Monday, February 4, 2008

First day flying Peter Lynn Synergy 15

Saturday morning I arrived home on the red-eye from Tokyo to a
wonderful sight--a neat little box containing my new Synergy 15 kite
(You da man Traig)! First off, I love the new bag as it is less
"busy", more robust, and made for attaching a snowboard in the
back-country. The bag also lists the exact dimensions of the kite on
its tag and states the flat area as 15.7 Sq. M, so it's probably just
like the V-16 in real surface area when you account for the
rounded/chopped off TE at the spar.

A front was moving in with the wind starting to tickle the buoys and
treetops outside my window, but the rain was holding off still at 1 PM
so--in the spirit of "better keep busy to combat jetlag", I went down
to the beach hoping to at least setup and fly the kite for the first
time.

With some rain droplets starting to hit, I setup very quickly . . .
threw in the spars and attached my existing low-throw bar to the
bridle (basically ignoring the TE "kook proof" bridle stuff by
attaching a larks-head around the whole thing).

The wind was still weak--especially at ground level, and the kite only
looked about 50% filled, but with the new design I thought maybe it
flies with a thinner profile and doesn't need as much. I also noticed
that (unlike with my Venoms) the inflation point didn't collapse once
thus allowing me to spend all my time setting up the lines and none
holding the inflation open during pre-inflation (with the Venoms I
sometimes prop it open with a sandal or twig, but I don't think this
will be necessary anymore). I pulled the tip adjusters fully tight
and the center 50%.

I launched the kite and it was obviously way under-inflated, but held
its shape very well and filled-in while I maintained back-line
tension. I don't think a Venom (and especially a Scorp) would have
made it without at least a bunch of clapping drama and probably a
bowtie.

The first thing I noticed was that the kite was flying way to stally
and I had to overstretch my arms to keep it flying forward. My
clamcleat has lost its grip recently and I hadn't bothered fixing it
as I'm very well in-tune with my V's and local conditions so that all
I really need to do is attach the lines to the right pigtail knots at
the start of my session and let the huge throw account for the rest.
Note to self: get my adjuster working right when trying a new kite model!

Anyway, I pulled-in my depower strap about 10 inches, tied it off, and
the kite flew much better. My first thoughts? The kite flew a lot
like an S-Arc with the speed/bar pressure of the 840 and the power of
the 1510. The bar pressure appeared much less than on the Venom and
WAY less than a Scorpion (in fact so much less that I'm going to
break-out the pulley bar and try it again). The major difference I
noticed was that the stiffer canopy with more cells held the kite's
shape much better in hard turns. Keep in-mind though that the wind
conditions were crap--probably 7-15, avg 10, shifty, and with rain
picking up. Hardly ideal conditions to test a kite and not looking
like enough to actually kitesurf. With my trim all wrong and my
adjuster permanently pulled in (though still IMO a little too stally)
I didn't have enough throw left to get an impression of the kite's
depower at all. What was clear in the stronger gusts was that the
kite can accelerate and turn more quickly than my V-16.

The wind ticked up a little bit and I decided to give it a try on the
water. Conditions were atrocious--chest-high shore pound, wind
directly onshore, and (with all the big surf lately), odd sandbars,
reef, pits, etc, on a beach that's usually quite clean. I fought
through the shore break a few times and managed some rides of a couple
of hundred yards parallel to the beach, but even with the wind average
sneaking up to 14 or 15 mph, the whitewater and currents were too much
for me to get out. The big rip current was just to the side where
there's nothing but huge nasty rocks downwind so I decided (given the
fluky storm winds and incoming front) not to use it as a ride out.
The kite felt very stable and smooth and I could easily downloop to
generate power when I needed it. Too bad I just didn't have much of
any downwind to work with :-(.

By now the rain was pouring and it affected the kite's performance
some, but not too much. I did notice one more S-Arc characteristic
which is probably due to the low AR--the kite has the same proclivity
as S-Arc's did to stall-out deep inside the wind-window in certain
situations and needed a couple of yanks on the depower adjuster (I.E.
LE lines) now and then to get it moving forward again. I suspect this
was due to the rain and that my rears were too tight, but it was
amazing how similar to the "S" this was.

My time was up--I had to head home for dinner--even as the wind was
finally picking up more. I got some beach jumps that felt somewhere
in between the Scorp (quick lift-generation) and Venom (nice float)
and hinted at some great things to come.

On to packing up in the driving rain, I expected to pack a heavy,
soggy, and sand-encrusted kite back into my bag . . . . And all that
without even a proper first session. BIG SURPRISE--this kite must be
made out of teflon! The kite surface is seriously hydrophobic to the
point that a good shake with the spars held together and the water was
gone. I can see how they accomplished this with some fancy new
material and treatment, but what really got me was that no sand stuck
to the kite whatsoever. AWESOME! No more heavy, soggy, sandy kites
to deal with even in a heavy driving rain :-)).

Finally, as I was about to detach my lines, I though I'd take a visual
check of how the VPC compared to the Scorpion. Something very weird
here: when I pulled the TE/LE kite lines to stretch the VPC into
shape, the "V" line stayed loose. I'm going to have to take a much
closer look at the kite this afternoon, but It appears that I was
effectively flying the kite with no help at all from the VPC. Did I
miss something in my setup procedure? I should have read all those
tags I ripped off the bridle with pictures and instructions on them.
Perhaps this accounts for the very low bar pressure and
deep-in-the-window stalliness I experienced?

Very early days for sure. Yesterday (Sunday) the wind was epic, but
too much for a 15M kite and I'm a big Pats fan so I stayed home.
Obviously I should have gone kiting :-(((((((((((((((((. Today I
might get a quick sess in but it's looking super windy again so it
will be back to the V-10. With 2X OH surf and bluebird skies at least
I'll be having lots of fun!

Bottom Line: This kite will take a bit of adjustment for me and my
custom bar, but my gut tells me I'm going to love it once I get some
decent conditions.

Cheers!

Gideon

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