Strapped...

Inspired by +John Holgate's video about how to KAP, I have made myself a couple of webbing straps ready for when my kite, line, winder and GoPro rig arrive. One to act as a tether/anchor point and the other to pull the kite down to attach the GoPro rig...

Seat belt webbing left over from making my hotwire and two snap hooks (rated at 160kgs, $4.40 each from my local hardware store) -

All fired up and ready to go -

Two straps; the long one for pulling the kite down - can either be looped around my waist or a foot through the bottom loop so I can be hands free, the short is the tether/anchor point -

Snap hooks rated at 350lbs (160 kgs)

I'm thinking I could use a butterfly knot to secure the kite line to the snap-hook on the tether - 

http://www.netknots.com/rope_knots/butterfly-knot/

Knots or kph...?

I usually measure the wind speed in kph (kilometers per hour) but most of the kite manufacturers you look at list knots as there primary measure of wind speed for their kites - should I start using knots?

kph and mph are both speeds that are measured by distance traveled over a period of time - 1 hour. So if you are travelling along the ground they are an accurate measure of speed.

Knots are a relative speed - they are not dependent on distance traveled and are mainly used for measuring the speed of ships and aircraft, who's speed is greatly effected by fluid factors (wind and water). If I travel at 1 nautical mile per hour in the sea I may not have traveled 1 nautical mile. The tide may be with me or against me. If the tide is with me I will travel further, if it is against me I will not travel as far. The same with aircraft. If I have a following wind I will travel faster, a head wind will make me travel slower.

So from now on I think I am going to start using knots as my preferred measure of wind speed and kite wind range and will change the units on my anemometer.