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Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

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Regis-de-giens
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Weight: 62 kg
Local Beach: France: St Laurent du Var, Cannes, Almanarre
Style: 62 kg , light wind, waves
Gear: Conceptair pulsion 18&15&12S, OR Flite 10m , Airush One 9&6, peak 5M , Rally 6, Elf 11 &7, 19m2 single skin proto.
foil Ketos, RCS Supreme, TBK Mana, snowskis, kite-boat
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby Regis-de-giens » Mon Jun 06, 2022 8:08 pm

I bought a second hand Spirit 15m.
Juste tested it today , 6 to 12 k knots on 24 m lines and 1200 cm2 foil.

Kite is easy to launch, powerful and a real freerace kite : rapid but still tolerant. Really beautiful in the sky.

Compared to lower ratio like Pulsion or FRS, you need to keep an eye on it at Zenith if wind is not very laminar.

Hang Time is excellent, kite is forgiving but gives a lot of reward.

I think my low end limit will be 6-7 knots if i want to keep a bit of tolerance before collapse. Jump in 7 knots were great , both long and easy to redirect before landing, a lot of hangtime.

Under 7, i prefer the pulsion for its hanging in the air, stability ,and recovery in case of rider mistake at the extrem wind windows. I feel more confident to still try new unmastered tricks in 6 knots with pulsion. For tricks masterized, Spirit is more rewarding.

Nice kite, really, and already looking forward for the next session, maybe with shorter 20 meters lines
Last edited by Regis-de-giens on Mon Jun 06, 2022 10:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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seppalord
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby seppalord » Mon Jun 06, 2022 9:34 pm

Hi Regis thanks for your insight.

My anticipation grows bigger and bigger.
I can't wait to get my 10m and 6m. Ordered April and estimated delivery is July. Crazy delivery times.
But these feedbacks helps to endure the long waiting :thumb:

Quiet curious how the low end on the 10m with surf foil will be, and the boosting of course :D

derek440
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby derek440 » Thu Jun 09, 2022 1:32 am

IMG_2151.jpeg
I had a 15m and 10m spirit for a year as my personal/demo kites and I agree with the points above. The 15m bottom end is about 6kn for someone proficient at light wind hydrofoil starts. I have also seen the 10m ridden with a surf foil below 10kn also. I am a heavier rider and I have a race foil and a moses 633 onda surf foil. I found the Spirit 10m to be ideal with the moses 633. Also I found the foil jumping on these kites to be very high and lofty and they are great for tacking/gybing. Inflation and water relaunch is the best i have seen, i actually relaunched more than once totally by mistake by just holding the bar in when i have crashed, it just wants to fly again. I also survived a 20 min lull with kite in water on a 6kn gusty day and managed to drain the water out (not much water), wait for a gust and relaunch the kite after about 20m in near zero wind. After selling the demo kites I personally openeed and used an 8m spirit a few times as a demo kite and I also raced on it once in strong wind and used it with a surfboard once in about 17kn, it was really good for each of these applications. here is a quick video of me on the 8m racing in strong wind: and my wife riding the 8m Spirit with a surfboard in about 15kn
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Regis-de-giens
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Posts: 2006
Joined: Thu Jul 31, 2014 2:58 pm
Weight: 62 kg
Local Beach: France: St Laurent du Var, Cannes, Almanarre
Style: 62 kg , light wind, waves
Gear: Conceptair pulsion 18&15&12S, OR Flite 10m , Airush One 9&6, peak 5M , Rally 6, Elf 11 &7, 19m2 single skin proto.
foil Ketos, RCS Supreme, TBK Mana, snowskis, kite-boat
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby Regis-de-giens » Sun Jun 12, 2022 11:54 am

Tested Yesterday with a small TT 118cm, in 8-11 knots.

Excellent . Very efficient in jumps, very easy as well. I did my first double rotations, successful from the first attempt. I am so happy. Also a backroll hand wash which was the first Time.

At one moment, i crossed a family boat and get caught by a fishline Hook they were draging at the rear, right inside my right leg , high pain . I had to let the bar go to Remove the injuring Hook (alone in the water, since the boat escaped ...) ... Kite in the water during about 3-4 minutes without any care, and it has relaunched as soon as i grabbed the bar again. Impressive.

Nice kite !!!! I also did my first real try of foot changes during tacks, and directly some series of "beautiful tacks with foot change every 10 seconds " on my HydroFoil, same wind. So it is now my "kite of first off" :-). It behaved extremely well during slack lines of piloting mistakes which gives zenitude to your trials.

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lederhosen
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby lederhosen » Sun Jun 12, 2022 1:09 pm

Had a try on the 10m and the 8m spirit in 12 to 22 knots on twintip.

What stuck out most is how stable the kite is, not a single ear tuck in 3 hours. Even drifting it backwards it hardly wobbled.

The 10 was a bit big for the amount of wind we had, so I had it depowered a lot but even then the kite handled nice and it boosted like a rocket.

It sits pretty far forward coming from a Kitech Frs, but it does not shoot back and forth when depowering quickly. Handling is really easy for a kite with that kind of performance. It also turns really nice and direct.

I really liked the kite, only the bridles are bit tangly. It is also odd that it is not trimmable. It is supposed to be not necessary to trim the kite, but I find that a bit hard to belief. Don’t all bridle lines shrink a bit over time?

Maybe a version with stiffer bridles and a trimsystem would be a good idea in the future.

derek440
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby derek440 » Mon Jun 13, 2022 3:11 am

Great feedback, am happy to see these good experiences, mine were similar. RE the bridle this is purely a design trade-off situation, the bridle has more parasitic drag than the canopy, reducing diameter has a huge impact on drag, weight of bridle and all those lovely handling characteristics and stability. Try placing the mixer inside the air inlet vent closest to the centre of the LE before rolling up the kite to minimise tangles. The canopy being so slippery also makes it hard to keep the bridles in place when you roll up the kite, the mixer in vent trick helps lots.

RE tuning you can eaily tune a mixer that has no quick-adjusters by using looping methods to zero the mixer and/or make B/C shorter/longer relative to A. The most common way to do this is to shorten A as it gets longer than the rest over time. To do this you take off the front pigtail and the next section of A in the mixer then the next part of the A mixer that connects to the kite you reattach that with a larks foot rather than a normal connection, this shortens A and makes the short-mixer zero again. The same can be done for other levels of the mixer and there are three different attachment knots/loops you can use that shorten by various lengths, normal loop, larks-foot, double wrapped loop and triple wrapped loop. Check out this tuning guide section on shortening sections of line with various loop knots from the VMG2 trim guide spreadsheet, also for how to connect these loops in a mixer check out the Ozone R1 "pit stop" guide, half way down the video "how to shorten a bridle using the double loop technique":
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Screen Shot 2022-06-13 at 10.03.35 am.png

jyka
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby jyka » Mon Jun 13, 2022 2:23 pm



There is a great comparison between gin spirit and fs soul.
Spirit seems to be a good kite. But it should be much cheaper. Resell value of other foil kites than ozone and especially flysurfer is so poor. If the price difference to soul is only $100 there is no sense. The difference should be at least $1000.

P.S this thread is mentioned in the video :D

derek440
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby derek440 » Thu Jun 16, 2022 12:17 pm

haha we are famous! I was actually the one who sent the kite to our kite life to test (from Australia) - they weren't paid they just like reviewing kites honestly and I think the review is honest and good. A few funny issues like the person stalling the kite during downloops was probably just adjusting from tube kites and/or bar setup (i sent kite only) but otherwise I think they got to see how awesome the kite is. RE the price, I've had some discussions about this, I can only suggest you hit up your local dealer for a discount or if you are in Australia hit me up for one! I think the quality and build and design etc are all as good as the other expensive kites (Chrono etc) and remembering these are made alongside Gin Gliders which cost big bucks and are leading paragliders, just like skywalk and ozone paragliders so the price will be high reflecting the quality, but I accept the points about established brands and resale due to brand recognition. I'm not sure where the prices came from in the video for Canada but in Australia Soul v2 12m retail price and price of Spirit on my website ginflymaax australia the spirit is $438 USD cheaper for 12m than Soul v2. We also offer additional discounts in some cases and demo kites come up etc and i think most dealers in each region would have deals like that so the RRP doesn't tell the whole story.

fernmanus
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby fernmanus » Fri Jun 17, 2022 3:16 pm

. I personally ride Gin Instincts which are very similar in performance to FS Sonic3.
Hi Derek,

What size of Gin Instincts have you been flying? I am curious about the 18.

Do you have issues with tip folding with the Instinct? How stable is the Instinct compared to the Spirit? For example, the Soul is so much more stable than the Sonic. There are locations where it is too gusty for a Sonic, but I can fly a Soul (or a Spirit) there. I fly on inland lakes and snow kite, so Stability reigns supreme. The Spirit is super stable, just wish it came in an 18 & 21 like the Soul.

derek440
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Re: Gin Kiteboarding Spirit

Postby derek440 » Sun Jun 19, 2022 2:17 am

I have a Gin Instinct 18m and have used it for a season, all of the instinct sizes are super stable and zero tip folding or bad behaviour which is amazing for its performance level. Some of our top local racers have changed from race kites like ozone R1 to instinct and are competetive in races against race kites. The 18m instinct handles like a gruntier 15m, for me being a heavier rider it helps get out in sub-10kn winds but it also has a good top end and I've safely ridden through gusts on the 18m in 15+kn. I should make a video with the 18m but I am often riding that kite it in rainy conditions so haven't done any video yet (its winter here). My wife also takes my 18m instinct instead of her races kites in light fickle wind sometimes because the instinct fabric (called Myungjin after the korean textile company that developed the new technology) is better if the kite goes in the water. Launch and relaunch are almost as good as Spirit which I think is the number 1 kite in that area. Recently my wife changed the kite bags around after using my 18m and i thought i was putting up the 15m (they aren't colour coded per size like Spirit) and i rode it in about 12kn that went up to about 18kn thinking i was on the 15m and i didn't even notice. I was rolling up the kite after my session and saw the number and was shocked. You do need a big bar tho to get it to turn and when tacking you have to steer the bar hard to get it to turn fast, same for downloops, but that's standard for a foil kite that size, I use a 60 or 65cm bar and that works fine. At my local spot (in Perth) I have sold three 18m instincts already and all three people are stoked with the kite. I recently had a try of a 21m Ozone R1 (v3) in light wind and liked it at first but then hated it, that kite is such a handful the instinct has impeccable manners. The wind was about 7kn and i switched back to the Instinct and had a great session.

RE the Spirit 15m I just notcied Regis just posted a video of him riding the Spirit 15m on a twin tip in 7kn


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