What a great day in St. Augustine. It was windy!!! We got to pull out some of the bow kites and try them back to back. Below are my thoughts on them, but would love to hear more from others out there that rode them. I also got to pull out my "old faithful" kite... my older 6.5 Nitro. I still love that kite!! Here are my thoughts on the bows from today:

8m Sonic:

Positives: Light bar pressure, great high end, good low end(rode it later in the day when the winds backed off a lot and was still powered up), jumps to the moon, good speed(not slow, not super fast, just right), simple bridle, probably the smoothest feel of any of them.

Negatives: Most of these are with the bar, not the kite: don't like the depower cleat system they have on their bar. Made the mistake of starting out at full power and took me a few minutes to be able to get a hold of the depower end to pull in a few inches. Would like a better stopper ball so I can rest more..the current one didn't hold when I let go. Lack of pull through a bottom turn on a wave.

9m Waroo:

Positives: Light bar pressure, great high end, good low end, good speed, jumps to the moon(got a little higher on this one than the 8m Sonic...of course it is 1m bigger too...), better pull through the turns

Negatives: Not really much that I could find out. I've ridden this one in a lot lighter winds too. Probably the only negative so far is I find myself riding with the bar pushed away a lot and that is a bit awkward. Same thing on the Sonic. I guess without the 2:1 pulleys on the bar, it takes a little more to depower it.

7m Shockwave:

Postives: This thing had as much if not more power than the 8m Sonic and 9m Waroo. You could control it easier than the other two. Push the bar away only a few inches and most of the power is gone. Pull it all the way in, and watch out!. Good pull through a bottom turn on a wave, nice stopper ball that works so you can let go of your hands

Negatives: bar pressure was heavy. I knew the 12m had some heavy bar pressure, and didn't think the 7m would have much at all...but it did. Probably not anymore than the Crossbows, but after coming off the sonics and waroos, it fealt 2 times as heavy. I had some good jumps, but nothing close to the other two kites...but this is a wave riding kite, so jumping isn't really what it was made for...

Whoa, Nice Air!!

Have any of you guys tried the Waroo 7 yet? I am wondering how it compares with the Sonic 8.

Ed

Not yet... we had one 7m come last week and it was gone the same day. We have more in 2 weeks. It probably will be about the same in terms of power to the 8m Sonic. Just a guess though...