General Flysurfer Peak kite discussion

Let me start with a shout out to Jason (3shot) who originated a kite-line specific thread a couple of days ago for the Born-Kites. I loved the idea and thought that the Flysurfer Peak series could use some similar love. Jason's thread can be found here:

Quote:

http://www.powerkiteforum.com/viewthread.php?tid=30721

It seems that Peaks come up a lot in threads about what sort of kites folks should think about buying when vacillating between FB and DP. Personally, my 12M Peak2 has saved more buggy sessions this summer than I care to count. Time after time I head out with about a half dozen kites in the back of my ride, sometimes fitfully launching one or two in what is inevitably light and variable winds, only to pack them all up and pull out my trusty P2! I long for the days where I am besieged with enough steady wind to allow me to work through my entire quiver, but lately it's been my 12M P2 or bust.

Something I thought I'd share in this opening post is a positive experience I had yesterday. I had recently purchased and installed a simple stall handle / break crossover strap for $25 (thanks Chris!):

http://www.hardwaterkiter.com/line-sets.html

One of these came standard with my PL Lynx DP set up and I really missed not having it on my P2 rigging.

I was buggying yesterday with my 12M P2 in what became increasingly strong and gusty winds right before a storm came in. It was far and away the most wind I had flown this kite in and I was trimmed in at the clem-cleat adjuster, sheeting like crazy, and flying the kite high in the window just to keep it from yanking me out of my buggy. A big bolt of lightening flashed and I knew I needed to pack up in a hurry (no Ben Franklin I)!

Getting a big kite down alone in high winds isn't the simplest of tasks as we all know. Once out of my buggy and standing still the kite pretty much auto-zenithed and was pulling me upward pretty hard. What the heck I thought, let's give this a go! I pulled the crossover line hard towards me and son of a gun, my kite curtsied like a lady and backed straight down all the way to the ground. I couldn't believe how well behaved she was! I hooked the crossover strap onto my buggy and she stayed pinned to the ground. I folded her up that way, straight downwind, with my three gravel bags to keep things in line. This session wrap up went so much better than expected!

Needless to say, I'm suggesting folks consider rigging their P2s (not sure about P1s as I've never flown one) with one of these crossover straps. This was the most graceful landing I had ever experienced in high winds with this kite so I was thrilled. The crossover strap also worked fantastically well for a reverse launch, sending her about 30 feet into the air before I let go and swung her around.

Hail the Peak!

Here is a photo of the cross strap in place on the Peak2 rigging. Since the picture was taken I tied an overhand know in the Pigtails right above the cross strap so that it wouldn't sneak up the brake lines and get out of reach.

Robinsonpr - yes, the dreaded "tip tuck". I do get it now and then. I recently pulled back the foam floaters and moved the lines up (shorter) one knot which seemed to help. I bought my P2 used from Chris (feyd) over a Hardwater. It had been one of his demos. He seems to have far and away the most experience of anyone chirping in on PKF when it comes to the Peaks. He and I discussed tip tuck (it was my principle concern too) and he told me he had dialed the kite in before I was getting it so it shouldn't be too much of an issue. I bring that up because I don't know what these kites are like "stock" so to speak. What he also told me, and this turned out to be completely true, is that you will experience fewer tip tucks once you get some hours with the kite. Hard to tell what I'm doing different, but tip tuck went from being a regular occurrence (a couple of times per session) when I first got the kite to a relative rarity now (most sessions have no tip tuck). Bottom line, for all the positives these kites have, I for one would not make tip tuck a show stopper. If you ever come across the "perfect" kite, please do your dear friends here on PKF a solid and let us all know about it!

I don't know how high the winds were in the episode I described above when I was sheeting out and trimming up. A storm was coming in as I said. When I was unpacking from my car the winds were light and variable (4-8 knots). My session began with just barely enough wind to get the buggy moving. With the storm clouds moving in the winds went up considerably. Purely a guess here, but I'd say up to 20 knots. I'm surprised I wasn't yanked into an OBE with a couple of the gusts, but it seems that maybe I'm getting the hang of this DP thing (or maybe luck is just as useful as skill in these settings).

Glad to hear you are willing to, err, "take matters into your own hands" when backing down the kite. I'm not sure I'd want both hands off the bar at times like that. I suspect you were sweating that one a bit.

I have tried stall landing at the edges. I can land with success, but my problem comes with the kite tumbling once it is one ground before I can secure it with sand bags. I suspect I'll be backing the kite down with the cross over strap more than stall landing at the edges in high winds.

It's all deadly! Not sure how much 3m will do but it can't reduce the power. In another thread about Born Kites ( http://www.powerkiteforum.com/viewthread.php?tid=30721 ) we recently discussed eeking more power out of my 8.5m NS3. John Holgate suggested increasing length by 50-100% (out to 30-40m; stock being 20m). I do notice a difference with the 5m extensions but as I detailed there are pluses and minuses. No free lunch, but the experiment is one far cry cheaper than new larger kites. Have you noticed that kites for some reason get more expensive when the wind dies down? You'd think it would be the other way around...

3shot - how long till you get it!? Looking forward to hearing your write up! The wind range on these things is amazing. Even in fairly low winds down to about 12mph I can cruise around on grass with my 6m, sometimes looping it if needs be, it packs quite a punch per square metre! The quoted "max" from FS on the 6m is 20 knots. It does really pull hard in those winds but I've had mine out in 25mph and with all that depower you can still stay safe. Super quick setup and pack down are an added bonus!

Crying out for a larger size to fill that 8-13mph range during these summer months. Sadly I think Steve is right and I'll be better off with a 12m. I'm gonna pass on that 9m Peak 1

Sad but likely true. With the sick range of depow these buggers have I just think you'll be overlapping a lot at 9m and not getting the low end you are seeking without flying the 12m. I suspect a well trimmed in / sheeted out 6m would have somewhat comparable grunt to a non-trimmed / non-sheeted 9m.

Just received my 6m Peak!!
Wow!!
Damn this is one sweet kite.



Yes. I've had a few beers from excitement. Yes, I do need a shave.....

Dang Jason, you are one sexy beast!

If we were tuned to our usual channel I'd be cracking about that shot being Born Porn. I'm just thankful that you didn't go all Playgirl Burt Reynolds on us. That could have been a haunting visual to shake. :o

Lol Steve. A couple more beers and my wife might be getting a "Burt Reynolds".

Thanks Sean. I could not believe my eyes when I picked up the box just how lite the kite is. At first before I opened it I was thinking something must have been left out!!

Ted. That 4m would have been nice to have this past JIBE during sandmageddon. Watching you work that 6m up and down the beach as far as I could see was impressive!

Yeah nice one Ted for the comments on the 6 + 12 quiver. I've been deliberating as I was considering a 9m Peak 1 to go with my 6m, but I think I need to go 6 + 12

Peak Porn. We had a beautiful day yesterday. Only light wind but enough to switch my short lines for long ones and test fly

Sean - that is a work of art!!! Beautiful kite. You've got to be stoked. Can you please take a look at the post I just put up on inserting photos? You just did exactly what I want to do!

Steve it took me 2 years to figure it out so you'll have to wait

I tried a hundred different ways and the only way I could get it to work was to do what 1oldkid told me to do which was use photo bucket. I created an account, then you upload photos. Once photos are uploaded you click on the desired picture, then, to the right of the picture click on IMG. When you do that it will say copied. I then right click in my post on pkf and paste the link. That's it, easy. For whatever reason copying and pasting from iphoto or other online accounts haven't worked for me but photobucket seemed to be the magic ticket

Sounds good! I know there is an insert photo butto, but it asks for a URL so what you are making total sense. Thanks buddy; I'll play around with it.

PEAK PORN!!!!!!
Jealous.......

0 gusting 5 again today..

Heat index of 105 today. Maybe I can float my Peak on thermals..

Just in case anyone needs or wants to change lines on a peak 1 and they don't pay attention when separating the front line from the fls line as I did, here is what flysurfer sent me. This is a critical connection point for a few reasons and needs to be right. I sent 2 emails, one to flysurferusa and one to the german flysurfer. They each emailed me a different way, so after more research, the designer of the kite himself sent me this method and said the other method was wrong.

Woohoo, ex-demo 12m Peak II en route!!!!

Quote: Originally posted by Windstruck

Flysurfer 6m P2 secured. Let's rock this joint!!!!

Funny I pictured you doing the Saturday Night Fever :dunno:

Congrats!!

This video loaded after mine on youtube. Dude is sick in the head to be on ice that thin :o :puzzled:

Set up is great with these. Unwind and launch. It would be nice to acquire a bar and lines for all of the stars so they are all ready to go. The only reason I don't is because I'm switching between long and short lines. So in a perfect world I would need 2 complete sets of of nasa stars with both long and short lines. Not likely to happen

Like I said on the Born thread, I really like your vids bro. The music sets the fun!! Damn I cant wait to fly my Peak. Another weekend of NW winds here so no go at my soccer fields. Last weekend was no wind... Getting really old seeing Pink Betty sitting in the corner...

Glad you got to fly your new baby!! Looks good.

Jason - glad you liked the music! My son is home from college this summer. He walked by me last night while I was working on these videos and said "Dad, why are you always putting that cheesy jazz on your videos?"

Ted - most certainly extra points for running down stage extras! :P What you don't hear on the video is me yelling "Incoming!" and the kid shouting "That is SO COOL!" He had been playing soccer by himself as the only other person on the fields. He stood rock still for about 15 minutes with his jaw on the ground watching me cruise back and forth. Fan-boy! :D

We really need "like" buttons in this forum.....

Were you able to find the kite only or complete? I see the landing strap on the 6m too

Peak fans: here is a Peak 2 6.0m vs 12.0m face-off!

I ended up having great winds today, pretty steady at 12+ mph with a lot of 15+ mph mixed in with even a couple of 20 mph gusts for good measure.

I flew my two P2s back to back to compare the two of them. I'd say that the 6.0m was at mildly under powered when the winds were under 15 mph and the 12.0m was mildly over powered when the winds got stronger than that. The behavior of the two kites are very different from each other as I hope the video demonstrates. I haven't taken a tape measure to the bars, but the bigger kite's bar is quite a bit longer than its little brother.

The 6 is highly maneuverable and responds really well to pilot input. I liken it to a turbo charged 4 cylinder rice burner. Tons of power build up in steep fast dives. The 12, on the other hand, is just an all-American muscle car with a big bored-out V8. Tons of fun to fly both!

Still a lot to learn on my part to control these two optimally but I was way better on the 6m today than yesterday so I'm on the way up the learning curve. It took some serious sheeting out and upwind turning to scrub speed before the turn with the 12m today. Amazing depow!!!

Not sure how many different bars they offer for the P2s. Maybe just large and small? I'd take a wider bar if I could get one for the 12m for turning purposes. Compared to the 6m it turns like a Mississippi River Barge. Of course too wide a bar would have its own issues. Not a biggie, but I have to be concious of the bar length when turning on the buggy and bringing the bar across my body. If I've got my GoPro mounted on the up tube for glorified selfie shots I have to be careful not to hit it coming across.

A little more Peak 2 fun on a nice afternoon. The 6m really shines once the wind picks up! What can I say, I was bored!

Another great vid Steve! With that nippy 6m in those winds it would be nice to see some powered downturn transitions!!!

Peak Porn alert!!

Got back off my holiday (vacation ) to find this little (big ) beauty waiting for me!



It's in great shape, can't wait for to get it in the air, should be up over the next few days and I'll post a mini review

Thanks Jason! These are fun to make. My wife and son think I'm off the reservation making videos like these.

Wives just don't appear to get it full stop. My wife thinks I'm a nutcase. My new Peak is safely in the boot of my car, she doesn't need to know I have a new green one

So, second time out with the 12m today, but this time with buggy in hand! And yeah Steve, you were spot on, totally different animal once it's got some apparent!!! I still had a bit of tucking during initial launch or if I botched a transition (still getting used to the barge turning ) but once powered up and moving it was sublime. Winds were low, probably average around 8mph, lulls to barely a puff, but it still kept flying, gave me some nice power and even pulled me sideways a few times, great fun! I was looping the heck out of it during the lulls, and to be fair it doesn't move too bad for a big girl :evil:

I've said this before and I'm going to say it again . A vast amount of what people find to be problematics with the Peak (or any kite for that matter) can often be contributed to pilot inexperience.

Cheddar's 12m would be a good example. It was a kite purchased used. We don't know what the original owner of the kite did or did not do to tune it. They may have attempted to tune it themselves and made the kite more unstable than it may or may not have been originally. Then Cheddar gets ahold of it takes it out and hates it. So this puts him in a suck position because he has a kite, that may or may not have needed a tune, that may or may not be flhiing right but he can't tell due to lack of expirience. So he goes out when he can and tries to get it figured out but in frustration sends it to the NW to get it tuned. It comes back better, likely because whatever the first owner did was reversed by someone that knew how to adjust the kite properly, but still has some inherent "excessive" tip tuck or flutter.

There are very few Pk2 kites out there that have any issues. We've sent back 1 kite out of all the Peaks we've sold and it was a 4m. Some of the early releases required some level of tune but almost every other kite that we've had complaints about was a simple issue of the pilot not learning to fly the kite properly. They are different kites. They take different skills and practice to get the most performance out of them with the least amount of negative flight characteristics.

Time in the saddle will fix a lot of Peak2 "problems". Even just static flying (which I STRONGLY recommend with any kite to really get a good feel for it) will benefit you with the PK2. After a while you just adapt t the new type of kite and learn to avoid or offset the things that make it fly poorly. Especially in the bigger sizes.

In terms of Cheddars hassle. If he wasn't a lone wolf in the wilds of Green Bay and had someone like myself who is highly familiar with the kite to help him I suspect we would have resolved the issue in a few minutes. Diagnosis and feedback of a kite over the interwebs is not the best scenario for this type of thing. If I have the kite in my hands, things become evident very quickly.

By a 6m Cheddar and take some time off to come visit and we will get you dialed.

Thanks Steve. :-)

Robin, every second spent on any kite flying is time well spent and time that adds to your muscle memory. However in this case I should be more clear it's time on Peaks specifically on the Peak2 that is required. In fact a lot of people that seem to have the hardest time are pretty heavily experienced pilots that are used to using certain techniques and skills to manage more traditional dual skin kites. The Peaks, especially the Peak2, kinda operate outside what is "normal" for managing the behavior of a kite. The kite does things that other kites can't mostly good but a few weird ones too.

The next closest comparison I can come up with is the Chrono. I've flown a lot of hours on a lot of kites. The Chrono has a reputation for being not entirely user friendly. But when I got on the Chrono for the first time it felt as natural as can be. None of the issues I've hear presented themselves in any real way and it was a dream to fly. None of the Matrixx's, Frenies, Montana's, Rangers or anything had much of an influence on how that kite felt so good to me. The kite that gave me the muscle memory to simply hook in and go, was the F-arc. Another kite with a bad reputation that takes a lot of work to fly well. Another kite that is one of my all time favorites.

The Peak 1 is much simpler and easier to fly. Some of what you learned on that kite is directly applicable to the Pk2. But the PK2 with it's increased performance and sensitivity to tuning is a bit different and adds some considerable learning curve. Ironically, kiters with little experience seem to adapt to the PK2 quickly.

I'm sure the kite you got is fine as I'm sure most are fine. I suspect Cheddar's was pretty much okay but the tune was messed up.

Maybe it needs a tweak, maybe not. You're in the same boat as Cheddar as you have nothing to compare it too and nobody on hand that can throw it in the air for a few minutes and figure out what, if anything, is going on. It will just take some time to get it dialed in. Like Steve said, it happens gradually and it's really hard to put a finger on it.

Also, if you want to experiment with tuning without messing with the mixer, tune it at the floats. You can really do a lot there by changing the line position of even changing the knot positions. Just be sure to mark where you started.

Look what showed up at my door today:D:D Absolutely stoked!! Now my 12m has a partner in crime. Up to my ears in work hours this weekend so it will have to wait till Monday for it's maiden flight. I have to give a huge thumbs up to Chris Krug for getting this to me so fast! From payment until it arrived on my door step was like three days total. Outstanding service to say the least

Now back to our regularly scheduled kite Porn

@Cheddarhead - outstanding Peak Porn! That is one purdie kite you have yourself there. Once the wind kicks up over 15 mph you are going to have a blast with that thing. You'll notice that the bar in narrower than your 12's and that it will be far easier to pack up at the end of a session than the 12, particularly when it is windy out and the single skin beasts want to flop around all over the place on the ground.

I'll be most interested to hear how you fly with it compared to the 12m, particularly if you are buggying. I have a lot of ingrained muscle memory from steering my 12m P2, a kite I love, but refer to as a barge for turning. As such I tend to over steer the 6m, something that I've really had to focus on to quiet my actions down.

Outstanding that you got it through Chris! All three of my Peaks came from him and I couldn't be happier to do business with him.

Really happy for you!!!