I've put some work into refining and standardizing my kylie designs since I last posted on here. I've been experimenting with the paint jobs too, with some attractive results.
One thing, that has helped, is a courser grooved finish on the top surface of the sticks. This seems to help them keep a faster spin out at long range and fly more aerodynamically than without the course finish. The faster spin allows for a slightly altered tuning which makes for a longer flight path.
I've been able to boost my maximum distance on my kylies by about 10-20 yards since last posting! Average straight level throws on my full sized sticks are now at about 70-80 yards, depending on how hard you're throwing and how much accuracy you are demanding.
My personal best distance, yesterday with the heavy kylie, (only throwing 3 times) and throwing directly at a tree trunk standing 5' above the ground, was 93 yards! I set up my throws so I could take careful measurements with Google Earth, and didn't have a lot of time on my hands or I would have thrown more.
I know I can beat that distance if I stop aiming and just let loose! I will be doing some additional distance throws on Thursday, at the park, if there is space available.
During the final few yards of a 93 yard throw, the stick will rise just slightly and fall off slightly to the side, making the maximum target range somewhere more around 70-80 yards give or take, in which target accurate straight and level flight is achieved. This final roll off, which occurs during the final 10-15 yards, is nice for helping you to see where the stick lands. It sort of flags itself up, and you know to look for the kylie just to the right of your target, if you missed. At these ranges I fear loosing the stick. I can alternately tune the sticks to not do this, but a few yards are dropped off the flight range that way.
I just uploaded a video to youtube on my Whipartist Channel, if anyone wants to see a few of the new sticks. The black and orange kylie does not have the grooved finish, as you'll notice, but the others do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGcQbLSoCYUI'm starting to sell these from my website on a limited basis, so I'll probably keep working on different designs in the future as people are interested. I really love making, tuning and throwing them, but running them down is a lot of exercise! Boomerangs are less tiring because they come back!! Last week I threw the 330 gram stick so much that my arm went out of commission for a while!
Another update, sadly, after having thrown kylies for a few years now, I just had my first failure of the polycarbonate plastic. I had a kylie which hit an angular, sharp and solidly anchored part of a metal gate, and it nicked the edge pretty badly, and shattered the kylie cleanly in half behind the nick. That stick had been thrown hundreds if not thousands of times at full force against solid objects. It has been used to break oak branches by hand, and was on of my favorites to use and abuse. It had hit rocks, fence posts, chainlink fence, busted through plywood, etc, hundreds of times without more than some minor dings and dents in the edges. This time the sharp solid metal of this portion of the gate was too much for it, and it did break. My 5 year old son cried when he saw the dead stick. We've had a few adventures while I had that very stick in hand. RIP good friend.
Ben