Jared

Well, I did write up some first impressions back when the Jinx 2.0 / Jinx UL 2.0 were first released. http://www.kiteclique.com/guest/focus-kites-jinx-jinx-ul-first-flight-jared-haworth Having flown the UL a bit more since then, I have to say it's a great balance between freestyle and precision styles. Because it's bigger than the Hydra, it flies a bit more slowly. It's great on 120' lines, but feels a little too close on 75s. It's fast on the way to becoming my favorite kite of 2010. Here's a bit of low quality video that I shot last weekend. I've posted this on a couple other sites already, some of you may have already seen it.

Focus Kite Designs Jinx UL

She does know; she doesn't mind terribly, since she's advancing the public's awareness of sport kiting :-D

I can't believe I missed this topic earlier! My wife models with the Hydra for me at the beach

Definitely the Talon UL; it's kind of unfair just how good it makes me look as a pilot.

For the first couple weeks when I first took up the sport, I wished I had one. But with a little bit of experience, I found that I could reliably determine which kite was appropriate for the wind speed. The only time since then that I've used one was during a sport kite competition, to determine if I needed to postpone my start until the wind dropped below 19mph.

I'll echo the sentiment to check with Jason first; but if that fails, I wound up ordering mine online from a company in France. And you can have it, when you pry it from my cold, dead hands Edit: I see that he replied while I was typing my reply. I'm not sure if they're making any more, so the trick is to find a store that still has a few in stock from the last time they were in production.

I think I'd be most likely to buy the Padded Wrist Straps

Rob has pretty much nailed it for me already (sorry to take so long to reply) I do own both an E2 and an E3. I should have bought the E2 last year when I was first starting out, but I went with the Zephyr instead, because my inland winds are a little to light for what I thought the E2 could handle (I was wrong, but that's a story for another day). The stock E3 is sluggish, has a very, very wide turning radius, and while it would do rollup tricks without too much trouble, all the rotational stuff was either far too difficult, or not even possible. Like Rob said, for a $200 kite, and particularly one that's likely to be many a flyer's "first serious kite", it left a horrible impression. Honestly, I wasn't even going to buy the E3, but the Berkeley limited edition was too stunning to pass up. Now that I've made the change, the handling is closer to the E2, but with improved pitch performance. I'm able to do 540s on it, and flic-flacs, and side slides, which were missing with the stock settings. I was very lucky that DaveH and Gardner put the work in before I came along, because I wouldn't have had Rob's patience to spend 2 hours tweaking mine.

Since there's been talk on a few other forums about what it takes to make the new Prism E3 a bit more responsive for us intermediate to advanced pilots, I figured I'd post my results here, with the necessary hat-tip to DaveH and Gardner for the suggestions. So, I moved the upper leading edge attachment point below the APA fitting: Then I moved the lower leading edge attachment point between the batten connector and the APA fitting: Finally, I shortened the outhauls to 21.50" (I think they were originally around 24") by tying a single overhand knot into each line: All this gives the E3 a much tighter spin, and changes the flight characteristics from "Heavier, slower Zephyr" to "Heavier Quantum Pro" I've been having a great time doing flic-flacs and Jacob's Ladders with it.

Mostly I was excited about not having to stretch, equalize and sleeve them. I can't quite justify a mega-roll of LPG to myself just yet.

Given how often I lose them, I think that Rubber End Caps are my most likely next purchase

I was lucky enough to find it second hand on another forum; I just wish it came with a shoulder strap, it's a little awkward to carry by the handle (since it's about 80 inches long).

I had been using the cheap HQ duffel bag, but I recently upgraded to the R-Sky bag and I love it. However, it's best suited for throwing in the car and driving it to the flying field, when it's fully loaded, it's not much fun to walk with it over one shoulder. I also have a padded Prophecy bag for my super-long kites (Prophecy and Total Eclipse)

Week 2: Insync, $179.00 by Bell Chiu http://www.briskites.com.au/index.php?l=product_detail&p=384

Since I didn't see a topic on the Modulus linesets, I figured I'd go ahead and start one. I'm still a relatively new flyer, less than 2 years total. I spent all of last year flying around on whatever 'included' linesets came with the beginner kites I'd started with. For getting the feel of the tricks, the fairly simple 65'x90# lines that came with my Jazz were great for pretty much any kite I was flying. But, since these are value-add bundle-ins, they're not the highest quality. The Modulus lines, on the other hand, exude professionalism. I ordered a set of 75'x90# lines, and the first thing I noticed when they arrived was that the line diameter was much closer to what I have been used to seeing on 50# lines. But, unlike my conventional 50# sets, these have yet to snap. They're strong, even up past the 15mph wind speed, and come perfectly equalized from the factory (nice, since they were the first lines I've had that didn't require some equalizing right off the bat). The blue/red color coding is a little odd. Most of the time, I'm flying in a grassy field, and it seems like my eye loses both the red and blue in the grass, they just don't stand out. When I've got them up in the sky, the combination of the thinner diameter, and the blue line against blue sky seem to make it impossible to see how they're twisted, to try and spin them out the other direction. Overall, I've been happy with them, but I do wonder if I'm spoiling myself for other line sets? Will I be able to switch between these and stock spectra? Time will tell.

Hey Dave, I've had one for the past 2 or 3 months and I absolutely love it. The wind range is incredible, it'll fly as low as 2-3mph (I've seen Paul fly it in 2mph, my skills aren't quite there yet) or as high as 18-20mph. Again, I got to watch Paul compete in Masters Ballet in 18mph winds with his. To make a somewhat off the wall comparison, it has a lot of similarity to the Benson Deep Space, but with a tighter, more precise feeling. It'll do nice, pretty square corners, but you can still fling it around the sky and do some seriously impressive cascades or Jacob's Ladders with it. It sits in a very shallow turtle, which has really taught me a thing or two about giving light inputs for my pitch based tricks. It'll roll up really quickly, one of my favorite things to do is to launch from the ground into a roll-up, fly around a bit, then flare it out and unroll it. Some Hydra footage from my Virtual Freestyle 13 entry

Alright, this is my kind of contest I've been meaning to add a Nirvana to the bag! Here's a featured product from the home page: North Rebel 2009 Buy any size 2009 North Rebel and get $400 OFF any 2009 North Kiteboard!!! While stocks last.