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What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

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Mitchel_12000
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What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby Mitchel_12000 » Thu Mar 25, 2021 2:55 pm

I recently posted a question about the Flysurfer Viron 3 in 6m as a storm kite next to my Soul 10m. The consensus was that it wouldn't be to great for a semi experienced rider. Now I'm wondering if there are any foil kites for stormy, gusty conditions at all. Last week I had some tense moments with my Flysurfer Soul when a couple of gusts hit my kite and the tips folded a little. No total collapses or something but it made me think if there are better foil kites for these conditions (hence my FS Viron Question earlier this week).

I love my Soul and would like to have a similar riding experience in tougher conditions.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby Janus » Thu Mar 25, 2021 4:23 pm

Hi, the "consensus" on the other topic was that there is not a foil suited for gusty stormy wheather..
You love your Soul so I suggested a size down for the Soul, an 8. Stepping down to a 6 is too much of a gap.
If you just got some gusts with a little tip collaps and overall good performance you can accept it or try shortening C with 1 cm and see if that goes better.. if not try another cm.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby Adventure Logs » Thu Mar 25, 2021 6:56 pm

Try the 6m. Very stable in gusts and in my opinion works perfectly with my Sonic3 11m so it will go well with a Soul 10m.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby stefFZ » Tue Mar 30, 2021 1:27 pm

What do you call stormy conditions? Which wind speed? Cap Town in January? Ocean beach San Francisco in June? Tarifa? South of France mid-season? Greece and its Meltem?

Viron is not an option for me. It is a safe kite for learning, performance is too low for TT.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby Mitchel_12000 » Tue Mar 30, 2021 2:01 pm

Well, with my soul I can ride untill about 28knts. It's starting to get pretty intense at about 25knts but still quiet controllable. I would like to kite with a smaller size in 25-35 knts. I'm getting to old for rougher winds ;-).

I'm totally stepping outside of my comfort zone here, but I ordered a 6m Pansh Genesis 2021 this weekend. If it sucks I lost E.135,- and I will have to save more money for a new or 2nd hand Soul. If it's oke I'll have a great deal. This kite is supposed to be suitable for unstable and harder wind conditions so we'll see.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby plummet » Tue Mar 30, 2021 10:39 pm

At the risk of sounding like pumpy. Lei's are the way and the light for stormy weather. Particularly when it rains. Foil performance gets shittier and shittier as it fills up with water.
Also, launch and landing in super high winds is easier/safer with lei's.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby RomeUtah » Tue Mar 30, 2021 11:03 pm

plummet wrote:
Tue Mar 30, 2021 10:39 pm
At the risk of sounding like pumpy. Lei's are the way and the light for stormy weather. Particularly when it rains. Foil performance gets shittier and shittier as it fills up with water.
Also, launch and landing in super high winds is easier/safer with lei's.
I may have to agree, if the soul is too rowdy you may want to get a single or a 3 strut kite. I push my 8m soul to mid to high 30s knts but when the wind gusts are are 10knt variable or more, that kite is an injury or a yard sale waiting to happen. (im 175lbs, riding a 143 board)

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby nothing2seehere » Wed Mar 31, 2021 1:31 pm

Mitchel_12000 wrote:
Tue Mar 30, 2021 2:01 pm
Well, with my soul I can ride untill about 28knts. It's starting to get pretty intense at about 25knts but still quiet controllable. I would like to kite with a smaller size in 25-35 knts. I'm getting to old for rougher winds ;-).

I'm totally stepping outside of my comfort zone here, but I ordered a 6m Pansh Genesis 2021 this weekend. If it sucks I lost E.135,- and I will have to save more money for a new or 2nd hand Soul. If it's oke I'll have a great deal. This kite is supposed to be suitable for unstable and harder wind conditions so we'll see.
The problem with the genesis is that the stitching of the straps is ..... flimsy ... Ask me how I know :oops:

As others have pointed out, if you are familiar with tube kites they can be a decent change. I've been having the same dilemma and went with a 7m tube kite. Its working well for me so far. I chose a bow style kite and the steering response wasn't too fast when dropping down from my 10m Soul. Similarly the amount of sheeting range was intuitive. I'll reconsider as I get more experienced with foil kites but with my significantly greater experience of tube kites I found the confidence of familiar handling to work well. I figure that the performance loss is less obvious when its that windy anyway compared to when its 15-20 knots.

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby Nelis » Tue Jun 01, 2021 2:51 pm

Hi,

New to the forum, first post, was lurking around longer. Essentially had kind of the exact same dilemma as OP, and I too have a 10m Soul, so I thought I'd chime in here.

The Soul 10 is now kind of my one-kite quiver. I use it from lightwind on HF until I get blown off it, then throw HF aside and proceed on twintip. This is fine at my local beach since I'll windsurf in anything above say 22kts.

For my holidays I will be going with a plane instead of taking my van this year, so I need to travel light but need 1 kite extra to cover the upper end.

Ideally the Soul 6 would fit the bill perfectly in terms of performance I'm looking for. However, as I found out, there's real drawbacks to handling a foilkite above 20kts. Leave the bridle flapping for a couple of seconds too long (say, the time it takes to walk from your bar to the kite) and there's spaghetti ruining your sesh. I can perfectly self launch and land my Soul 10, but in higher winds clumsy/clueless helpers and foilkites don't go together well. The Soul is also quite slippery, have had one occasion with 25kts where the kite slipped out of the hands of the helper so I had to release kite mid-window on the beach, resulting once again in spaghetti.

The new kite should perform well in higher winds on the twintip, but it'd be nice if it works well on HF in 15-20kts.

I want foilkite performance; a kite that flies deep into the window, fast, floaty, stable. Which dictates I go look for a high aspect LEI, they only come in 5 strut design (I think downwind performance/drift on HF of these things is supposed to be bad) It sort of contradicts the single/no-strut trend for the hydrofoil part. My previous kites where Liquid Force Solo v2's 9 & 12m (the Soul 10m replaced those two and does everything better than those two). So this was my line of thought.

Size? I'm thinking 8m (Ten Velox, F-one Furtive, maybe Edge)

Anyone comments, other good ideas, or try talk me into another Soul?

Gr, Nelis

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Re: What foil kite for stormy weather on twintip

Postby FLandOBX » Tue Jun 01, 2021 3:50 pm

Nelis wrote:
Tue Jun 01, 2021 2:51 pm
....I want foilkite performance; a kite that flies deep into the window, fast, floaty, stable. Which dictates I go look for a high aspect LEI, they only come in 5 strut design (I think downwind performance/drift on HF of these things is supposed to be bad) It sort of contradicts the single/no-strut trend for the hydrofoil part. My previous kites where Liquid Force Solo v2's 9 & 12m (the Soul 10m replaced those two and does everything better than those two). So this was my line of thought.
Welcome to the forum, Nelis.

Like you, I love my 10m Soul, especially for light wind hydrofoil. In higher winds, I use high aspect 5-strut LEIs, both for hydrofoil and twintip. They work just fine for the hydrofoil. They loop fast, float downwind well, handle gusty conditions better than no strut/single strut options, and, of course, motor upwind better than low or mid aspect LEIs. In higher wind, kite weight isn't an issue as it might be in lighter wind. So, don't rule out the 5-strut high aspect LEIs as a high wind solution if you're relying on your Soul for lighter wind. :thumb:
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