Peter Lynn

Peter Lynn (born 1946) is a New Zealand kitemaker, engineer and inventor. He is notable for his construction of the world's largest kites (Guinness book of records holders), giant inflatable (sparless) display kites (the most widely known is the 27 m octopus kite), the popularisation of kite buggying and contributions to the development of power kiting and kitesurfing. He spends much of the year travelling worldwide and displaying his kites at International Kite Festivals.

Lynn, together with his wife Elwyn, established a kite business at Ashburton, New Zealand, in 1973, producing single-line kites for children. In 1974 he developed the Peter Lynn Triangular box kite, a framed triangular form cellular single line kite. Beginning in 1984 with the Centipede design, he then developed large creature-themed display kites for the growing number of international kite festivals. These large-scale sparless kites include the manta ray, octopus, puffer-fish, gecko and trilobite.[1]

In 1987 he began developing power kites for traction uses, and designing boats, buggies, boards and snow sleds to use with them. The sport of kite buggying in its modern form began from a kitesailing craft he developed. It was equipped with three 'skis' and was quite unsuccessful on the water. In 1990 he converted it to a land buggy by replacing the skis with wheels. More than 10,000 of his buggies are now in use, and there are also many other kite buggy manufacturers. Kite buggying has become a popular worldwide sport.

In 1994 he developed the ‘super-ripstop/thru cord’ ram air kite construction system for large display and traction kites. This is a technique of strengthening ripstop nylon by sewing high-tech dacron or spectra/dyneema cord across the material, and providing an adjustable cross-sectional aerodynamic profile by the use of variable length cords rather than the fixed rib used in a conventional wing or ram-air parafoil such as a parachute.

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