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A big smile on my face!! ;)


Craig Best
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I recently purchased a Rev 1.5.....my first exposure to quad line kiting. The first time out was an unpleasant experience. The kite kept crashing upside down and the lack of consistent wind and a novice pilot caused me to continually run down and flip the kite manually. Add in the temp in the 90s and high humidity and it was a nasty night.

Tonight was the second time out and was much more successful! I read the manual (aka RTFM) and watch the videos. I still landed it upside down quite a few times but now I've learned to flip the kite with the controls. There was much more wind tonight....perhaps too much at times.....but I was able to control the kite and put the brakes on to slow it down.

A much more enjoyable experience!

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It gets better and more enjoyable each time out -- stay with it. You will reach a plateau where you think, "is this all I can do?", then one day you'll have a "breakthrough moment" and it will start to get really interesting.

Like everything else, it boils down to a higher return equal to the amount of time invested.

Oh yeah, the smiles get bigger too! Welcome to the dark side. We have cookies. Don't forget to breathe.

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Try to develop a routine that you can do exactly the same, every time, and most of your troubles will disappear.

That being said, I still wonder how those darn twists got there sometimes.

I recently helped 2 guys with their brand new EXPs. The first thing I noticed was the top and bottom pigtails were the same length on the handles. Top should be a couple of inches or so longer. When I changed them It felt much better and the guys liked it better also.

Be a student of JBs "how to" videos and it will help a ton.

It was tough for me in the beginning. No wind. Too much wind. Too many people around. Keep trying. After about 10 hours or so things will start clicking.

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I went back and watched the line mgmt. tutorial again and really practiced for a couple of weeks. I don't have any problems anymore. Maybe one wrap or two when tying the handles to the winder ( I've been leaving the handles attached lately). No big problems anymore. worth it.

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When you wind the line on the winder you put a half-twist per wind in the line. When you unwind you remove a half-twist per wind, like a spinning-type fishing reel, so if you don't put any extra twists in it when you are attaching to the bridle you should have zero twists. In reality you usually end up with a couple, which should come out easily by turning both the handles together. Using exactly the same procedure each time makes it much simpler.

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Totally agree on the "find what works and do it the exact same way" - EVERYTIME! Making it a habit takes all the variables out!! No such animal as a "perfect wind", at least not regularly, but with practice, you should make it very easy to straighten out any small issues!

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