I think that this characteristic may actually be one of the reasons the Reos excels as a kite for strapless riding - it helps if the kite follows your trajectory wherever you go to maintain contact with your board and provide freedom for sudden or upwind turns on a wave, etc. you don't want a kite that floats you over the dips or during upwind top turns as this tends to pull you off the board when wave riding. It may also be one of the characteristics that helped the guy (Aa) on the Reo get the high upwind angle in the recent Jaws video.
well I thought this thread was long gone but since it's still going I might as well add a few thoughts after finally giving the twintip a run over xmas. So what I found was the kite had no punch when jumping and kitelooping so seemed a little boring. When changing direction it tended to fly over to the other side and stop at the edge of the window then lose power before you could gain momentum in that direction. It's probably something that with a bit of timing you could sort out but why bother when you have a set of c4's ready to go. But unhooking was a different story. Probably not the best for getting huge pop but very easy and forgiving even when they wandered up to 12 mid jump. The other thing I found was although they are forgiving and stable learners tended to do better on the catalyst as the reo very easily gets to the edge of the window and loses power so needs some kite skills to keep it moving and off the edge of the window until you have plenty of speed.
So all in all it seems everything that makes it work in the surf kinda makes it a bit average but still usable in the flat water.
^^^ Yep, Ozone are spot on in specifying each kite -
REO = waves
Catalyst = Beginner and all-round waves and freeride
C4 = Freestyle, wakestyle, and freeride for intermediate and above
Edge = Race and massive air
They all do their designated jobs superbly.
iv'e got a
13 edge
10 c4
6 reo
just need to at an 8 catalyst to complete the set!....
plummet,i just got my new catalyst 8 ,i was upgrading my edges 7,9,11,the seven for the winter nwesters and big swells we get here in the mid west,my mate who sells solely ozone in the uk advised me to go with the catalyst 8,i was out last week in 38knts real gusty,the kite behaved superbly,after about 20 mins i tuned into the speed of the kite and had a ball,it seems to be marketed as a beginner kite but it felt great ,smooth in the turn good floaty hangtime,a couple of the locals said the was a bit of flex in the canopy when the gusts came ,but i didnt feel it in the bar , the fast flow inflate is great compared to my 2010 edges, very happy with the kite
I've been reading through a fair bit of this and can't sort of make up my mind/work out if the 10 or 12 would be good for my circumstanecs;
95kg
Goldie, so mostly 3 - 4 ft surf
6'2' strapped board ( can easily chage feet or ride toeside )
Fairly intermediate on sb and riding it a lot more than the twinnie.
I guess the breeze is mostly 15 - 20/25.
Would the 10 get me going in 15Kt?
Who has these to demo on the goldie
Thanks,
Rob
At 72kg I have 6-8-10 and ride unstrapped short, wide, flat boards
The 10 goes good for me in 13-17kn. Any more than that and I'm on the 8. What I really like the 10 for is those light/marginal days when the surf's good - eg at the start of summer. But if I had to chose 2 kites it's be 6-8 with a fish or nugget for light days.
I reckon at 95 kegs you'd probably be after the 12 as a big kite. See if you can get a hold of both to compare. Apparently the 12 goes pretty good.
Thanks for the feedback
I was sort of leaning toward the 12. Currently I have 13 Waroo I think is 08/09 and is getting a bit, well used and doesn't sit as nice as she used to. And since I'm going the way more and more toward the sb I thought I'd explore the more wave specific option.
Cheers
I flew the 10 Reo, it is not a "light wind kite" even for my 70kg. I haven't tried the 12 Reo, but the 12 Cat is my ultimate light wind kite... it's a whole class up above all other 12m kites I ever flown, and I flew and owned a few... It still turns relatively fast and smooth for the smaller waves, but the real thing is how close it likes to fly to the edge even in light winds...
Had a pretty onshore session today, and a couple of times when I was hooked in edging hard away from the kite it managed to unhook itself. Both times I was using the chicken bone, 1st time leash on flagging line resulting in a swim in.
Anyone had this happen to them before, and any ideas what may be causing this? The chicken bone seems long enough? I have read similar issues on Seabreeze before but I can't remember which thread, and a search yielded no results.
I would check your spreader bar surfingboy I have seen 1 or 2 straighten out a bit.
and bobajob I would go the 12 for a replacement to the 13 best mind you I am just shy of 90 kegs and the 10 does me fine from 15 knots on a fairly wide tail board (airush quad)
Heres the thread your after guys
www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/Kitesurfing/Newbies-Tips-Tricks/Chicken-loop-unhooks-why/
ride c4's and have had it happen quite a few times. You have to twist the donkey dick so it sits straight and is not twisted as you feed it through the chicken loop. make sure the donkey dick is parallel with the chicken loop. make sense? SHould stay in just fine after that
I Have hered the reo gos flat on the water if taken by a wave, and dose not recover???
Truster, fopund this on page 2, may in part answer your question
Select to expand quote
Not true at all, Reo is very fast to relaunch. Unless its gets torn up by a wave it will relaunch well so long as you have some line tension.
1)relaunch fast in flat water
2)relaunch fast in flat water,in between 10m sets
3)is it one of the slowest to relaunch when the lins have no tension after hit by a wave???
so what is the fastest kite to relaunch with slack lines after it's been hit by a 10m set cos I wan't one
I kinda know what you mean truster. I have noticed in smaller surf (not 10m that's for sure) the old delta kites with a fat ar** leading edge used to be able to ride over white water pretty well instead of catching water in the wingtips but I wouldn't go back to them if you paid me. Also the reo like many modern kites have a slender leading edge and struts so maybe you need to up the pressure a bit if your finding it doesn't come back to shape as well.
This review may be superfluous given the thread is 7 pages long and I guess many people may have ridden the Reo's by now, but for what its worth to the wave kiting community......
Kitepower Sydney kindly sent a demo 10m Reo up to Magnetic Island for us to try, and allowed us to keep it for a few weeks until we finally got some wet season trade wind, which is not always a frequent thing!
I rode the kite using a 2012 Xenon prisma 5'8" quad with a single front strap, and I'm about 80kg dripping wet. 7 years kiting experience. Previous kites used with surfboards include 2010 cab switch 12m, 2010 cab Nomads 11m and 9m, 2011 Naish Torch 10m, 2012 Naish Park 11m.
I flew the 10m Reo in the following winds:
12-14knots 20 minutes
17-20knots 2.5 hours
22-25knots 30 minutes
Mushy wind chop breaking on a reef edge, shoulder high waves, gusty cross onshore conditions.
The kite was really quick to pump up and easy to rig. It won't stand on a wingtip for a solo tethered launch, but slide launching it was very straightforward, as was solo landing.
In the air it feels very light, stable and easy to control. No problems keeping it in the air in 10-12knots. Given the previous posts in this thread, I tried my best to get it to luff, and found that it was very difficult, but possible, if you flew the kite quickly toward 12 and then fully depowered it right at the top of the window. I would think that many hybrid C-kites would do a similar thing in light winds, and I don't rate it as any criticism of the kite nor anything that a intermediate to advanced rider would ever have issue with.
In 12-14knots I couldn't get upwind, even with lots of sining the kite. Fun to throw around the sky though. 12m reo may have worked?
From 16-17knots this kite was definitely in the game, and I had a heap of fun with it in 17-20knots, with just a tad of depower pulled on. I'll reinforce what others have said - this kite turns very fast, with beautiful control thanks to the depower and direct line connections, and it really does open up a whole new set of possibilities with your wave riding. I found I could attack waves that jacked up suddenly right in my riding path with very little lead time, waves that I previously would have let go - the kite was responsive enough to be heading back across the window as I set up the turn and therefore keeping the lines tight right through the hack and the exit.
The fine control also allows for a range of turning options, from very quick wingtip pivot turns, to tight arcs and downloops, to wide controlled arcs with speed and power, and again these translated into a whole range of new possibilities of interacting with the waves on the surfboard.
I got one nice squall burst of 22-25 knots for a half an hour and the kite was still a joy to fly in that range, I just adjusted the depower to a comfy spot and it just cruised along, soaking up the gusts and turbulence without any problems. There was a bit more canopy shudder than you would expect from a 5 strut freeride kite, but that is just a reflection on the tri-strut design I think.
Overall a really nice package, the Ozone team have done a great job here and I could see it would improve my wave riding a lot to be using this kite. Didn't try it unhooked nor drifting down the line toward the kite as the conditions were too onshore. I admit to feeling a bit of envy at the southern states and west coast crew riding the 8m and 6m in decent waves and 25-35 knots, but hey, the change of seasons is nearly here and NQ is about to fire up a big winter of trade winds! The only gripe I had was the bar ends, very hard and I could see them putting a nice ding in your board if you weren't careful. Otherwise the bar was well thought out, easy to use, and very tough as per usual with Ozone gear. I also taught one lesson on the kite and the learner also commented it was easy to fly and confidence inspiring.
We have a cab drifter demo on its way, and would love to organise a BWS noise and a RRD religion demo as well, so we can really get a good overview of the current crop of waves kites. Certainly the Reo has set the bar pretty high.
Thanks again to Kitepower Sydney for the test kite.
Andy
