Delta shape resembles a bird in some ways. A few modifications may be needed, but using this shape is definitely something to think about.

In addition to research we also played around with the shape of the kite. The term "bird shaped" is really rather broad. Our kite could either directly resemble a bird, like our original plan, or be loosely based on a bird and open to interpretation, like the delta kite. Another question that came up was whether the sail would be applied in one piece or multiple pieces. It will ne simpler to use a single piece if our design is closer to the Delta shape. A more exact bird shape may require several pieces. This may require testing several different structures

By next week  we hope to have the materials needed to build and test our initial prototype.

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