Plummet said..1950 said..Plummet said..
There comes a point of gustyness when the foil is simply not practical anymore. At the point you need to get back into an lei.
This is what i was most scared of. So there is one more LEI vs foils wins for LEI. it will relaunch when crashed hard, and it's more manageable and better handles ****ty wind (gusty/shifty)
Yes. But the other side of the coin is that a foil are way more stable in light winds. They just hold up in the air when a lei constantly needs to be flown or it falls out of the sky.
On a side note. As closed cell foils get old they get porous and hold their shape worse. In essence they become less stable. Also the mixer on the bridle can be out of wack and that can make the kite unstable too. Its possible your old speed 3 is worn, stretched and bridles out of wack making harder to control than a new one.
The speed 4 is so incredibly stable.
yes, my speed 3 is quite old but i think trimmed as good as it can be, i even experimented with some tips reading on foilzone like "c line bit shorter, etc.." but found most stable & best performing on standard mixer tuning, and set to hard steering. still new in my quiver so i do mixer test every time, checking all the lines all the time, noob stuff, etc...in reality its really great kite, but as
bigtone667 said..
I remember one of the dudes at Kernel having his X19 come up to 12 oclock in a gust at speed. It lifted him of the ground and then the wind died. He continued to fly forward for about twenty metres into the "wind" and just missed planting himself into a rock groyne.
this is worst scenario that can happen. i crashed like this few times practicing in shallow water. then read and learn that foils have to be "flown all the time" and found my personal solution to this situation.
if gust hit or maybe in worst case if it drops lower to wind window and gust hit and you know that's gonna shoot out to edge or even over the edge, do everything you can to prevent that acceleration. i found that trying to stall it before it accelerates quite fix problem instantly. you just don't let it accelerate holding rear lines outside of bar, like you want to back stall land it. it will pull, hard but in all situations i'v been i managed to drift on heels few meters and after gust passed, just back to normal.
speed 4, yes. i could imagine. new kite, bit thinner than speed3.. it could be stable as hell..
