Grantmac said..
Did you get it back with the non-servo bar? Have you gotten it on the water?
Yes (good question), and yes a little.
For a conclusion on the servo bar, see for yourself what you make out of this:
Recap, we have four upgrades, that I know of.
The no.2 (first line-kit) overlapped the no.1 (knots only), none of them made much difference.
The no.3 (tip adjustments) and no.4 (second line-kit, non-servo bar) where scheduled for my upgrade-return. 777 said both make a huge difference individually.
I would have tried no.3 on my own, as I always felt the glider tips were central to the instability. But I returned it, as I think I otherwise would have to reverse the entire no.1 before proceeding with no.2. No way I will spend more time on the PT if not entirely sure the setup is correct, so you 777 guys do it!
The no.4 (non-servo) I'm not so sure about. I'm quite certain that the sliding function itself is not much in the way. But having that movement calls for lines that are maybe not fixed at an optimal position most of the time. This setup might complicate load spreading during even tiny fore-aft adjustments with the bar. I'm not a glider techie, but I feel my experiences correlate.
So when returning I wrote that I would prefer the servo bar, at least on snow, but stated clearly that if they thought the non-servo upgrade was for
the best for all use, I would of course take it. They said all upgrades were necessary to meet the current best state.
So all done, returned with a message "I left the servo kit in the sleeve in case you want it back.."
And the product page is still all about servo. But then again I have a feeling that they won't touch it before results are back from more users.
My guess is that we have not seen the last of pulley bars on parawings. I think the PT just had too many parameters out of control, when 777 needed to relate to their actual market. And I think this tiny market were guys like me ("I know this and that, and I can always do some fast and cool freeriding while learning to parawing") I don't think 777 attracted the best and most seasoned parawingers, not with a super product hit, neither with a budget for top pro riders.
Now that they got the Skin, I got from them clearly that the PT is not a beginner's product.
At a time I blamed myself for buying the PT when I knew there were no reviews, and no videos that really made the PT parawinging look
playful.
Of course, 777 could have been much more clear about requirements and limitations, they must certainly have known at some level.
But I think there were actually never "wrong" with the PT. Some smaller fixes yes, but the upgrades were really about "partially neutering" a first race parawing, to fit it in a market.
For instance, before having any upgrades I had a couple of amazing sessions on snowboard (meaning easier parawing control), proving an incredible wind range. (No overshooting for me, but some had that problem.)
The PT now sits further down in the wind window, and it is not so kiterace-flat. If I didn't have the Skins, I would probably try to progress with the PT.
Enough ranting, here's
todays results.
I knew I would only be having a very short period of useful wind (mostly 10m/s, but dropping totally many times), and gave the Skin 3, the Skin 4 and the PT 4.2 each around 10 minutes with two upwind runs on one leg, and back on 1.5m 6s wind waves on some banks. No parawing takedown/packing today. Floaty DW-board, big foil (SeaDevil 1040 but could have taken the 840 and maybe something smaller).
The 777 guys think it is unfair to compare single and double skins, but I think we all should know the differences we are up to, so we can make an educated decision on choices regarding progression, time and money. Hope this helps.
The Skins fixed my confidence, after some earlier PT-humiliation on water. The two sizes behaved pretty much the same. But the 3 was preferred and the 4 was really more than needed for today's setup.
The PT double was much better after the complete upgrade. At least more friendly. Since I can fly the PT lower now, getting on foil is faster and easier. Note that I used it with freeride covers. (777 put them on, had meant to take them off but forgot)
At 190cm I can fly the Skins fully horizontal while getting on foil. That, and their very low weight helps, I would think.
Further out at stronger wind I think the PT 4.2 got on foil as easy as the Skin 3, but in less and more unstable wind going out the Skin 3 was clearly better. Then again, if I spent much time with the PT I would maybe be better with it, or simply not bother.
I only pumped the board, decided to not try pumping the parawing before I get some more stability dialed in. From earlier testing on land, the Skins turned out to pump pretty well for a parawing. Pumping the flatter no-mod PT seemed fully useless, after the upgrades,
maybe.
I forgot to put on the watch, but I had good sighting on islets at my homespot, to reference upwind performance.
The PT appeared to have slightly better upwind performance over the Skin. Maybe equal without freeride covers. But this is me now. I think I'm not riding anywhere near efficiently across chop due to not-yet-there parawing balance, but ride more confident with the Skins. I have a feeling I will find the the PT "blade" to eventually outperform the Skins on upwind. For now I couldn't care less about a couple of upwind degrees, gotta progress to prepare for a bit bigger conditions.
I fell one time with each parawing, no crash test plan there. With the Skins this was rider error during big wind drops. Turned out to be surprisingly easy to restart. The 3m got sully submerged, but I just needed to hold this very light canvas out two seconds and it flying practically as before.
Alas, the PT had freeride covers and by luck I managed to bounce it off the surface a couple of times while getting up on the board again. The SeaDevil can turn very controlled also at low speeds. So not thinking much and going slow when gybing onto a small wave, I could not keep up with flying the PT. But of course that could be handled one way or another in the future.
Btw the "depressive PT" is maybe gone. At one moment, fast upwind made the PT abruptly seek down, but I managed to counteract. But maybe it was all from the unstable wind. Will follow that up.
Maybe I'll take out the PT and test some more, but the next sessions will be Skins. Maybe then I can also understand the PT better.
Anyway, the session definitely terminated. Had to get ashore and run to the house, as strangely sneaking clouds had lightning strike a couple of hundred meters on each side of me. Having playground in Skagerak and the North sea, the waters with the highest temperature rise wordwide, has mostly given us a lot more wind and waves so I don't complain. Still, should be the best wind period now. Something is off, weather variations has increased the last decades.
Finally, here's the PT 4.2m bar and lines with all four upgrades:
To compare, here's the Skin 4m bar and lines:
So the PT has 3 sets of lines, while the Skin has four.
Came to think of that after I had noticed how much smoother pitch movements on the bar is with the Skin. The PT is more abrupt.
. Since the release of another double-skin parawing, the PAIA, it has become more evident that double-skin wings are a different breed altogether. They demand different conditions and skills compared to single-skin wings, something Olav is now discovering in his move into parawing foiling with both options.
