I keep seeing offers on e-bay for PANSH SPECIAL Ace 6m Red & Legend 4.5m Blue Power Kites, selling for about $200.00.

Sounds like a sweet deal, however I don't want to throw money at a pair of kites that are garbage (if they are).

Have no experience with pansh kites.
Any feedback would be great.

they are worth it! Trust me!

The pansh ace are similar the flexi blade but not as stable or as well made. They are way less $$ however, it is always a debate what is worth it. I have found that to get the most out of one it takes a bit of 'tinkering' I ended up changing the AOA to get some more speed and less lift. It took 3 tries to get ok. I almost never use it, I own MUCH better kites and for what I do it is the most costly kite I own, purchase price over hours of use. Check out the profoils they are going (if not all gone???) cheap as well and in my experience much more stable and predictable. I will mention I have an early ace...

Just debating in my own mind as to get two cheaply, or save the cash and wait for the reviews on the new HQ NEO.
Pansh get now
NEO play the waiting game.

I hate decisions llike this. lol

allow me to pimp pansh...

I have a soft spot for pansh, as they were the kites that first got me scudding and jumping.

yes they definitely require modding. My 5m ace was one of the USD $99 ones from summer 2007, and I played around with it quite a bit. Now I'm quite happy with it. It was my second kite, after a 1.4 prism snapshot, and it remains my second favorite after the blade.

when I got the blade I wasn't sure whether or not it would show me that I'd been flying an inferior kite. After some time on both, I'd would have to say that no, my Ace 5 is not inferior, it's just different. It soaks up gusts way better, doesn't scare me when it re-inflates deep in the window, and flies in very little wind (3-4 mph). It's not good on the edges of the wind window unless the wind is beautifully smooth. Having said that, I can have fun with it in winds gusting from 5-20 mph and wiggling a good 90 degrees: not the kind of wind i like to fly, but if that's the wind I have, it's easier to handle in those conditions than the blade. It does like to move around, and needs to be flown actively.

I don't know the legend 4.5, but if it is like my legends scaled up it is big on traction low in low in the window, not so big on lift, and super stable.

The canopy is the best part of the kite. The bridles are not that great, they are made of stretchy line, not static. the handles are workable. The lines coming with pansh are OK, not like my flexi or ozone linesets, but not all that bad, reasonably smooth and slick and with very little stretch.

They're not garbage, but they do require time and fiddling about to get working well. They rarely come RTF.

If you're on a budget, they re definitely worth looking at. If you have cash to spare, give them a miss.

I have had a couple of older radsails, and they're much worse than pansh, imho.

look in kite reviews for my thread "tridude's blade arrives in hong kong (also: vs 5m Ace)" for a more in depth comparision.

Be aware I've only flown static so far, and only for a year.

hope that helps...

furbs

Pansh kites have well made sails, but the lines are mediocre and the handles kind of suck. As furB mentioned, you have to fiddle with them to get them to fly well, but if you have time, go for it. With careful tuning, my Ace6 flies like a dream, and can hoist me up for super floaty jumps with the greatest of ease. All for a third the price of a Blade :-P

really a matter of time vs. money

Save your money and get a kite that is well made that needs no tinkering after you get it. If you can and you have the skills save for a Flexi Blade.

I've flown Pansh kites and was not very impressed. I would rather save my cash and get something that is nice and has a high resell value.

Scott

Don't forget to consider durability either. Pansh has only been out a couple of years so no one has put these through 3 years of regular use yet either. Meanwhile we know that Flexi/Ozone/etc. are high quality and last for years and years (and therefore will retain more value for resale as well).

That said, for $200 you might as well buy them, fly them, and decide for yourself.

I'm NOT Pansh's #1 Fan !

I think they make an O.K. product but I would like to see them start supporting the community they feed off of.

That said...... You can buy those 2 kites and then sell them for say $75 each when you want to invest in something else. This way you get some flying in now + save a bit longer for the Neo. They won't be cheap, you know ! :wink2:

Yea I know they're gonna be some cash.

They will more then likely be on NEO 2 when I've got the cash.

(Selling 2 dogs, 3 cats, 1 teenager for neo fund raiser.) will throw in the wife along with the others for a straight trade. :frog:

:frog:

I see dozens in here thrashed. I'm glad dp's come in just above them with far superior quality!!!

If kites are cars the pansh's are a bit like a super charged Lada. I go out at any and every chance I found my pansh disappointing the first fly the handles were so crummy I gave up on it and switched to something else. The second (with flexi handles) The lines were so gummy it was like trying to fly with rubber bands and gave up again. The third time I found the kite super lifty, and slow. I again put it down as the wind was gusty. On a rainy day I made an AOA adjustment and on the next fly decided that it was still not right, It sat around for 6 months waiting got back to it and changed things again still wasn't right and pulled out a bridle attachment. I removed all my fiddling and went back to as it was shipped made the repair flew it again hated it and it is still in the basement. I'd rather go out and fly than mess with it anymore. So 130 bucks for 2 hours maybe 3 hours (43$ per hour) My access 6m 800$ for over 700+ hours (I am on 2nd speed system and soon to be third) so 1$ per hour or less. That is my call.

Oh, dear.

Pansh kites do invoke some pretty strong feelings!

I've had 200 hours on my ace since i finished my mods.

I'm a happy do-it-yourselfer, and modding my kite was a real adventure of learning. But for sure that's not for everyone.

The other thing is that my cash flow is rather meager, and certainly not sufficient to support the full flow of my kite lust. So that makes Pansh a strong contender for additions to my quiver. Again, that's not everyone's situation.

The last thought I'd like to share is simply that the difference between a cranky supercharged lada (pansh) and a well-tuned BMW (flexi blade, among many other kites) is negligible when compared to the difference between any functioning car and walking. Having said that, not many panshes come ready to fly, although they have gotten much better than this time last year, when I got my ace.

cheers,

furbo

furbowski,
I agree there "negligible when compared to the difference between any functioning car and walking." That is very true. I have options, I didn't mean to come on too strong there. Do I remember that you had converted your ace to de-power or was that some one else?

No, haven't even flown a depower kite yet, but the "kitestuff" folder on my desktop is filling up with photos and diagrams of mixers and other depower set-up details. I keep meaning to sit down with my mum and a sewing machine so I can figure out how to make my own sewn loops, once I learn how to do that I'll have a go at re-bridling one of the big aces.

95% of my modding was done at the beach while waiting for wind. What that line about boating? "there is nothing so much worth doing as messing about with boats"? something like that. substitute kites for boats and there's my idea of heaven. And god knows pansh are cheap enough so messing up a mod won't break my heart. I'd love to mod my blade, but I want to know it quite a bit better before I do that, I'm sure a lot more thought has gone into the development of that kite.

what do you mean by speed system on your Access?

cheers, bro.

furbs

The "negligible" line is borrowed from another interesting panshkite discussion on another forum, they're all good fun to get into.

The 'speed system' is the connection between the A,B,C bridles and is part of the control for the variable AOA (de-power) I think that the small pulley is used to decrease the bar pressure. The big thing is it increases and decreases the flying speed and wind window size, as much as 'grunt'. I think most depower use a similar system Ozone just names it the speed. There is a lot of force at the pulley and is a wear point. It is easy to replace and standard to all ozone de-powers but some of the big ones. ( the largest frenzy and manta I believe) I don't know if I can explaine it better maybe some one else can do a better job of it!?
Alex

I got you, it's kind of like what flysurfer calls a mixer, I think. Too bad most depowers are so expensive, I'd love to give one a try and see how it works. The closest I've gotten to that so far is the AoA on my blade, and that can't be adjusted on the fly. Never even flown a bar, not to mention a depower bar yet, just trying to learn what i can from reading PKF, good place for it, and it's among the friendliest kite sites on the web, I do like it here...

@csa dead_on, hope ya don't mind the hijack, good luck deciding what to get! tell you one thing, if I were to win the lottery tomorrow, I'd buy a place on the beach in Cabarete, another in Thailand, and start buying kites like crazy, and Pansh would be pretty far down the list, except maybe for that little demon the 2m Ace!

furbs

Quote:

Flexi/Ozone/etc. are high quality and last for years and years (and therefore will retain more value for resale as well).

I can second this. I've had a Skytiger 40 I bought in 1997 and a Skytiger Hi60 I got in 1998. Both have had a lot of hours flying and abuse. The 40 has had some serious beatings from friends flying it, and has been dragged though pickly bushes, dragged across asphalt, all sorts of abuse. It's over 10 years old now and still going strong. Not a great kite by todays standards, but its solid, reliable and predicable.

My Pansh Blaze I have doubts that it's going to last as long, but for the price I don't really care. I can't afford to buy a 12m kite in any other brand, so it works out as a good deal for me in terms of initial cost.