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Ok Taut is a little partial to Naish not a secret. but he is a source of knowledge on many things so hey give a bro a break. I had bad exp with brand new Torches a quiver of 3 made me sooo sad really loved how they flew was in 2014 kites were 2013. Maybe the best or one of the 2 best c kites I ever fly. Now I ride Vegas fricking love them never give me any problems are built tough. Not trying to highjack this post... just stating what was I saying?

Hey guys, thank you very much for your replies and opinions.
Enduro might be a choice. Im also looking at F-One Bandit 2018.

@Taut:
my problem with Octopus System is that none of maintenance places (I have asked for help) wanted really to fix it.
Most of them were complaining how difficult and complicated the system is to fix once it starts to leak.
Thats really disappointing because I loved my Naish Parks.

I would recommend to fix it yourself. Generally there is no real need to bring a kite for bladder repair to a maintenance place (unless it needs to be welded)
it is not that difficult. I had to fix the LE bladder on my 2016 Pivot and never did it before. Just take your time and do it step by step. Took me 1 h (and I made a mistake in between by wrapping a bit too much Teflon tape around the male valve).

Plenty of you tube tutorials if your a hands on guy will be easy. I am challenged when comes to hard to reach valves and almost all were bad on the 3 kites I purchased so I opted to return to where I bought them. Was just gonna be too much work.

I rode many years of Parks and Torches. I love Naish kites as much as I hate the octopus system (and I love them a lot!).

After I couldn't repair at a reasonable cost a couple of Torches, I made the move and replaced my most used Park (10m) for a North Dice and my most used Torch (12m) for a North Vegas and I'm pretty happy.

I've used the Dice for two seasons already. I have a 2016. Never gave me a problem. It keeps going on and on.

Back to topic, in the papers, the Dice and the Park should be something similar. Both are marketed as all around kites with and inclination on the C shape side. And both kites are three struts. (I'm not sure about the 2018 Dice).
In the water though, they feel different. The Dice feels a bit more mushy on the bar for me. And the jumps are a bit more lofty. I think the Park turns faster and feels more alive.

My 2 cents.

I have the Dash. I love that kite. I also have an RPM; feels very similar to me. I love the RPM too.
I HATE that mother loving octopus system. I would pay more for a Naish kite without it.
I had to sell my beloved and spotless Helix kites because it was uneconomical to fix the frikin' Octopus connection.
As a customer may I have a choice?

To me it's weird that a repair place doesn't want the business. Think it might be from before they reorient the zippers for the struts. I've changed a few times and it takes maybe a few minutes more per strut, but the alignment of the LE bladder is easier.
Too bad you experience that

stakas wrote: ↑

Tue Feb 27, 2018 9:22 pm

I have the Dash. I love that kite. I also have an RPM; feels very similar to me. I love the RPM too.
I HATE that mother loving octopus system. I would pay more for a Naish kite without it.
I had to sell my beloved and spotless Helix kites because it was uneconomical to fix the frikin' Octopus connection.
As a customer may I have a choice?

Each to his own. I had to find approx 16 small holes (thorns) on the old system LE.
You can imagine that I had to reinsert the LE few times till I found them all.
Now, the system is changed a lot I don't understand why people complaining.
External systems are not easier at all, and Octopus is comparable regarding time for repair, but with all the benefits.
Btw how's the low end, pop and slack comparing RPM vs Dash?

Thanks.

I also come from riding the park range and am curious about similar feeling kites. (RPM, Dice +?)

I also had an octopus connection go bad on my least used 2012 kite. After taking it apart and putting it back together far too many times (finally got good at that), I still couldn't get the seal to hold, and actually made another octopus connection leak during the process of elimination. Maybe it's age and the plastic getting too rigid? There must be some magic special brand/width/length of the teflon tape that is required because the 2 types I tried felt very different. The one video that is out there is way outdated. Naish should at least include some basic 'official way to fix the octopus' on their website (though they're not in the business of helping you keep your old gear going strong).

After the 10th try, I decided my time was worth more and simply bought a slightly newer (2014) Park off of someone who was clearing out closet space (great deal!).

While i generally haven't had issues with leaking octopus, I'm not looking forward to touching that crap again and am willing consider ungainly but logical external hoses for my next over the hill kite.

bc-sf wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 01, 2018 6:05 am

Naish should at least include some basic 'official way to fix the octopus' on their website.

Now this I agree with.
It really should have very very little teflon tape. I think key is maybe two round if even that. For me I tried a couple of rounds then a lot less and it was fine so I continued that. But yeah a good instructional manual would be good. I do think a good instructional video would be great. The kites are pretty bomber in build.

I do remember there was a video on youtube about this. Now that the zipper has been re-oriented its pretty easy to access even small struts.