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I got a Crossbow one for my daughter last year, about a month before she became a fully fledged teenager when kite flying suddenly took second place to going out all night and staying in bed all day. The build quality of the crossbow is excellent but I would say for landboarding that some extra padding could be added to protect the kite's leading edge when it is on the ground. The bar is a good build quality but a criticism of the crossbow bar is its layout. There are too many lines, the attachment for the safety leash is a long way down and requires a long leash. This issue appears to have been resolved on newer models. The kite and bar comes with a ruck sack. The bar, lines and kite all fit into the bag with extra space for safety equipment/wet suit and a pump can be securely attached to the bag. Cabrinha kites have a valve on the leading edge and to pump it up a normal cone fitting can be used but if you can get the screw on fitting pumping up the leading edge is much less frustrating. Setting up the kite is straight forward but I suggest paying particular attention to the bar and ensure all lines are separated and laid out as all the bits and pieces attached to the bar make it easy to to think no lines are overlapping when in fact they are. The lines are colour coded and one line has a larks head loop and the other a knot so you can't get your lines mixed up. Once set up and hooked in it's time to launch! For landboarding there will always be a time when the kite crashes and has to be self launched. This is easy with the crossbow as it scuds along the ground to the edge of the wind window and rolls up onto its wing tip. A gentle tug on the back line and up it goes. As I weigh 11 stone this is a small kite for me but the area I fly in is prone to gusts and a considerable amount of turbulence. In the strong winds I have struggled to find a kite that deals with the gusts and turbulence well enough to stop me from face planting all the time. We all read about kites that can deal with gusts but we have to be careful with interpreting what is meant by it as gusts on the coast are totally different to gusts inland. The 7m crossbow has been flown in some really horrible winds with a constantly changing wind window, windspeeds changing from 20 to 35 mph in an instant. With a fixed bridle kite you get the inevitable collapse and reopening and if you don't release the bars and let the kite killers take over you're sniffing the ground like a dog. Not with the Crossbow 7. A bang as the wind speed suddenly changes a quick push of the bar out towards the kite and the power goes and your still up on the board with the kite in the air. In other words the depower is very effective. The kite flies quickly and turns very, very fast so don't use it to learn how to kite loop in the air! Horrible winds aside this is a good friendly kite to learn how to fly LEIs. Many landboarders worry about using depowerables and their size has alot to do with it. For an adult this is a very good storm kite and a friendly kite to learn on. Not much pull in 10mph but it's depower and responsiveness make it a very trustworthy kite that with the right wind allows you to do a whole host of tricks if you want to do them. It gives you confidence! By : kitedonkey

I bought this kite to begin to practice what I had learned in lessons. The kite was purchased with bag, bar, lines, and pump included. The build quality and durability of the kite is very good and stood up well to two weeks of use on Maui with no signs of wear. The 2007 Omega is the first kite in the Cabrinha lineup that included the most recent inclusion of tougher construction. This is most evident in the material on the leading edge and the stitching used. Setting up the kite is easy with the Sprint single point inflation which includes a one way valve. The lines and connection points on the kite are all numbered and color coded. The kite is easy to launch and fly and handles gusty winds well with sheeting out the bar as you feel the gust hit the kite. The center lines have a pull - pull system for tuning the power where the red ball is pulled for less power and the black ball is pulled for more power. This was a big help on a really strong wind day when I needed to back off the power some from the factory setting. The kite turns fast but held well at 12 while I put on the board for water starts. With the turning speed it was easy to generate power as needed by working the window. The kite re-launches from the water really easily and many times re-launches itself. The kite bag is well made and has large expanding mesh ends that allow for storage with inflated struts (which also have close off clamps from the leading edge). The bag also has enough room without the extension of the ends that the kite fits in snug for compact traveling. The bar is a metal alloy with a center mounting on top of the bar for the center lines to pass through. It worked well for me, but I have heard that some don't like this set up and prefer the more expensive carbon fiber bars with the center hole. The bar, kite and lines can be set up to fly 2 to 1 on pulleys or 1 to 1 without pulleys. I flew it only in the 2 to 1 from the factory setting. The lines are 22 meters long in total with 15 meter lines and 7 meter extensions. I did all my flying at the full 22 meters but it is nice to have the option of using shorter lines. There are a lot of line and harness extensions so if one wears out it is easily replaced. Overall I'm really happy with the kite's performance and durability. By : Dave_5280

I recently went on work experience to a sail makers/repairers and fixed a cabrinha helix as part of it. The vertical seams for the air pockets had split. As a result of this I no the kite pretty much "inside out" as far as structure goes. And I can say that whoever had this kite before had used it a fair amount. The seams were well stitched into the upper and lower skins; they had just split in the "equalisers," (the holes that allow the air to move between cells. Having never flown any other traction kite before I had nothing to compare it to, but it looks very slick. It is bright yellow/green and it has the cool carina "c" in the middle. Judging by pictures of other kites on the internet I would say that it had quite a long, thin aspect, giving it a huge presence for such a small kite. The first time up was before the kite was repaired, and it wasn't very windy so it doesn't count, but compliments to the kite as it would stay in the air even in light airs (a compliment to such a small kite) The kite was the only part in for repair; there were no lines or handles, so we made some of both. We used some 1.6 mm Kevlar line for both power and brake lines, and made some very Gucci handles out of a white fibreglass batten and some black grip tape- they were then referred to as the wands. However we didn't no what brake lines were for, so we just tied the brake bridal to the power bridal and flew it to line. the lines were not exactly the same lent , so we shortened one with a simple double figure8, only to discover that Kevlar doesn't like to go around corners that sharp- during a power-up one snapped at the knot- luckily the pilot was laying down(more on that later) First (real) flight Blowing about a force three according to wogz (he joint owns the sail repairer.) we used a beach on angelsy island with a name that I can't say or spell. First impressions were f*** I this thing am cool. I didn't any anything about wind windows, but even in that weather I worked out that to get back up the beach after 2 minutes of flying you had to have the kite above you or next to you. As we were flying statically, we powered up by sending the kite into one of these sport kite style spirals, enough power to keep your feet skidding (or scudding) down the beach. However I did think that the power came in lumps and didn't trust this or my feet as much as I could have done. Second flight We found a cunningly arse shaped hole at the beach and discovered a new way of being shot into the air: lie with your arse in the hole, dig your heels in and power up with the kite near to the ground. N.B keeps your arms straight otherwise power is lost and you end up on your arse again! As the kite powers up you literally stand up- very Michael Jackson! However if you power up too much you ended up running after it as the Welsh bracken isn't good for scudding! I also used it on a skateboard in a medium breeze, only to discover that the kite pulled well, smoothly accelerating, breeze was perfect, its just the kite seemed to be much more mellow and sluggish. I put this down to the apparent pull on the lines being reduced as I was moving with it; its just it is here that the kite shows its small size. Third flight Light/medium airs. I felt the window wasn't reduced considerably, but that occasionally the kite would randomly stop pulling and turn into a pile of nylon floating down to the ground. Extremely frustrating. To conclude: ~light airs this is a pain in the ARSE ~medium airs+ it is fantastic-as long as you keep it moving ~feels very controllable, I would take this out in anything that looks threatening/is stupid ~not the best puller, but a very good static fly. ~it will randomly luff ~it can overly slightly-but I don't think this is a problem ~it hasn't been proved but it feels as if it will lift you nicely. As far as value for money goes I couldn't give you any sort of opinion as I cannot find a price anywhere. Lines and handles are the same. But I can say that if you crash a lot you will do it some damage. If there were a category for it would go in between beginner and intermediate. By : j-)