Hopeless in Hamamatsu

Not enough room in the car to take a board but forecast for no wind anyway so that was fine ...

I did, however, take my new Navigator bar that arrived from Ricardo of ripsessionkites.com like, 10 minutes before we were due to leave - perfect timing! - and also took the Synergy 19 & 12. Just in case.

Friday was crap. Saturday had some wind though ... and MASSIVE waves that had been whipped up by the passing typhoon - thank god I didn't have a board or I might have tried to get out there :D unpacked the 19 and set up with the Navigator bar ...

Coming from weeks of LEI flying, at first I found the bar pressure heavy and the turning slow ... until I got back into Arc Mode - a little sheeting in and pulling the bar will whip the kite around nicely. Get some speed into it to keep it lively. Don't sheet in too far for too long ... ah yes, know I remember! Soon had the Syn 19 whipping around nicely! Some great scuds and jumps but really, the wind was still too light ... maybe 12 knots at most. Good to test the light wind annoying habits of the arc on the Nav bar though ;) spent about 2 hours noodling around.

Landing the kite by trimming for power, flying slow as I could to the edge of the window and stalling the kite, then letting it power up a tiny bit and bouncing back until it was directly downwind, the unhooked and dropped the bar ... perfect flagged landing, no twisting!

To review the Navigator ...
• Well designed bar; nice attention to little details, like the recessing the line tidy bungy loops & being able to change the bar size.
• Safety through the center of the chicken loop - awesome!
• The Ozone Megatron-esque safety - awesome! Although looking at the leash that has the Zero7 red hat, I'm wondering if the Zero7 bars couldn't be modded like that ...
• Double depower line, spinning head and cam cleat trim - very nice, works well and should be bullet proof, although I'm a little worried about the result of long term stress on the spinning heads erm spinning parts - we'll see. A mile of depower.
• Bar foam felt weird - too smooth ... I like the rougher Zero7 foam better ... and the foam around the depower line's metal runner through the bar seems poorly trimmed - like a bit of an afterthought. I'm betting it'll get mangled pretty soon and be a moot point though. I preferred the bolder colours of the Zero7 too ... the curved line through the foam is not just a design element; it's harder than the other foam and gives you a good feeling for where you park your hands. Meh, I know what I mean ;)
• Power lines have the V some way up the lines, with the front line safety kind of like the Zero4 ... seems to work nice - the kite flattened out a lot less in moments of low airspeed and held a stable shape much better in turns etc. Perhaps a bit more responsive to turning inputs when not moving compared with the Zero7. Kite can still invert though, when I intentionally flew it fast past the edge of the window at about 11 o'clock (I was trying to get the kite as out of shape as possible to see how much of a difference the bar made) ... the kite sank down and inverted to land LE down and I depowered then walked toward the kite to flip it over - no problem. Also, just once, the kite went to the RHS of the window and stalled and the safety line fell through the metal ring and the kite REALLY started to get out of shape ... as it was out over the breakers (beach was narrow today) I jerked the center line to recover it. So I think it's a good thing.
• Line extensions ... hmm, not sure. By that I mean, not sure if I'd notice a difference :D
• Adjustable stopper is pretty good but I'm wondering how much utility it'll actually provide ...
• Didn't like : heat shrink = LOL ... nuff said!
• Didn't like : the big ugly knot that's hidden under the neoprene booty that covers whatever is going on behind the cam cleat ... nasty! Spoils the smooth lines :)
• Didn't like : like I said, the wishy-washy colours ... FIRE TRUCK red and BOTTOMLESS PIT black please!

Great bar, looking forward to piling the hours on it ... again, massive thanks to Ricardo at ripsessionkites.com (yes I'm pimping!) for the excellent service and taking care of me!

PS. Wife called the courier and they just delivered my Speed 2.5 19 Silver Arrow! Now to unwrap ... OMG it's Christmas!