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Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

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jaros
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Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby jaros » Thu Mar 22, 2018 7:36 am

I think you said the big Kahoonas are not good for using with hydrofoil? What about the small one, for winds stronger than 25 knots?
Thank you for your oppinion!

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby jumptheshark » Thu Mar 22, 2018 1:18 pm

I've never used the smallest kahoona so this is guess work based on the fact its a full on delta. Have plenty of experience with deltas, but kites down below 5m can be a different animal altogether and really vary. It's hard to find small kites with a nice smooth power band.

One issue I could see is that most deltas are not very responsive with slack rear lines. That comes into effect a lot when foiling in high winds with small kites and can detract from the fun. If you try one, keep a little tension on the bar at all times to maintain response and smooth it out as much as possible.

Foiling is now a pretty broad category, so it really depends what you want.

Some would argue its an inefficient kite and wont go upwind very well. They're not wrong.

If your on a race oriented foil and more of a straight line rider or long distance cruiser, it's a bit of a miss match and you will likely be happier with something less delta that sits closer to the edge of the window.

All my hydrofoil kites are pretty inefficient and sit deep.

If your into carving around and playing on swell then I would think it will likely work. Kites that sit deep are easier to maintain front line tension when your constantly carving through downwind, and for many freeriders, foils go upwind well enough to make up for less efficient kites.
Last edited by jumptheshark on Thu Mar 22, 2018 1:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby Windigo1 » Thu Mar 22, 2018 1:54 pm

The Kahoona is a great freeride kite for high winds it's stable and has good depower but apparently it's not so good for foiling. I haven't tried it but one of my friend got a 5.5 just for foling and he returned it really didn't work. If you already have it try it but if you're going to buy the kite just for foiling maybe you should consider a purpose built wave kite or a race kite depending on what you want to do.

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Peter_Frank
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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby Peter_Frank » Thu Mar 22, 2018 3:09 pm

If you use it often on the "lighter" powered side, I think it would work just awesome.

Because, with the smaller kites, you wont get slaughtered by the apparent wind really, thus a kite with some power is preferred in these sizes, and depower not as important - just opposite to the bigger ones where it is a no no generally, having grunt thus less depower.

This is because you get immense (too much) power in light wind, when you accelerate and ride faster than the wind.
Where in the winds you use a 3.5 m2 you will ride slower than the wind, thus not that important to think about getting too much "speed" power :D

Only if you ride in very gusty high winds, it could be pleasant with depower :wink:

I might also be wrong, as in high winds, just like on waveboards, where it for many of us is essential to be able to fly the kite through the powerzone without getting ripped off your line and board - the same could happen on a hydrofoil, too much power when you fly the kite around for a carve :-?

So in light winds, depower is essential because of your huge apparent wind power.
In high winds, depower is essential to avoid too much power when the kite is flown in the window.

8) PF

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby grigorib » Thu Mar 22, 2018 9:08 pm

I got a 5.5m Kahoona for that reason specifically and it didn't work out well.
It's a good kite to ride strong winds but amount of backstalling in lighter winds is just killing all the joy.
Also crappy relauncheability.

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby borist » Fri Mar 23, 2018 7:58 pm

Different riding styles prefer different kites. I have a quiver of Kahoonas of varied vintage stored at my folks house and use them when visiting Europe. 2 years ago, when my foil was Spotz 2 and preferred high AR kites (Sonic FR, Edge or similar....), I hated riding with Kahoonas. Year later I travelled with Spitfire and those kites were just fine. Turn well, drift well, hang in the air well, relaunch almost by themselves and were cheap to buy. During that trip I foiled will all my sizes and was very surprised that even 11.5 was OK. The smallest size I have is 5.5 and I had a great time with it and do not recall any trouble with the relaunch and am quite sure I dropped it at least couple times. I do ride with bar trimmed in a little (like all my LEIs when foiling) and do not remember any backstall issues. While I never flew 3.5, I do not see any reason why it would be much different

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby Peter_Frank » Fri Mar 23, 2018 8:00 pm

borist wrote:
Fri Mar 23, 2018 7:58 pm
Different riding styles prefer different kites. I have a quiver of Kahoonas of varied vintage stored at my folks house and use them when visiting Europe. 2 years ago, when my foil was Spotz 2 and preferred high AR kites (Sonic FR, Edge or similar....), I hated riding with Kahoonas. Year later I travelled with Spitfire and those kites were just fine. Turn well, drift well, hang in the air well, relaunch almost by themselves and were cheap to buy. During that trip I foiled will all my sizes and was very surprised that even 11.5 was OK. The smallest size I have is 5.5 and I had a great time with it and do not recall any trouble with the relaunch and am quite sure I dropped it at least couple times. I do ride with bar trimmed in a little (like all my LEIs when foiling) and do not remember any backstall issues. While I never flew 3.5, I do not see any reason why it would be much different

Agree, well put borist :thumb:

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Re: Best Kahoona 3,5 for hydrofoil?

Postby jaros » Fri Mar 23, 2018 8:09 pm

Thank you all for your answers!


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