North NEO doesnt reverse - nor on land nor on water. I still think that with "and in the winds I ride, no way to water relaunch anything" you should try FS soul or kitech FSR. I regularly making demo relaunch how little wind FSR need for waterrelaunch - always deepwater and from difficult position - leaving people staring in disbelieve. I think this kites is relaunchable when you can rode it or maybe less, 6 knts region.
Sorry, if you were referring to me tomtom, but I was talking LEIs only, not foil kites, as I believe this thread is about strutless LEIs and maybe onestruts
Foil kites are a different league in terms of relaunch, very true
I've a gong strutless V2 12m² (with batten)...
did not fly it very often, just got it a few weeks ago.
Very stable kite... it does not fall out of the sky... it just floats back and recovers.
It flys in 6 knots... that's for me the biggest advantage able to fly in light wind without dropping and stalling...
I didn't restart it because I did not drop it... but from 8 knots on it should restart with the correct technique... less wind and it won't restart... as all other tube kites.
I did start it backwards on the beach and that worked well...
With my ozone cat 12m² (2014) on marginal days with 9-10 knots I'm just fighting to keep the kite in the air... It just stalls and you have a nice swimming session.
Disadvantage of the strutless: the high end is not so 'high end'... it flutters when you depower...but then you're already out of range of the normal use of the kite and you should take a smaller size...
From what i read, these kite work wel on surfboards and foils... on TT there are better ones...
And the price is a big difference... I bought mine at 1/3 of the price of a comparable foil-kite which are very expensive IMO.
I haved used my new strutless gong 12m couple of times. Great kite overall. Was quite cheap, but still isn't any worse than other (more expensive) kites.
I use it only on foiling. I have 5 strut kites when it's more windy and I use a twintip board, so I don't care if the strutless kite can't handle higher wind speeds.
Strutless kite stays in the air in the light winds and it drifts well.. Relaunch could be better. But strutless kites are lighter, they will stay in the air when strutkites drop to water. But don't drop it to water in 6 knots
Maybe I still buy another real light wind weapon, a big foil kite for the wind speeds 4 to 8 knots.