I was just flying my 4.9 at the park... as usual the winds were a little gusty and my Blade doesnt like this. I know that it is because of the high A/R of the kite. My question is; Does the 8.5m size of the Blade handle shifty winds better than the smaller sizes?? What about the 6.5m size?

Wanna borrow my 6.5 for a few days? Just text or call me to meet up.

I find the more I fly gusty winds with my blade 6.5 the more I get comfy with it. A lot of the comfort side of things has to do with how many hours I've got on the kite. For me it's all about where I am on the learning curve. My Ace used to make me nervous in gusts, now I put it up and get a smile on my face when the blade gets too much for me to handle.

lower AoA setting helps, max AoA gets pretty edgy. the gusts yank HARD on max AoA.

I've not flown the other sizes, but in general the bigger the kite the bigger the impact of the gusts, and my blade is the edgiest kite in my quiver to fly in gusts.

Somebody who's flown all the sizes a lot (Zloty?) would give you much better advice.

Take up BB on his offer, that's a fine act of generosity!

furbo

The thing is, with bigger kites, you will use less wind. Generally, the less windy it is, the less gusty it will be. When using a 5m, you'll be up in the higher winds, where its gusty and winds are rolling all around the place. With an 8.5, and even a 6.5 [to a lesser extent] you use winds that are not as snatchy and less prone to being gusty.

What Baluk wrote. The stronger the wind the bigger the gusts wind speed difference between gusts and lulls.

Scott

One time while flying Furbs/Tridudes Blade 6.5, the wind wasn't even blowing 8 mph, but would puff up every once in a while. It was so calm I had not yet attached kite killers. A gust came along and the handles were just snatched out of my hands. Pop, they're gone. I found out later that I had adjusted the AAA to full lift which makes it very punchy. I feel fine with gusty winds if a little scared. I'm worse off when the winds are coming and going. It won't fly very well when the wind stops. On the other hand, Wexler has been comfy flying the Blade with the lower AAA settings (when he was contractually eligible to do so) with no problems at all up to around 10 mph.