Fractured Axel

Anyone know how/where I might be able to get a copy of Mark Cottrell's book "Swept Wing Stunt Kites" (published 1990, out-of-print). Checked GWTW forum, eBay, Amazon, etc, but no luck ...

I have #32 of 105. I suppose you could borrow it if you wanted but it I don't think it's something I'd sell as I still re-read certain bits every now and then. One day I hope to actually understand it.

Mark used to frequent these parts though so maybe he could be convinced to re-release it under Creative Commons ?

Mike.

Thanks for the offer of borrowing, Mike, but I wouldn't want to run the risk of your treasured copy getting lost in one of its two postal journeys ....

http://www.abebooks.co.uk/ has been very useful for finding out-of-print books for me in the past. They don't seem to have a copy of this, but you can create a "wanted" entry on there, and it's worth checking back from time to time.

Just seen it's self-published. Good luck with that one!

I hadn't realised so few copies exist! Will indeed be hard to get .... I did find this when googling 'Mark Cottrell' and kites:
http://aeiresearch.com/ and fired off an e-mail, hoping it's the 'right' Mark Cottrell ....

IIRC... there was a first run (of 105) with green covers/backs and then.... more. It all gets a bit fuzzy then for me and I think Mark (or Andy King perhaps) might be far better placed to talk about this.

TBH it is something I've always thought about scanning and PDFing but it's not my work so that would only be for my own archival purposes.

Mike.

If some one gets a PDF of it AND we get Mark's permission I would gladly host it on my site in the archival area......if some one contacts him please pass my name along....
rob

If anyone has other contact details for Mark (apart from the Mark Cottrell on the aeiresearch web-page; haven't heard anything back yet), please let me know and I'd be very happy to follow things through to try and get a pdf-file plus permission to have it posted.

SWSK- not quite the rarest of my books! Lets see now, Kite Aerial Photography ran 6500 copies, Kite Store Book of Kites 2500 copies, SWSK 105 initial run plus another 20 over the last 20 years for people who asked and finally the really rare one Traction Kiting- just 10 copies!- I got bored and never really finished it. There is also a Soft Foils book that never got past the outline text/intro text/main drawings stage.

Anyway, I do have the original artwork for SWSK, but it is cut & paste stuff so always scans with shadow lines on a flat bed (I tried about five years ago in order to convert it to a PDF)- I should have a couple of paper copies and could sacrifice one of these for scanning, but if anyone does have a copy and wants to scan/host it etc then they may do so.

Ask for contact details, and the man himself appears ... Good to see you here, Mark!

Personally, I'd love to have a copy, so if someone who has the book has the time to scan it and convert it to pdf:

I've scanned mine to pdf - I'll stick it on my site in the next few days otherwise email or pm me and I'll email a copy to whoever wants it

EDIT:
You can download it here:http://www.iannewham.com/images/swept_wing_stunt_kites.pdf

Thanks Mark

Yours is a later version than mine. For one thing I hadn't seen Appendix 5 before

Mike.

Ian: !!!

Grazie, Merci, Danke, Thnx.
Nice readin'.