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- [00:01]
A
Welcome to the kitesurf 365 podcast.
- [00:04]
B
Welcome back to the show. I hope you all had a great weekend. DK returns front of the techcast. I know it's been a long, long time, guys, but I've been super busy. DK and sue have been super busy. They're shifting to J Bay.
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C
So I thought it would be a
- [00:16]
B
good idea to get a TechCast out there and talk about their new facility. Rad Skylab. We will get back to regular programming with the techcast over the next few weeks. We'll put out a call for some Q and A and I'll let DK get onto that. It is kind of crazy that this has come out in the middle of the brainchild piece. It's just funny how programming goes like that way.
- [00:35]
C
We've got two people who are involved
- [00:37]
B
in development at completely different ends of the scales. So that's super cool. Let's get to the show. Ladies and gentlemen, Dave K.
- [00:51]
C
Dk. We're back for another techcast, buddy. And I know you've been busy because I normally hear from you about four times a week and I haven't heard from you in about three weeks, so I know you've been busy.
- [01:01]
A
Oh, dude. Ridiculously busy. In fact, actually really good to see you. And I hear you're on a plane today.
- [01:09]
C
Yeah. In literally five hours. I'm off to the airport. So. Ready to go? My first. Oh, no. I was gonna say it's my first trip of the year. I went to Japan, but this is my first competition. I didn't go to France because that was the sort of height of the. The bombings and stuff like that. So I think it's okay to travel again now, you know. Well, fingers crossed. I'm going through the Middle east, so if you don't hear from me again, it's nice knowing Qatar Airline shot down. Then start praying.
- [01:36]
A
Oh, yeah.
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B
No.
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A
What a disturbance for like both you and I, like our. Our favorite airlines to travel from. Where we're at is. Are both. Are both Middle east based and it's been just. It's been complete disaster for the last few months. So. Yeah, yeah, you know, I mean, shout
- [01:51]
C
out to Qatar, right? They didn't have that Mykonos flight on. It was one of the flights that had been cancelled, but just due to the fact that they didn't have, you know, a lot of people went flying, but it's just really kicked off again. So I was super stoked because, you know, you know, when you're traveling with, you know, And I've got kiting gear, recording gear, audio gear, cameras. It's a. I don't want to be changing airports. I like direct flights. Yeah, I'd rather pay €100 more and just check it in and it's going to be there for me. So yeah, that's all part of it. But DK, this TechCast is going to be a little bit different because I really wanted to dive into your new project which is tech focus, just to let people know this isn't a continuation of the kite boards and cable parks which we will do. I think I really want to do that in South Africa with you and sue because I think that's fair. But this is a little bit information or this. I thought this would be quite cool for you to sort of talk about this because I know this is sort of the next phase of what you guys are doing. So I thought it'd be cool to do that. And then obviously when I'm back from Econos, we'll put a call out for more tech tech questions and we'll, we'll get back to the, to the Q and A stuff because I think the Q and A stuff is also great too happen to the, to the listeners as well.
- [02:59]
A
Well, actually to be completely honest to you and you and the listeners, like I've been so hyper focused on what we've been doing here. Like I couldn't even. Like I was thinking, like has there been anything interesting? Like I, I probably haven't even had my finger on the pulse of what's going on in the greater kiting world right now to actually figure out a, an interesting topic. So it's, it's just been all about Rad Sky Lab and well just actually sue and I just completely refocusing our lives from, from. Well, we've been based in Cape Town for the last nine years and as of like a week and a half ago now we are full time in Jeffreys Bay. And for the last few months it's been a, we've been back and forth between the two places like almost weekly the way, the way it's been going.
- [03:52]
C
But that drive must be terrible. Are you sick of that drive yet?
- [03:57]
A
It's not bad. Like it's one of those. So I always like the thing with Jeffrey's. But like Jeffreys Bay is just a little bit too far away from, from Cape Town and sort of justify this if, if J Bay was four or five hours from Cape Town, it would be like, it would be so easy to do a weekend here. But it's eight, eight and a half hours. And so it's just like, it is just a bit far to come for a weekend. You really have to come for a. You have to come for a long weekend. Now the first time sue and I came here is actually was December of 2016. So we're coming up on 10 years from our very first trip. And we literally fell in love with the place the first trip, first time we. And yes, it's world famous for its surf, but it actually has some really nice kiting up this part of the world. And in particular, actually it's one of those questions that's come up. We'll get more in details about what we're actually doing up here. But some people, I've literally had people questioned like why J Bay? Why Jeffreys Bay? Why shifting there and
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coming?
- [05:23]
A
Or sue and I have owned property here since, oh, since about, I think 2018. We bought our first. We bought a plot, a bare piece of land here back then and we actually put a. Since pretty much the day we bought it, we put a little, it's called a Wendy House, but it's a little wooden shed, 3 meter by 3 metre wooden shed on that property. And we've been camping on that, in that shed here for the last, for the last eight or nine years. And that's because in particular over the, over the winter months in South Africa, Cape Town, which is really well known for its amazing kiting in the, in the summer, is actually not. It's pretty miserable. You can, you can kite, you can kite through the winter in Cape Town, but Cape Town is. Cape Town faces the Southern Ocean and it just cops every single bad storm that's running around the Southern Ocean over the winter. And there is. It's very common to get snow on the hills there, but it's just cold, wet and miserable like it's, you're better off to be somewhere else over the winter than trying to go kiting, kiting in Cape Town. So having a base up this part of the world, we've been coming up here and doing, even through our whole, the whole time we were with air rush, we would do winter testing in this part of the world because it's. Yeah, we love it and we get the conditions specifically in those off, those off season time of the year. We get conditions here where we can, we can test and ride and, and probably a little bit more varied than what we get in Cape Town as well. So yeah, we've been, we've. It's been 10 years since we first came here, we've been, we've been sort of like, we're sort of regularly here for the last sort of nine, eight or nine years. And yeah, as of a week and a half ago, we're now based here full time, which is just, just amazing. Absolutely amazing.
- [07:32]
C
You're still going to go to Cape Town for the kiting season, right? So what, December, January, February, you're going to be in Cape Town after sort of King of the Air on. Is that the sort of plan to be there for the. Because you almost need to be there. Right. The industry's there at that time of year. It's sort of most important place to be almost.
- [07:48]
A
Look, it's Adrian. Same reason you and Ben go to go to Cape Town. If, if you're not in Cape Town for that, for that critical peak summer season, you're basically not in the industry because everybody, everybody go. Goes to Cape Town. Yeah. And so we've got a couple of plans. We're, we're either going, we do have an apartment, we still, we have an apartment in Muizenberg that we're maybe, maybe we're going to use over the summer or maybe we'll rent a place on table View side. But either way, like we, we have to be based there for the peak part of the season. But yeah, for the rest of the year being based out of this facility is going to like revolutionize what we do. Absolutely. For sure.
- [08:36]
C
So, you know, you started by saying you have no idea what's going on in kite building. I can tell you the kite building industry is struggling, brother. People have been, riders have been upset. Yeah, it's unprecedented times that I've been covering the sport. I have not seen it in the States. So. Yeah, let's hope that as a collective we can navigate this times and you know, we can keep sort of kiteboarding thriving, you know, but very interesting. It's, I hope history not repeating in certain areas, let's put it that way. That was a bit, that was a bit cryptic.
- [09:08]
A
Yeah, let's, let's not be wind surfing is what you're saying, which is. Yeah. And there are always shakedowns in industries and hey, sue and I, we own a kite brand and we know our sales figures and we know what's, we know what's going on. We probably more than anything, we diversify our. Like actually I think sue and I are probably the definition of diversified in this industry because we, we literally have our fingers in every, in at least, at least half a dozen different pies that we can we can shift around when.
- [09:51]
C
He means pies, he means brands.
- [09:54]
A
Oh, brands. Yep. But even we do, we have a whole side of our business where we design, build and install cable wakeboarding packs. I've got, I've. I've got a couple of commercial software products which are one's primarily based in the kiteboarding industry and one is just a general engineering software product that's a whole other side of our business. And then the actual lab here is all part of that as well. It's like to be able to sort of take all of these different facets of our business and actually offer it, really offer it a place for all of those businesses to actually do really well out of. So yeah, which is what we're sitting at at the moment.
- [10:43]
C
So the lab is primarily for development. It's not going to be for mass production. Right. Or can you do mass production of certain things?
- [10:51]
A
You're exactly. Well, actually probably need to explain what we're actually talking about because I think you and I know what Red Sky Lab is, but I'm not sure if, I'm not sure if we actually explained that very well. But right now like I am sitting in, I'm actually, we're actually rebuilding the office right now, but I'm actually sitting in what will be the showroom part of a 300 square meter factory space that sue and I bought several years ago in Jeffreys Bay. Now this building was originally built in, I think it was finished in 1980 and it was built by a local surfboard shaper called Larry Levine. Now this, this building and has. Well, sure, probably from the 80s through to almost like basically to the end of the 90s, the very first few years of the 2000s, this facility was a kind of the, like almost a cornerstone of the surfboard manufacturing industry in Jeffreys Bay. And we've actually had some. Well, pretty much every, every surfboard shaper in Jeffreys Bay in the greater Jeffreys Bay area who got started in, got started in the 80s or 90s has worked out of this factory at some point in time. Like it's, it's been that. It's.
- [12:26]
C
It's cool though. I have a little bit of. With water and stuff. That's cool, dude.
- [12:30]
A
It's absolutely amazing. In fact, we couldn't. When this building came up for sale and in fact we bought this building during lockdown of all things, which is. Yeah, that's an entire story all in itself. We saw it come up for sale. We didn't realize it was actually an ex surfboard Factory. When it came up for sale. When it came up for sale, it was a car workshop. And it has been a car workshop since up until when we got it moved or got the keys back to it in February. But when we came to see it, when we were sort of in negotiation to buy it, we started walking around and it's just like, hey, wait a second. That room's painted, used to be painted blue. I can see it and I can see where the lights, where the lighting was on the walls. This was a shaping bay. And then the next room, this was a grinding bay. Wet sanding bay. Absolutely. Like, there's no way this was, this has to have been a surfboard factory. Like the layout and just the, like the whole layout of the place, even though like those rooms were being used for storing car parts. And yeah, a little bit further into the investigation, it's like, holy. This was Larry Levine's factory. This thing's, this has got like, this
- [13:53]
B
is,
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A
this is board making history in one of the most famous board making or most famous surfing locations in the world. So that was a. There was a whole side of it that just completely blew us away. And in rebuilding this place, we're actually trying, we are really hoping to sort of at least highlight some of the history of the building we really hope to have in the showroom, maybe have some cutting some photos of, of what happened in this place prior to us owning it. And we've had a couple of the local shapers come past and actually walk us through the whole building and explain where they used to work and what they used to see. In the 90s there was something like 700 surfboards a month was getting made in this place and shipped around the world, which is just like, this is just mind blowing to me. So yeah, that's sort of the history of the history of the building.
- [14:51]
C
But just let me jump in there. DK did they lost the WSL this year? Financial reasons like everyone's king, you can say whatever, but let's be honest, it's money, right? You can't pay, they don't come. What did. Was that a noticeable loss in the region? Because I know that it's been a stable on that calendar. It's been an off the calendar for over the years, but it's been one of the sort of premier breaks. Right. Was that a big loss of the community this year?
- [15:16]
A
It will, it definitely will be. So WSL holding periods typically late July, early August here. That's peak, peak swell season, peak winter in J Bay. There will be another event but it's not going to be anything like the same size as what you get with the wsl. Yeah it's, it's going to cost. So it is. There's basically in J Bay is a tourist town. It basically has.
- [15:46]
C
I heard it's the most expensive event to run on the calendar. Just I think just because it's location it's far. Everyone's got to travel. I think the set and I'm talking set up. I'm not talking just permits. I'm talking about whole setups and crew flights and everything. I, I believe J Bay is although wanted by the surfers logistic. It's exactly what's going on. Kite surfing. It's like it's a logistical nightmare to have events at the best locations. Unless you have Tarifa or Cape Town or Baccarat. You know those are sort of set up already set up.
- [16:19]
A
WSL's head office in California. So just, just the logistics of getting their own team here is the most expensive. I'd always argue that, that once you're actually here it's probably the cheapest place you could. It's the cheapest place to hang out and, and wait for the. Wait for the waves. The two things, two things. With the JBay WSL it's always been the by far and away the most favorite stop on the tour for the athletes themselves, the town itself, the vibe, the surf quality. The event always goes really well for the riders. The WSL has liked it because it is. It's the African stop and it's remarkably. It's good. The live feed's really good as well. Like you're actually. The wave breaks really close to the beach. Yeah and just it's. It's really good video. It's really predictable all that side of things. But the WSL does need they. There is a certain amount of money I think they asked from the local community and this local community doesn't have a lot of money. So that's the. Yeah I think that's where. Where they lost it. But hey who knows could come back next. Could easily come back next year and people still come here because the surf's absolutely amazing.
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C
So yeah I bet there's hardened people who like happy it's not there because it brings.
- [17:46]
A
That's actually, you know, there's some old
- [17:48]
C
grumpy surfer out there like thank God they're not coming this year. I've got the surf. I want to wait. I want every wave to myself. I'm a local. I, I deserve the second wave in every set. You guys can fight over the rest.
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A
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, yeah, I'm a local. No, there's a.
- [18:03]
C
You're not a local yet, dk. You're gonna have to.
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A
I will never be a local man. Not. Not with this accent, for sure. Not so.
- [18:11]
C
And they lost it up to Raglan too, which is hilarious.
- [18:13]
A
Yeah, yeah. So no, it's. Yeah, it is a loss, but it's. I said the town will survive. And actually, honestly, this is one of the thing again, this is again, a question that people have had about Rad Sky Lab. And I haven't actually detailed what Rad Sky Lab is yet, but we'll get to that. But one of the. That we are asked about Jeffreys Bay. Like, why Jeffreys Bay? Well, I. What I like how I like to explain Jeffreys Bay to my, like to my family back home. So the last. So if you go back and listen to kiteboarding cable parks like the, the four part. The four part series that sue sue and I recorded with Adrian in lockdown. We. The last facility that sue and I had in New Zealand before we shifted to Hong Kong to go work for Cabrinha was a 250 square meter commercial workshop with a self contained one bedroom apartment in the back of the. In the back of the building.
- [19:31]
C
And
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A
to this day, sue and I will say, like, that was our. We probably did our best work there or our most creative work because we were. And everything we did in that space was like super exciting. Like, it was really not. It was not unusual for both of us to be wide awake at 3 o' clock in the morning because there's a brand new board that sitting in a press that was laminated the night before. And we're so excited about what that board is. We end up asking each other, like one of us will finally say, are you awake? And we wake up, grab a coffee, go into the lamination bay and pop that board out of a press. Like, we were so obsessed with that, with what we were doing there. Now in the 15 years since we had that facility, we have had an amazing privilege to work all around the world with some of the biggest brands in the world. Was the biggest brands in the world, the largest factories, the most talented designers, and we have our own skills have increased like multiple orders of magnitude. I can say without a lie, like, I am a infinitely more skilled designer now than what I was when I was working out of that facility back in New Zealand. But for 15 years I haven't had. I haven't had a facility the size and capacity of that facility. During our time at Air Rush we had a, we did have a development lab and I did help get that lab humming along. But it was, it was, it wasn't as big as an ambitious and ambitious as what we're doing here or what we had in New Zealand. So this rad sky lab is about. Yeah, let's, let's get back, let's get back to what we had in New Zealand but Supercharge it with 15 years of, 15 years of skills. A much bigger network. Yeah. A much wider or in a much bigger footprint in the industry or reputation in the industry. So yeah, that's the, that's where we come, we came from. Now we had that, we had DK kite boards, Rukaka Kite Sports in New Zealand. And it was based in a tiny little town called Ruakaka. And the nearest and we were 30 minutes drive away from a regional city called Whangarei. And Whangarei as a commercial center I think was probably 35 to 40,000 people. It might be a 50,000, 50,000 people city. I think it meets the definition of a city in New Zealand. Well, Jeffreys Bay isn't a tiny little like Jeffreys Bay was globally has a, has a perception of being this tiny little surf town. But in reality Jeffreys bay is a 50,000 person commercial city. There is, we have, there are like we basically in terms of access to materials, access to access to just resources. We have even within walking distance of where we are in this workshop. We have a massive amount of resources available in terms of hardware stores, custom paint suppliers. There's an engineering shop walking distance away that's helping me build the new press for this workshop. There are, we actually have two kitchen cabinet shops with like I think between them they've got about six CNC machines. They're like, they're our direct next door neighbors. So we're talking, this is a seriously commercial. Like this is a city of a size that actually has a massive amount of resources. And then if you take into account the sort of greater area which includes Cape St Francis which is about 30 minutes away, Cape St Francis has some of, has a boat building industry making some of the most desired, the most expensive and the most, some of the highest reputation carbon fiber foam sandwich, cruising, racing catamarans in the world. Not just one business, there's several businesses making these absolutely amazing, amazing yachts. And because of that there's actually a massive composite supply business here. So actually when we bought this workshop, two Doors down was my composite supplier. There's actually a branch office of the same one I used in Cape Town. They've now moved about 5 minutes drive away but disappointed would have been nice to have them walking distance. So yeah, this is a like. But the upshot of all of that is this is not a small town. This is actually a, this is a place where we can actually do some quite good business when it comes to actually design and development. And then an hour's drive away from here is Port Elizabeth, which is a. Port Elizabeth as a city actually has a bigger population than New Zealand. So it's a. That gives us. And has. There are, there are actually, there are factories in Port Elizabeth making cars. So you have a, like the infrastructure. Infrastructure available there is then infinitely bigger again. So yeah, this is a, not a, it's not something that was sort of, hey, we're shifting to this tiny little town and we're not going to be able to do anything. This is actually a commercial town that we can actually make a commercial town with a great, with a, with a great surf break.
- [25:48]
C
So dk, is Red sky going to be purely focused on kiteboarding or is it going to be very diverse and you're going to do different stuff? Because I know you are the board shaper, right? That's your, that's your core business. Are you getting away from board shaping now or, or are you going to offer a lot more products for the kite boarding industry?
- [26:07]
A
So yeah, like that's a really good question and we'll define it this way. Like we haven't, we still haven't in this, in this actually defined what Rad Sky Lab is. But this, this facility, it's how sue and I, in framing it, even for our own minds, what the tag or even the tagline is we would like or our goal with this space is to create the world's premier water sports development lab. So the idea being the ultimate goal would be that anyone who wants to develop any craft or any piece of equipment for use on the water in water sports, sailing, we'll call is. That's. That's a boating industry. But let's say we're. If we define it eight foot and under, it might be a good way because that's the size of a CNC machine. It would be, if you can think about it, what ultimately the goal here would be. If you can imagine it, we should be able to turn it into something we can take on the water and test in less than a week. And it doesn't matter what that is. So if you think about every piece of equipment that we currently use to go kiteboarding, ultimately I'd like to be able to make a prototype of any of that here in under a week. It's going to take a while for that to happen. So to start, yeah, I'm known as Kiteboard Shaper. Predominantly we're going to get started with being able to prototype kiteboards here. So unless a lot of the listeners know, I do design work for a lot of different kiteboard brands. And a large part of the motivation for this facility is that when I'm doing that development work for other brands, sometimes the prototyping takes longer than what I would ideally like. To be a really good designer, you need to prototype. And so the earlier you can prototype and the more rapidly you can prototype, the better the product you're going to get. Now when some of the product, some of the development I'm doing with brands, it's taking several months to get a prototype rather than a few days. Several months to get a prototype really slows down and you're not going to. I'm not going to be able to do my best work if it takes several months to get a prototype because basically we just run out of time. So to be able to do really good work, I need to be able to get prototypes in a few days and test them. And the brands I'm work and the brands that I'm working with, they're more than happy to get more prototypes and more prototypes quicker. If we can't get the factories to actually make those prototypes quicker, let's build a facility where we can build prototypes and like at the 5, like a twin tip prototype from scratch. Like if we were doing completely new top and bottom molds, completely new rocker, the whole lot. Five days from the design available on a computer to something on the water, five days is pretty easy. And so that's the, that's the first thing we're going to get going.
- [29:49]
C
And you would send them the file and they would mass produce those in Asia. Is that how it works?
- [29:55]
A
Completely.
- [29:55]
C
Dk, can I ask you a question? Can I jump in? But let's say you've got a North product and an Airush product and you've got a product you really like. How do you not share the core designs for both brands? Because both brands will want to say something that's we want a board that's no one else has, right? Let's say, let's say that Atmos, which is one of the legendary north boards, you Know a proven board, a king of the air winning board, the big airborne of choice. Now air Rush has they want a new board. How do you not step on everyone's toes? Or is that inside secrets?
- [30:30]
A
The thing being say I'm working with two different brands. Those what I design, the brands define what they, what they're hoping the product will achieve. And two different brands will come to me with two different sets of parameters that they want to, that they want to achieve. And they'll also. Those brands have different team riders and different test riders who have different tastes or requirements in their product. So yes, I, I design across a range of different brands and I'll design a, a freeride big airboard for a range of different brands. But each of the, the final iteration, the final board that gets approved by the brand will ride differently because there are different customers with different requirements, with different team riders with different like even the way the different brands kites fly will affect what makes the board, the tuning on the board ideal between those brands.
- [31:46]
C
I mean there must be a little bit of grayness in the crossover because what people want and what actually works is always different. And I understand like, you know, you've worked with Alex Pastor for many years, right. And he probably trusts you to do the job. And I remember baby Shark saying to me, oh man, I'm dialed in this board straight away. And he knows that you guys, that you designed that board and the boards he used to write. He said I'm, he said the kites I'm working on, the boards I'm already feel comfortable with, you know, so there must be some crossover. It cannot be cross, it cannot not be crossover.
- [32:18]
A
The only other designer in the industry that's probably comparable to me when it comes to boards is Franz Schittsoffer, who designs for both Elevate and Core. And, or you could probably compare what I do with boards to what Ralph does with kites. Now the. If you look at every kite that on the market right now that Ralph Groeschel has designed, they're all Ralph Groeschel designs. Like there is a definite he as a designer. Ralph has a, there is a, a definite feel or like or a definite underlying philosophy with his designs that reflects through, across or like what he delivers to every, to every brand. But if you fly a Harlem kite or an F1 kite or, or the Reading kite or the Geniqua kite, they're all subtly different because they have. Each one of those, each one of those brands have a slightly different require and different team writers and same with what I do, I absolutely, for sure, a DK design has a particular. There is a particular DNA to every board that I've designed because I have a set of. There is a set of parameters that I like to work with. And then that give me the ability to then tune that design really well for the end consumer, for the app, for my brand team writer in customer. Like that. That can be. That can be done.
- [34:06]
C
There's a great scene in one of the blank tests, the bigger test when Aaron's testing it. Remember Aaron's like, if. If you haven't seen that series, it is behind the paywall, but it is maybe pay for a month and watch it because it's really interesting. That series where Aaron is just, you know, he's got his head down, he's got his fingers on the bar and he's sort of flying the kites. And you know, he says to the cameraman, he said, it's really interesting. He goes, I know this is a brainchild kite, but it's not the brainchild kites that I've flown. And that's the professionalism of Ralph too. Right. Just letting Aaron fly the Harlems. But he's like, this is distinctly different. But I know, I know what it is, but I can feel the difference. And that's really interesting. Which goes back up to what you're saying, right? Is that, yeah, Ralph is where he is because he's professional. You are where you are because you're professional. You're not just. You're not just giving them an Astra print and saying, hey, is a brand new air rush board for you. You know, it's. That would be absolutely. That would ruin your reputation. That would be it. Because there's people out there who'd work that out. You know, there'd be some precaut going to all the photos and measure them up and stack them onto us. Hang on a minute here. What's going on? And that people do that, by the way, to kite, especially to some kites designs and stuff, you know.
- [35:18]
A
Yeah. Though in saying that like I do. Yeah, there are. The shape is actually only a small part of the tuning. And so even in the lacuna range, we have one set of tools and I get two different. I've got a free ride board and a big airboard that I get out of those tools. They're actually different outlines. The top and bottom shaping is the same because it's the same tool, but the tuning between those boards is just miles apart. So. And that comes down to laminate Specification and thickness, flow. And all the things, all the subtle internal things that I do actually make the bigger difference rather than the sort of the macro things that people can point at and look at. And it's the same like Ralph's kites all have a very similar aesthetic, but the tuning between them can be dramatically different. And it's the same with boards. And it's typically things that the end user can't see. Like, the most important things, like the stuff I agonize about the most, are the ones that are the least obvious or have the least ability to be communicated.
- [36:40]
C
You know, dk, I don't know when this episode's coming out, because obviously the. The GK event is going to happen in the next three or four days. But when this does come out, I've probably been to Ralph Grossell's. I'll probably on my way back from Ralph Grossell's workshop in Macedonia. I don't know if I told you that.
- [36:57]
A
No, no, you didn't. That is so cool.
- [37:00]
C
So after Greece. Yeah, we're. We're going. Well, I mean, Macedonia is next door, right? So we're flying or flying up to the north of Greece and then just going to cross the border and then Ralph's going to pick us up and take day in. In the workshop, which is going to be super interesting. I don't actually know what we can share or see, but, yeah, it's. I'm looking forward to that because that is something that not many people, very, very few people in the industry actually go. Actually, a lot of team riders never get to go to factories.
- [37:28]
B
Right.
- [37:29]
C
It's. It's a very small thing. So that's going to be super cool to see how that's working a. In Europe as well, which is kind of crazy. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to that. Anyway, let's get back to Red Sky.
- [37:39]
A
What.
- [37:40]
C
What else? I mean, 40 minutes and we've barely spoken. This is the problem, DK. When we don't speak so often, we just get off the topic. So what else? So you got boards. What about surfboards? Because I think surfboards is an interesting one. How can you change board shaping? Because, you know, traditionally it's all done by, you know, the hand. The hand sanding and all that. That's the traditional way. But I know Apple Tree started doing different stuff. Are you going to go down that same road with surfboard strapless board construction?
- [38:12]
A
Adrian, we come back world's premier water sports development lab. So it's water sports, not kites, not Kiteboard, not kiteboard lab, anything like that. Funnily enough, the very first board laminated in here since the last surfboard shaper shifted out in 2005 is actually a new strapless surfboard for me, which I'm, I, I actually shaped the board quite a while ago on a friend's CNC in Cape Town, but finally got around to laminating it here. And it has some really unique, well, unique. It's somewhat in the construction box of what Apple Tree does I make. I've and I've done. I did a bunch of prototyping with that style of construction in the Air Rush lab many years ago. I really like it. I, I've made some, some surfboards for me, some surfboards for friends like surfing surfboards. And yeah, I've got a bunch of, there's a bunch of lacuna Team riders are all like when are we getting our new kite surfboards? When are we getting a new kite surfboards? So that sort of stuff. Absolutely. And a lot of it, it's the concept of development. So like trying to get the Apple Tree style vacuum infused over an XPS core construction is kind of like that's the, that's very much the sweet spot. A lot of brands are using that
- [39:47]
C
in normal surfboard construction. Are they doing, are they doing this now? Are they still. I feel like they're still like to hand shape and use their, use their stencils and do it that way. Is that becoming more common, the CNC and vacuum press or what do you
- [40:03]
A
think in, in mainstream surfboard construction? No. Vacuum pump is. A vacuum pump is a foreign concept to a, to a standard surfboard shaper. But for cnc shaping is very prevalent. Like that is mainly because, mainly because they're trying to make. The surfboard industry is trying to make boards faster and a. Especially what's called a horizontal spindle style CNC machine, it's one that's got a. Almost looks like a saw blade is what's used to shape the machine. You can mow foam very quickly. So the concept that like they're trying to shape a board in 10 minutes, we really want to shape a board in 10 minutes. We're going to make a fortune if we shape a board in 10 minutes. That's the surfboard industry is using predominantly the surfboard industry is using CNC for that. They also. It's more repetitive, like repeatable I should say they can get better boards. What we're going to try, what we're doing here is development. I actually don't Mind if it takes two hours for my machine to shape a surfboard? Like no. Like I would rather do really small step overs. Get a really accurate, really nice finish off the machine with minimal shaping. But yes, construction is something I really for specifically kite surfboards. Construction is something I really want to do in this space. So really we're getting started in composites. First thing is twin tips. I've got sitting just a few feet from me right now there's a thousand kilos of steel I beams which are getting painted. They're going to be assembled into our board press. There's a CNC machine getting rebuilt that's sitting just beside that. All of that is just for. Is predominantly to get started on twin tips. And that makes the most sense as well because that's a majority of my clients are twin tip clients and be able to do development rapid development here. So the idea being is like the CNC machine and the press are very. Or the whole process is pretty closely aligned to what we do at the high volume facilities. So we can rapidly develop here and then hand off to the factory good to go. Like knowing that the difference between what we build here and what will come out of the factory is a few percentage points of like final tuning on the final like on the production molds. Like we can, we can get close enough that we can go, okay, we're just going to production molds. The first boards we're going to get, we're going to test. We may do some slight tweaks, but we'll be ready for. Ready to go into it. And that should shorten or both shorten the development time for my clients, but also produce a much better product because we can just, we can, we can get through the initial design stuff so much faster, so much more hands on like look at, get problems sorted out quick out of the whole lot. But you did ask about production. This just won't have. This place just won't have capacity for it. We would, we could like if we wanted to make a thousand twin tips a year out of here, we could have made that decision to start directly to start off. But it would have three CNC machines and 10 presses and we'd have a staff of 10 people and be hating every moment of our lives because we have to deal with all of the associated crap that comes along with that. This is a prototyping facility. It's sue and I, we might have the odd person come in, help us out. A big part of the space is actually going to be people can come in and work in the space and actually create their thing if they need to. Like that's, that's really going to be part of it. But it's not about production. It's making one is what it's designed to do.
- [44:16]
C
I was watching on your YouTube channel. I'll put the link for that in the bio. I mean I know that's something that you guys are working on and I guess that's a learning process too. But your CNC machine is actually so rough and ready.
- [44:28]
A
It's. It's awesome.
- [44:29]
C
Yeah, but that's normal, right? That's normal.
- [44:31]
A
Yeah.
- [44:32]
C
But your CNC machine is old, right? You bought it from someone else. It's a secondhand machine and you're revamping it and doing it up and. Yeah. How's that process to do that? Is that fun or frustrating?
- [44:44]
A
Oh totally. No, no. This is so, so cool. So this is the, the barn find CNC project? Well firstly, yes, There is a YouTube channel for Rad Sky Lab and Adrian can drop the link in the show notes from this. That's and the, the motivation behind the YouTube channel is actually comes from a couple of my favorite YouTube channels. One is a a there is a British based car restoration and modification business called Retropower and Retropower do on Sunday nights they put out. Every Sunday night they put out a video which is literally just the, the owners, two brothers just walking around the factory discussing where all their projects are at. And this place is insane. They're building. I can't imagine you get a car from these guys for less than like 3 or 400,000 US dollars. They are bespoke hand built pieces of art. And the walk around the factory is just like oh yeah, one of our guys spent like 40 hours this week making door hinges because we weren't happy with the hinges that were on this. And this is how we made them. And we cut parts on our CNC and we 3D printed parts that we checked and then we went and got them CNC machined out of aluminum and just ridiculous levels of engineering but beautifully well documented. They're more than happy to just go and talk about it. And so like and I always thought that was really, that that's really cool to be so confident in what you do that you're happy to show people what you do. And really the whole channel is advertorial. It's just going we do the absolute best and we're happy to show you that we do the absolute best. And they as a business they now have it takes them Two years to build a car and they have a three year waiting list. So if you want, from, if you want, if you put your deposit down now, it's five years before you get your, before you get your car. Rad. Sky Lab will be a bit quicker than that for your lovely hand built or your bespoke twin tip. That's definitely something we want to do here. So that was one motivation and then the other motivation is a signal Snowboards which is a Californian based snowboard manufacturer. For quite a number of years they had a YouTube series called Every Third Thursday and Every Third Thursday was the think up some weird idea for a snowboard, make it in the factory and then go and test it and just document the whole process. And they did some ridiculous off the wall projects. One of my favorite ones is they went to the, the Jack Daniels Distillery, got some, some used Jack Daniels oak barrels and then sawed up all the timber out of the barrels and made the core for the, for the snowboard from this, from this recycled oak barrels and then carefully veneer cut the Jack Daniels logos off the outside of the barrel and made the top sheet from it. And it's just like, that's just so amazing and just really good story behind it because they got to go to the distillery and see how the barrels are made and stuff.
- [48:19]
C
It's kind of like, I don't know if you watch Clarkson's Farm but like, you know, when you get to a certain level you, you get fu money, you know, like I don't know, I don't know if you're not that level yet, but I just was watching the latest episodes and they just went to Holland and they've just got this on all. Everything's becoming automated but you're actually seeing a sign of the future. You know, why should a farmer be sitting on a, on a compine harvester when you know, you know when it's so accurate to do it by GPS now and just do it by remote. This is the future and if you don't adapt, you get left behind. And it's, it's interesting to see and I, I think what you want to do is adapt and you know, be the people who are making the future. That's it.
- [48:59]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally, totally.
- [49:01]
B
Sit back.
- [49:02]
C
It's to be, to be a forward thinker rather than to be reactionary.
- [49:06]
A
Totally. And, and I, I think the listeners could probably have probably understood this from all of these techcasts. I, and it's both my own passion and Sue's passion is that we are. Education is a big. And information sharing and knowledge sharing is. Is a. Is a massive passion of ours. Like we are. We are not people who like. Who hold our secrets and consider our secret like and consider our knowledge to be power over other people. We're actually. We are. The whole reason to do this TechCast or the TechCast exists is because I, I enjoy raising the knowledge of. Of people around me and getting them to do better work. Well documenting what we're doing in this workshop is a natural extension of that. So rather than it being a closed door skunk works. You don't. It's nothing you. You never get to see what's going on. We just. Just beautiful things appear out of the ether. That's not really our style. There will be some work that we just can't share. Like that's just in particular my third party work for other brands that's just. That's their ip. We can't win. That's not going to be shared on the channel. But the, the passion projects, the, the having a beer on. Having a beer on a Friday night in the factory and going wouldn't it be cool if we did this and just having a dream.
- [50:41]
C
I was going to say do you have a dream board that you can just write crazy ideas on and, and one day come back to those or. No.
- [50:47]
A
Well we're still painting the walls so we don't. There's going to be no writing on
- [50:51]
C
the wall just yet.
- [50:52]
A
Oh no. But there's. There's actually I think we've got four, four different whiteboards stacked up ready to go up on the walls in various places for sure. But that's. But going back in history like 15 years ago in the, in the DK lab or decay factory in New Zealand that was a common occurrence. We just didn't have like we didn't have the reach that we have now. We didn't have the like to run a. We didn't have the know all to go. Oh what actually probably just didn't even have cameras to even video what we were doing let alone the ability to put it up on the. On the web. So the. The Red Sky Lab channel is really about like sharing what's going on here. Sharing the stoke. So if you. You might not ever buy. You might not ever order a custom kite board from this facility or.
- [51:49]
C
But
- [51:52]
A
once a week, once every couple of weeks there's a really cool video that comes out that you can. That gets you all stoked on to go kiting because we made something in the factory, in the lab. And then we went to the beach and we rode it and it was so much fun. That's the, that's. And that was really the signal snowboards side of things. You mentioned the Barn Find cnc. That's. The Barn Find CNC is the first project series on the RAD Skylab channel. And again it's one of those. This is actually just such a classic DK story. I. We've owned this, we've owned the space for five years, but we've been leasing it, leasing it out up until February of this year. So we knew, we knew early this year we knew we were getting the keys back to it. And I have a CNC supplier that I work with in China, makes really great machines. I actually help people all over the world buy machines from the supplier, help them spec the machine out so that they get something that's exactly what they need. They don't overspend, they don't, they don't get an underperforming machine. So I've been dealing with these guys for many, many years. That's the, the machines we had in the, in the airash lab came from them. I'd written up a specification for, for the machine I wanted for this lab and on that, that included a really unusual setup of three spindles. And if you, if you go and if the listeners go and watch, watch the channel, I have a really good explanation of why I like three spindles. Now that's super unusual. Between Christmas and New year this last December, I'm on holiday at my in laws beach house and I'm scrolling through Facebook Marketplace and this is the CNC machine for sale in Johannesburg with three spindles on it. And I'm like, what the, like how does that even exist? So I end up talking to the guy. Now it turns out this machine was bought 10 years ago, used for a month, and then has been sitting idle. And in the 10 years that it's been sitting idle, its control system computer went missing. So this thing is not only 10 years old and not only completely not being used by the company that is in, but it's brain dead. And I'm like, oh, this is awesome. So I end up doing a deal with this guy and getting this machine like literally the first week we're in the lab got delivered down here from Johannesburg. And I'm the, this, I'm calling it the Barn Find cnc. And the whole story is about getting the machine, fixing it and putting a new like fixing it from 10 years of not being used and putting a completely new control system on it, getting it back up and running for, for our results here now.
- [55:02]
C
Dude, I'm all about, I'm all about reduce, reuse, recycle. I've just been up in the north of Thailand at my permaculture course, mate. I'm all about recycling, buddy. I'm over shoveling shit making compost, but I'm all about recycling.
- [55:14]
A
Yeah, totally. No, well this is the thing on pure economics. If I was only making the decision based on numbers on a spreadsheet, we probably should have bought the new machine from China. But as a story for the YouTube channel, that is, that is ridiculous. No, that's, no, just buying as a machine and getting delivered, plugging it in, turning it on game making boards. Oh what that is, that has zero interest. But also, and this was actually part of the discussion with the guy that I bought this machine off is, and I told him very truthfully, if like if I don't buy this machine, it's basically scrap metal. Because the number of people who would even take on the job of such an unusual setup in turn like turning it back into a workable machine is a very, very small group of people who would actually take on that job. And even if like I would take on the job, but it would be uneconomical for somebody else to pay me to actually do the job. So it is. I, I'm literally saving a machine from scrap metal.
- [56:30]
C
Is that CNC going to be your major driving instrument within the shop? Everything's going to come through that. I mean will a 10 year old machine going to be able to handle the vicious workload you and sue are going to put it through?
- [56:43]
A
Well, there's two things to that. Yeah. Well one actually the reason this machine is not scrap metal is literally because it was sitting in Johannesburg and not anywhere near the coast. Because it was in a dry, high alpine environment. It didn't rust away. It did get a little bit of surface rust, but like that. But it was also, it had almost no use. So it's got, it's got very low hours. So. And it's pretty much the specification I was going to buy. So in terms of its, it's the, the sized heft like all the specifications of all the other of all the motion parts, all of it matches up with what I was going to buy. It was just happened to be here. But yeah, if it had been living 10 years in Jeffreys Bay unused, it would have rusted away into a big pile of scrap metal. Like, it wouldn't have even been scrap metal. So. Yeah, and that's actually a big part of the first couple of. One of the first videos is how I actually had to get onto this thing and stop it rusting away now that it's down near the coast.
- [57:48]
B
So.
- [57:49]
C
So let's get back to kiteboarding. How does this factory play into the development of lacuna? I understand probably, you know, you. Well, you know, you'll have to get your design still made in China. Is there any opportunity to. To get testing kites made in South Africa so you can keep that high turnover going? Is that even possible? And. And can you do that in your factory?
- [58:14]
A
Well, like I said initially, we're composites. So if we start off, if composites, the first part is twin tips. Because twin tips is twin tips.
- [58:24]
C
Bread and butter. Yep.
- [58:25]
A
Yeah. It's also a history. Like, we've done all of that before. If you're doing twin tips, then doing hydrofoils is. Hydrofoils are just small twin tips. If you. On one, like, on one level, they're. They're basically the same. Like, it's only a size thing in terms of process, as far as I'm concerned. So hydrofoils, definitely. So it's. We've mentioned surfboards. We're already the. Again, a surf surfboard is a little bit different to doing a twin tip. But I'm already. I've already sort of. That process is something that we definitely will be able to do here. Cut and sew is going to be the next thing that we really want to get into. So there's a. There's a specific space in here. And if you go and watch the. The factory tour video, there's a very, very much a specific space here that's going to be really ideal for setting up sewing machines. And it's. It's far enough removed from the rest of the workshop that it'll be able to keep it cleaner and drier from the stuff that will make lots of dust. And then it would be really nice, like the. When it comes to cut and sew, one of the jobs I'd like to do with the CNC is modify it with a laser head so that we can. Then we can cut kite fabric actually using the same machine, which makes a lot of. Which makes a lot of sense. And again, this is one of those advantages of, like, rebuilding the machine through our inspector. If I want to add a laser that's capable of cutting kite fabric to it, I can do that. And so if we can then cut Fabric and then we can sew it here. Then being able to prototype kites and wings is definitely a possibility. But even just to get cut and sew for modifications, repairs. And then there's everything else. There's all the other soft goods, whether it be harnesses, foot straps, wetsuits. We won't sort of make wetsuits, but anything that needs to be cut and sewed. There's a whole branch of kite pony development which is cut pieces of fabric and sew them together. That needs to be. That is kind of like stage two of this workshop build is to get that with the eventual goal of, hey, can we, can we build a kite in house? That's absolutely. It's going to be something, but it's again, not production. It's going to be. Can we make one so that we can.
- [61:07]
C
Yeah, sure, sure. Send the file off to have it reproduce. Right. The amount of wastage that must go on, on in kiteboarding prototypes must just outrageous. I mean, that also drives the price of kites up as well. Right? I mean, if we can simplify that process, the price of kites come down. I mean, we should be. I'm always going on about the race at the bottom. Nobody seems to give a. It's all about cranking the price.
- [61:28]
A
I, I think I've told you this one in the past, Adrian. I like, I love to quant when I'm. Because we own Lacuna. So we've, we've got our own Kite brand. But both sue and I do external development work for a number of all the top brands across the, across the industry. We would have at some point done work for them. When talking to other brand owners, to CEOs, to development managers and other brands, the question always comes up about Lacuna. And I said, I always. The nicest way for me to frame Lacuna to those businesses is like
- [62:13]
C
your
- [62:14]
A
kite designer ordered more prototypes this year than Lacuna sold kites. So we are, we are smaller. We are, we do smaller amount of production than you do prototypes and that which. Yeah, like I said, you say about wastage. I don't consider prototyping to be wastage. I consider prototyping to be a fundamental part of.
- [62:38]
C
I'm just talking material wise, you know, I mean, it's just.
- [62:41]
A
Yeah, well, yeah, having cut and sew here allows us to recycle. We can set recycle prototypes into, into other products. There's, there's, there's a whole side of the business to that. So there is, there is that side of it, like so Cut and sew. That's definitely going to be, that's definitely going to be part of what we do here. But I think I've mentioned possibly in earlier techcasts the concept of second order product development. And when we say, we want to say make a kite here like, or anything that we want to make here when we, when we are. If you're a brand and you are prototyping at your, if you do not have dedicated prototyping facilities, you'll be doing all of your prototyping in your manufacturers facility. And the manufacturer generally has a process that fits inside a box. They have a, we can do X size with X materials with X amount of complication like that, it fits within that box. And as you're, when you do development, if you're doing development within that, but basically you can, as a brand you can develop within that box because that's what the factory is capable of doing. And if you want to do anything outside that box, the answer usually from the factory is we cannot. So you just, you've got to stick within that. So I call, when you're developing within somebody else's process, I call that first order development and you will never get yourself one. Like let's say the IKP has five different, there are five different brands all getting made at that one factory. Or if you're dealing with, maybe you're a brand coming out of Aqua Dynamics in Sri Lanka, you're working within their box, but so are all your, so all your opposition, you will never get one up on your competitors. If you're really, if you and you and four other brands are all working within the same box, you're basically just moving the same sliders around but you're never going to break out of there. You can push it, but it takes a lot of effort. If you really want to change to a completely different box, what you have to do is pull yourself out of that process and get into what is called, I describe as second order development. And second order development is you're not just developing the product but you are developing the process that the product is made in and, or you're developing the material, a completely new material. So let's say case in point, Ocean, Rodeo and Alula, they step change like they were suddenly like they went from being just a brand to being massively ahead of the curve compared to all of their competitors because they didn't just go to the material supplier and pick a material, they developed a completely new material. But in developing a completely new material they had to Develop completely new seeming in construction processes to actually put that together, which they did all of that in house before they went to their manufacturer with the material and with the process to actually to convert that material into kites that you have to do somewhere else other than your own, than the factory that's manufacturing your equipment. And if you don't have the ability to invest in that yourself, then you'll need to partner with a facility that is specifically invested to create new. To create something that's outside of the box. Rad Sky Lab is specifically being set up to do that.
- [66:49]
C
So going to Cape Town, the industry's there. I know you and sue have been having meetings with Brad. How. How sort of warm are they to giving you opportunities to design stuff? I know, I know that the brands that you've been very strong with over the past know, you know, the way you work, but there's also other brands, right? Brainchild is a. Is another brand. I know that, you know, you and Ralph are kind of like doing something similar, but also keeping distance from each other because you're in a similar space. Have other brands been positive to what you're doing or. And I guess some of them are a little bit like, we're not interested.
- [67:26]
A
Adrian, the reason I haven't kited. I've only kited two days in the last three months, is because even. Even the small amount of teasing that we've done for what we're going to do with the space. Actually, I would say, like, one LinkedIn post I put up just teasing. What we've done in this space is we have people lining up, like, I've got. I have new customers talking new products, specifically because this facility is being built and they don't have access to that. Like, there were projects they wanted to do, they had no idea where they were going to do it, and suddenly this is coming about and it's exactly what they're looking for. CEOs of companies I've not done business with before are like, get it done. This is the project. We've got to get into it. Like, I was hoping for that in about a year's time. It's like, it's now. And so, yeah, yeah, it is actually awesome. And. But it just means. It's just so much. Like. It's just. It's relentless. The amount of work that needs to be done here is like, I. It's. Sue and I are like, we can't. You can't turn your head and go like, oh, I could just go spend 10 minutes doing that like, but it's like there's like 110 minute thing like all over the, all over the factory, but which is just awesome.
- [69:05]
C
Do you think down the line, DK this, you know, the opportunities are vast and you know, you know, even vaster outside of kiteboarding. Do you think down the line that this might be the end of kiteboarding? Your, your interest in kiteboarding as, you know, bigger opportunities and processes and orders come through that maybe kiteboarding will take a back step? Because before kiteboarding has been what DK and Sue are about. But is this maybe setting up the next phase of your life? I mean you'll always be kiteboarders, right? I mean, I mean there's going to be a time when we all stop for sure. But you know, actively involved in the, in the industry. Do you, do you see that happening down the line?
- [69:45]
A
Who knows about the future? What I previously I've described myself as a board rider fundamentally. And I think we discussed it, we've discussed this in the past now kiteboard. For the last 20 years or 25 years, kiteboarding has been it. Well actually there's kiteboarding, but in parallel to that, cable wakeboarding. So we've been. As an athlete, I've actually been infinitely more successful as a cable wakeboarder than I have been as a kiter. I have, I have competed, I've represented New Zealand internationally and won and podiumed at international at world championships in cable wakeboarding. So that's been. Even though I'm known as kiteboard shaper, like as, as a, as an athlete, I've, I've been a Cable wakeboarding has actually been where I've, I've excelled at. So there's always been that. But then like there's just. We're now in like a premier surf town and there's a whole discussion about what I think of the. Like there's a whole. Yeah, we could easily bow into another hour. But discussing that the J Bay is an amazing brand internationally and I don't think it's being very well utilized by local surfboard shapers. I think they could actually make some nicer products and some internationally renowned product. And if we can, being based here, if we can help motivate that, fantastic. I'm also like, I'm seriously involved in software development around the world now, which is really good because that actually helps pay for everything that we're dealing with here. But between my CNC machining software and third party clients. Yeah, there is a lot more to us than kiteboarding. We're probably more diverse now than what we've ever been. But our passion is still kiteboarding and there's such amazing places to kite here and pretty soon we're just going to be able to make something, make a board and take it to the beach and go ride it. It's like yes, we're back to where we were in Rurikaha in 2011.
- [72:09]
C
So I think, I think DK at the end of this season I'm going to half this season. I'm going to probably order another custom board from you but I'm going to return the original Kites F365 board to you for your lab. It can go up there on the wall as a thing. But mate, by the way that's made in, that's made in basalt and I want to give Basil to shot a shout out because Ishigaki rocks scratch my
- [72:31]
A
board to absolute death.
- [72:33]
C
But it's still got an edge on it. I mean I could probably swing it around and ride the back side now and just have those, the edges on the front side. But yeah, I think I'll, I think I'd like to do that as a. And donate that board back to you and then in return I'll. I'll get another one because I think
- [72:47]
A
that'd be kind of cool as well
- [72:48]
C
because I always like the surfers do that. You know how surfers always bring their boards back to the shaper and you know, I guess obviously for you know the reproduction wise but I always think that's really cool as well.
- [72:58]
A
You know, that'd be fantastic. We've actually sitting under my parents house in New Zealand is a. There's a whole collection museum collection of boards from our, our time as DK kite boards. There's like there's boards that sue won national championships on this board. She's competed in PK and KPWT comps on there. There's a whole bunch of like critical like when we changed techno like we brought in critical technologies. Looking forward to getting all of those here and, and putting that story up on the wall. And as you know there's a couple of, there's a couple of Red Bull King of the Air winning boards that are, that we're hanging on the wall in Cape Town. They're, they're actually that they're. They're going to go up on the wall above my desk. So yeah actually there, there's that and there's a very special flag from King of the Year is going to go above my desk as well. So yeah, Nice, nice. Looking forward to getting that done.
- [73:58]
C
Well, look, decal. Let's wrap that up there. I think we can probably come back to this, but I think. I think we'll dive more into this in part 5 of kiteboard and kite boards and cable Parks. I think I'd like to really sit with you and sue to do that. I doubt we'll get up to the facility, but I will in time, come to. To the lab. I'd love to see that. I think it's super cool. I love the fact that you are, you know, doing it from your position, you know. You know, you're paying for it yourself. There's no massive investments, there's no shareholders. It's like we're going to start from the bottom, work away up. And that's kind of the way you've always done things right from. From time, from when you book, if you listen to that series. And there were some people on Discord talking about that, you know, you ordering your first CNC back in the day and. Yeah, it's kind of cool. So, dk, mate, let's. Let's catch up next month, man, again. And we'll get some. We'll maybe put a shout out for some more tech questions and. Yeah, looking forward to seeing you then.
- [74:52]
A
Yeah, thanks, Adrian. And enjoy Mykonos. And we're. We're starting to come into new product release cycle, so I'm. What I'm looking forward to is, hey, maybe we can. Maybe there's some interesting new products coming out if we keep an eye out in the next. Actually, there's a very good chance you're going to see something at Mekonos. And which rider? I don't know, like, it's just. It's that time. It's this time of the year.
- [75:19]
C
Yeah.
- [75:19]
A
Yeah, you keep an eye out. But I think I thought you're talking about.
- [75:21]
C
I thought you were talking about your stuff, but.
- [75:23]
A
Oh, no, by the way, there's some
- [75:27]
C
massive new tech coming out as well. And, yeah, we're gonna be. We're gonna be shooting something on that very soon.
- [75:33]
A
Excellent. Well, we. As soon as what you. As soon as that comes out, you and I need to talk about it, so. But maybe.
- [75:40]
C
Maybe I'll end this call now and I'll drop a little bit it for you. Probably can't, but I probably will. All right, dk.
- [75:45]
A
Fantastic, mate. Thanks, listeners, and we'll catch you all again next month.
- [75:49]
B
Hey, guys, I hope you enjoyed that episode. Don't forget, if you want to support the show, the easiest way is to do it for free. It costs you nothing. Rate me on Spotify. I'm loving those five star reviews. Share them in your local WhatsApp or kitesurfing groups. Or just simply tell your mates if you want to support us more regularly and if you want to support us more financially, head over to Paul portraitkite.com portrait is an independent media company trying to tell the stories of kiteboarding the way we believe they should. These projects are funded by people just like you. If you want to find more, head over to portraitkite.com let me tell you quickly about Heels Speaks in Mykonos, Heel Road, the eight Top Kites, and it's really interesting to hear his open and unbiased feedback as an unsigned rider. So if you're interested in what Heal has to say, definitely go check that out. The podcast guys will always be free, so you don't need to worry about that. Use the search button@kitesir365.com to search your favorite writer or topic. We'll be back this Thursday on the Megapod with Part two of the Brainchild exclusive. See you then.