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Three good sessions under my belt, and the kite is all it is cracked up to be, in my humble opinion. To start off, I only kite in the ocean, and the kite is a bit of a tow-in-vehilcle for me as much as anything, to pull me into the waves, and provide power for carves as necessary. I don't do many tricks except rolls (when strapped), and I ride strapless mostly, which is the only way I've used this kite. I can't testify to jumping on the Switchblade, as such. I like the bow kites for surfing, they are like a throttle on a jet-ski, with the ability to go from zero power to full bore. I have had a Xbow 16 for 10 weeks or so, and ride it a lot.
These were the gustiest, meanest, side-off winds I've ever encountered, ala Hurricane Wilma, and the kite ate the gusts like crazy. The power delivery in these conditions was very smooth, and the kite wanted to overfly really badly in some of the brutal gusts, but a flick of the bar to turn it back to the window to keep it moving was all it takes. Had to be quick, though, almost stalled several times. Dirty, dirty wind.
She sits a bit deeper in the window than the crossbow, and as a result, seems more stable and better in the gusts. The power delivery is also a bit smoother, as the kite is a little less likely to run to the edge of the window, except in the total hell gust. Flying across the window, the kite moves really, really fast, with an incredible power ban with the bar pulled in.
I removed the stopper ball (useless) and put on a slingshot screw ball, but in these conditions, I was sheeting the bar the full range of the depower. In, out, in, out, in, out. The only way to manage...
In a few huge gusts, I pushed the bar away quickly from full power to zero power, in the power zone, and no inversions, nothing even close. This is a big advantage to me, I don't want to try to weed out an inversion with sets pouring on my kite in the water. The xbow scares me like this a bit, at the upper end of its range. This inversion thing needs to be solved on that kite. If you like to fly your kites really hard and fast (which I do) and not park them, then you don't want to ride an Xbow too overpowered. When over-powered, you kind of have to park it and just hang on until your ready to jump, there's not much choice. The jumps are fun, but there's a lot more to kite flying than just park it and jump, IMHO. A well-sined kite for power is just a magnificent thing, and the Swithblade does this much better in its proper wind-range.
This kite is tuned better than the Xbow. No extra knot is needed, and the middle knot is the best attachement. The kite is extremely sensitive to over-sheeting, worse than the xbow. I know, because the first thing I did was add a knot, and the blade wanted to stall terribly when I pulled the bar in. Middle knot on the blade with no added knows, but i do recommend adding the 4th knot on the Xbow closest to the kite...
The kite is more responsive in turning when the bar is pushed away than the XBow. This is another big plus. The Xbow turns painfully slow depowered, but the Swithblade is much improved. Part of the problem with the Xbow is that when you are nuked and the kite is diving (say from a big jump), you have to pull the bar in to turn to take the kite out of its dive. This can be scary in top-end winds. Already lit on landing, and you still have to pull the bar in or your kite will slam the water. The Switchblade is much easier to pull out of a dive while depowered.
These are just initial comments. The kite really rocks, I think in a few sessions I can say this is my all-time favorite kite, and I buy a lot of kites. I am keeping my favorite c-kites for flat water (I really don't think I'd like a bow for flat-watering), but in the surf, this Switchblade is the *!#%& SHIZNIT!!!
SilverBullet
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