Hey Guys,

I am curious about the Hellfish, from the pics it looked like quite a high performance kite with unbelievable upwind ability.

Anybody got more details on it.

Cheers
Rich

LOL
The hellfish was amazingly pimped. Retailers went nuts even before anyone had seen them eh Mr Mchellfish?

The thread here was "i have a secret" if i remember rightly

Then for no reason they started to spontaneously combust....one after another.

It was quite a scene.

I remember chatting with Brownie who had a crinkly proto at the spit. I remember thinking at the time that won't last.
Looked more like something you'd wrap potatoes in.

http://www.ikiteboarding.com/kiteboarding/articles/best-hellfish-review.aspx

Monkey Griffin (I think it was an '06). I would take the '05 Gaastra Visions I learned on ANY day of the week over that pig.

D

jarradm said...

This one will jog the memory.

The RRD Con-V

Yes! I still have TWO of these babies (10m & 14m) . Learn to kite with these (and a directional board) and everything else is easy to fly.
Have been tempted to take them out for a retro session, but each time the wind is up I can't bring myself to 'waste' good wind

Ha ha - classic PR!

There is more shovels fulls of steaming stuff than a garden convention.

Ridiculous pimping and slagging from other brand ho's too. Certainly not unique to Best.

The M80 was more than a bit of a lemon too (unless your hobbie was stitching)and is being tarted about a bit.

Good ol Mr SS pimpy - wonder how he reviewed the SS Link when it came out? 100% honestly I bet.


What i still can't work out is how Best thought they were going to get away with it? Surely the protos gave them ample warning - but no they promoted the bee-jeesus outta the biggest lemon to date.

More humble pie anyone?


Lesson here is sift through the hype and BS - and go try the kites 1st.

Naish V4 10m in about 2004ish, totally pulled to the left at all times and jelly fished about, was a excellent kite once you were totally powered up and going hard. They were canned after a few months and every person who purchased it, sold them quick.

i bid $3.80 for the hellfish plus i'll let you give $20 to come pick it up

XTC kites, Cabrinha Switchblade 2, PL Waterfoil - but the 3m does pull like a truck and stays fully inflated when it crashes ready to relaunch without notice and rip your arms off, 16m RRD Type 4.1 - steers like a truck, no safety release anywhere and takes hours to pump up and Best Waroo. My favourite was the Ocean Rodeo 15m sold to a guy rigged with 5m line extensions as the main lines, no QR and a wrist safety which when you released the bar just left your wrist attached to a fully powered and looping kite instead of your harness.

Heres some of the earlier Hellfish Hype

www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=7181&whichpage=1
kiteforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=2315453&navi=1&button=forum

Yeah in fairness to best they recompensated everyone who bought a hellfish, or so i am led to believe.
Taught me a few things tho, never ever buy a kite unseen, never believe the hype and try before you buy no matter what.

Yep - although Best did huge damage to their rep, despite having made excellent kites (almost every time) previously and since, they did fess up and return the hard earns.

Unlike some other brands which are perceived to have a better rep who basically said "Aww gee now that the warranty is over that really was a sh!t kite - but get super stoked about this year's model which is faster/safer/better/etc etc etc and give us another wad ofya spendies!! Thank you come again..."

So although there was a carton and a half of googs on the Best faces, I still think they have waaayyy more cred than some other brands out there for the way they eventually handled the mess up.

Yes, I ride Best kites - but have no affiliation or pipyness at all. I picked up my 2005, one season old kites super cheap, possibly due to the (at the time) recent loss of rep that affected the resale of the kites i bought. I absolutely could not fault these kites (for their vintage) in build, design or any other factor BTW. Lucky me I guess for not falling for the hype or brand bashing that went on. Must have had my BS deflected sunnies on at the time..

All companies make a citrus machine eventually, it says a lot about the company as to how they handle that though...

Pretty bloody happy i haven't owned some of the fruits listed here too. A bad kite makes for very little fun on the water.

getfunky said...

Yep - although Best did huge damage to their rep, despite having made excellent kites (almost every time) previously and since, they did fess up and return the hard earns.

Unlike some other brands which are perceived to have a better rep who basically said "Aww gee now that the warranty is over that really was a sh!t kite - but get super stoked about this year's model which is faster/safer/better/etc etc etc and give us another wad ofya spendies!! Thank you come again..."

So although there was a carton and a half of googs on the Best faces, I still think they have waaayyy more cred than some other brands out there for the way they eventually handled the mess up.

Yes, I ride Best kites - but have no affiliation or pipyness at all. I picked up my 2005, one season old kites super cheap, possibly due to the (at the time) recent loss of rep that affected the resale of the kites i bought. I absolutely could not fault these kites (for their vintage) in build, design or any other factor BTW. Lucky me I guess for not falling for the hype or brand bashing that went on. Must have had my BS deflected sunnies on at the time..

All companies make a citrus machine eventually, it says a lot about the company as to how they handle that though...

Pretty bloody happy i haven't owned some of the fruits listed here too. A bad kite makes for very little fun on the water.

This is why I became a best dealer .Sick of me and my customers being dicked around with dodgy service with other brands .

what about cab blacktips or contra F$$K IVE SEEN SOME SCARY TIMES WITH THOSE KITES BUT FUNNY WACHING

poor relative said...

Some hellfish blasts from the past with the usual suspects.
Ahhhhh history

www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=7181

www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=7226

kiteforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=2315453&navi=1&button=forum

wow! I'm glad I read these threads. Did not beleive anyone could be so blatently dishonest....will read what people write on this forum with a lot more skepticism.

Funny - I always thought one guy in particular got more negativity than he deserved and he sounded like a knowledgeable person when it came to commenting on a kite's performance. Not anymore.

ashkiter said...

vegemite said...


Slingshot Link - A true shocker. Some salvage through new bridle

sounds to me like you didn't ride one of the smaller links,
7 and 9 metre are awesome kites, big ones i heard were a problem

Hey my 10.5 link was good untill the 100th session....well its still good really

yeh the 7, 9 and 10.5 were alright once you took out the batterns and put the red bridle on.

I still dont know what slingshot were thinking with the 12 and 15 tho.

"Lets make a kite with nineteen struts and attach a shyte load of fibreglass to it. Fark while we're there, lets put split strut on it, onepump, and re-inforce the living shyte out of it with bumpers"

"And to really piss anyone off that trys to pump it up, lets make those nineteen struts the fattest struts known to man and reccomend 10.5psi"

Sorry Slingy, I love your rev tho