Flysurfer Peak4 in 5 m2, truly stoked

[F-Bear]

I love all these posts....been fun watching the Peak4 go from underground novelty to mainstream acceptance ! We all owe Horst and his original "Flysurfer Peak4" post a HUGE THANK YOU for trying this kite on the water and posting about it. Who knew a kite optimized for snow would also be the perfect kite for water ???? It has so many advantages.

Have not flown an LEI since getting my Peak4 5m....either for landboarding or for foiling. Anyone who hydrofoils really needs to try this kite. Or those who landboard in gusty crappy wind ! And excellent point on the launch sites it opens up....I can now launch from the other side of our lake which is a forest. Peak4 makes it possible. Dont' care if off-shore on on-shore winds either.

My kite does get wet...zero luck in re-launching it in water. But no big deal....totally worth it. And yes it dries out FAST...some sort of coating repels water, unlike my other LEI kites which soak it up.


Peak4 totally changed my kite life....so much so that I sent a thank you note to Flysurfer and asked them to personally go give the designer a big hug on my behalf !

This kite is just so good....the other companies better be working on a similar concept or soon Flysurfer will dominate hydrofoil kite market !!! Unless you wanna go really fast on a hydrofoil, this kite is the bomb. Affordable too.....amazing. IMHO we are in the middle of a kite revolution !

I wonder what would happen if they made a Peak4 from that magic Allula material Ocean Rodeo has??? FS should team up with OR and offer the "Peak4 MEGA ULTRA UBER Edition"

FB

[tomtom]

"I wonder what would happen if they made a Peak4 from that magic Allula material Ocean Rodeo has??? FS should team up with OR and offer the "Peak4 MEGA ULTRA UBER Edition"

nothing magical.

this kite is already very light and its properties are dominated by aerodynamic not by weight and momentum.

[Peter_Frank]

Went out a few days ago on a good wave day, 2-4 meter sets (according to the wave measuring at the harbor), starting with 7-8 m2 wind for waveboards, then picking up slowly, as well as the waves, to 6-7 m2 conditions, nice.

Was out 6 hours, and when it was 7 m2 wind for waveboards, I took my 3 m2 Peak4 to see how it worked today, had a blast

Could even fly the kite low going down the faces downwind, and still depower so not getting too much power/speed.

Eventhough, a couple of times when on the steepest part, even my 1200 cm2 was too fast for me, and I went out of control ha haa - but simply me not being sufficiently good


Nice conditions







Okay, wanted to go out on foil now, so took a 1200 cm2 wing 92 cm mast and the 3 m2




Aaaaah, lovely !





FOILBOMB ha haa, when going too fast down a steep wave, my mistake but this happens





Great to have the freedom with this kind of type, that depowers and "float" like nothing else





After some hous I went out on a waveboard again, with a tad smaller tubekite, conditions just got better and better




Peter

[jumptheshark]

Thanks for the quality info Peter. I have a slightly different story!

Had the mother of foil kite initiations yesterday.

Day 4 on the Peak4 5m. Still gushing and amazed. All four sessions I would have passed on with only LEI kites in the quiver due to launch spot or wind direction. Yesterdays being the most extreme. Our prevailing is westerly. When it shifts northwest we are screwed locally. Its offshore with dead air until way out there. One of our only exposed spots is our usual launch at the bottom of a bay. Becomes the upwind spot and the gusty wind coming from overland pushes out the mouth of the bay. Totally reckless on a surface board, but I've worked up the nerve twice to ride a foil within the bay in a NW. Both times on an 8,5 cloud and long lines. Doable, but super sketchy, phenomenally gusty and no great exit with an LEI. Pretty bad risk reward ratio.

Enter the Peak4. Was busy for the best part of the day when it cranked from the west. By the time I could go, it had gone north. Literally pushing straight out the bay. Plenty of wind though, so I put up the peak, and.... well it just felt so easy, I had to try. TOTALLY RIDICULOUS how much more fun the gusty conditions were to manage. Could stay upwind and within the bay no problem. Night and DAY from the yank and recover I was expecting. The swell were still coming in from the southwest, so a novelty set up for here that was fun to take advantage of.

Then it happened! My rite of passage! I didn't stay out long and had to come it at a little rock beach at the edge of the bay. Had come in there just two days prior with zero issues. I ride over, plop into the water before it gets dangerous for my foil and let the kite drag me toward shore. Nicely controlled and low I try to simply lay it on its back in the lea of a tree. Miscalculate and put it down right at the waters edge so it gets a bit wet. No big deal right? Wind up my lines only to realize to my horror that in the past two days a three meter berm of mucky fine weeds have filled the shallows and has completely engulfed..... the entire bridle and half of the canopy of my brand new kite!

That poor kite will never be crispy clean again! Probably dropped 50 bucks in resale! Anyway, spent a couple hours last night picking the damn stuff from ever tiny fine bridle knot on the kite. Lesson learned.... the hard way! if you can't get out onto dry land and put it down clean, Ditch further out in CLEAN water far from the dreaded WEEDS!!!!! Still have another hour of picking before I can take it to the lake for a dunk and then hopefully a session.

[lamza]

Guys
Is 5m good enough for light winds around 8 knots for my 63kgs/140 lbs?
Or should i take 8m

[Peter_Frank]

Guys
Is 5m good enough for light winds around 8 knots for my 63kgs/140 lbs?
Or should i take 8m

I dont think the 5 would be sufficient...
Pretty certain actually.

It is not as such ar "marginal" wind kite, as tomtom also have pointed out.

You can get other and bigger kites working better in 8 knots I think, when you dont ride waves, but of course the 8 m2 would probably fit the bill if you for some reasone would prefer this kite over others, but havent got mine yet...

Peter

[jumptheshark]

Totally agree with Peter.

The 5m is not a light wind kite * . I think, with skill and a 1000 square cm wing you "can" get up and going in steady 10 knots, but the riding is limited and you must work the kite. Besides, the water is FLAT!

After 5 days in a row on this kite, I'm pretty confident this is my "big" kite. Might eventually try longer lines, but it will live attached to 17m lines. One wing, one board. Super impressed with this kite. Got it cleaned up and had a killer sessions on it today. As you spend a bit of time with it, it only gets better as you start to tune into the timing and differences in character.

I am so glad I bought this kite. Perfect fit for my most common conditions.

I don't know if an 8m Peak is the right kite for you or not. I know it will be similarly easy to put up and take down, incredibly light wind/gust/shift friendly. That being said, having played around at the very low end of the 5m compared to just one or two more knots, I can understand there may well be diminishing returns on this concept of kite as you go bigger. EVERYTHING is slow in light wind and your always playing with momentum just to keep going. Not my bag! For me, with a 5m, I know that really the only way its going to end up wet is if I put it there. It just doesn't drop from 12 to 2 very often, where in 8knots..... well those wind speeds get exponentially more flukey and your mileage may vary. Anyway, you're light, I bet an 8m would really work for you if you insist on riding in gutless flat conditions.

I put the 5m peak right where most have pegged it. Covers the range of a 7 and 8m LEI. Not quite a 9m, but the devil is in the details. You can take the 5m peak out with more success than a three strut 9m LEI on the low end. Where it won't quite produce the same low end power spike for water starting, it will reliably stay in the air in major lulls, so its not gonna fall unless you hamfist it in 3 knots. You just need that 15 seconds of 10+ knots and your gone, where the 9m Lei is far more likely to get and stay wet. The risk reward ratio is more favourable for me on a 5m peak than it is with a 9+m lei, even a strutless one. On the top end, for foiling, its clearly better than a 9m LEI. I'll rig down from the 5m peak to a 5m LEI.

Bottom line, if you see a whitecap, I can go on a 5m Peak4 (77 kg lift 170). I would imagine its the same for any light weight rider, and middleweights with decent skills... the 8m might fit the same range for true heavyweights.

5 days straight and stoked.

* credit due to Tomtom and Dsurf. Cheers to both of you.

[lamza]

Thanks guys that answers my doubts

[Regis-de-giens]

Wow wow wow .... please censure this dangerous topic otherwise i may loose some euros on a future peak4 ...

[drsurf]

Guys
Is 5m good enough for light winds around 8 knots for my 63kgs/140 lbs?
Or should i take 8m

Hi lamza.

If you're using a surf foil of approx. 1000 sq cm or more and the wind goes over 8 knots for some of the time, I'd go for the 5m as it has a much wider wind range. If you have days where the wind is 10 to 15 knots as well then definitely the 5m Peak4 as you'll be using it a lot

Wind strength and quality varies from site to site and what you measure at ground level may be different 5m higher. However if the wind is always 8 knots or less then the 8m is the kite to get you foiling.