I bought myself a Tensor 4.2 for my birthday, and thought I'd share my experiences with it.
The kite comes advertised as RTF. The lines are attached to a bar, which can be converted to handles with the included handle ends and Allen wrench.
There are three kite killers included: one for the bar setup, and two for handles. It's supposed to be very easy to convert between the two setups,
but I haven't done that yet (mainly because I lost the Allen wrench during my second flight and haven't had time to find a replacement).
Winds for the first flight were not spectacular, but enough to get the kite off the ground. I launched the kite, and as soon as it was airborne, it
began looping to the left before crashing. At first I thought it was just me being an idiot. It did this each time I tried to launch it before finally
staying aloft with some significant pull on the right line. This is when I noticed the bridle didn't look quite right. I landed the kite and inspected
the lines and bridle, which in hindsight I should have done even though it was advertised as RTF. Someone, in their infinite wisdom, had attached the
left brake line to the left brake bridle THROUGH the left main bridle! Makes perfect sense that this would cause the kite to spin to the left. About
this time it started to rain, so I packed up.
Second flight was later that day, about 50 miles south. Before launching, I disconnected, untangled, and reattached all the lines and made sure there
were no other bridle issues. This time, it was a much better flight. I also used a D-loop and a PL Base Harness from Dakitez to take the extra strain
off my arms. In bar configuration, I found that the kite makes slow, wide turns since there is no tension at all in the brake lines. I was able to
generate a little bit of lift, but nothing spectacular. Towards the end of my flight, the wind started gusting stronger than I was comfortable with,
so I was able to test the kite killers and the quick release on the D-loop; both worked spectacularly. It was at some point during this flight that I
lost the Allen wrench.
A few weeks later, I had the time for a third flight in between classes. This time around, the winds were excellent. I managed to get airborne several
times (some intentionally, some not), and a few of those were with decent hang time. :wee: Easily the best outing I've had with this kite so far.
The Tensor has two knot ladders on it, one for the break lines and one for the main lines. I've played around with the break line ladder a little, but
not the main lines. I'm hoping the slow turning issue will be resolved with some combination of tweaking the lines and converting to handles. I'll
keep y'all posted.3shot - 7-4-2013 at 05:50 PM
I do like the bar to handle optionterraxkite - 25-5-2013 at 09:59 PM
How is this kite working out for you. Are there other kites in this size range one should be comparing to?John Holgate - 26-5-2013 at 03:08 AM
In relation to your 'slow turning' - are you using the bar configuration? And that has the brake line to the center? If that's the case, then yes,
it may well be very slow to turn. Put it on four line handles and put some brake input into the turns and it should speed up the turns nicely.
Jumping with a 4m ? Dude, be really careful - there are lots of stories of bruised and broken body parts on this forum doing similar to you.....indigo_wolf - 26-5-2013 at 08:29 AM
Would probably like this option better if it had been designed to be "tool-less"
ATB,
SamProletariat - 30-5-2013 at 11:21 PM
That prism works pretty well with am ozone turbo bar as well, FYI. Although, if you're gonna blow the money on a turbo bar, you might as will just
buy a used depower for about the same price.
Good review, kiznosh. In my mind, I put the tensor in a group with the beamer, hornet, buster, flux (flame on!) And the octane. Quality varies
widely amongst that group and features are slightly different, but all are reliable, tough,predictable kites that aren't too lifty or skittish.
The features that set the prism apart are the handles to bar thing and the adjustable angle of attack bridle like the Flexifoil Blade AAA bridle. I
was turned off by the fact that the tensor is the top of the line power kite for prism, so I ended up going beamer > flux > hornet instead, but
after flying one, I'd have totally been happy getting started with a prism.
