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Decided that l needed a kite the same colour as my Fauchi. Thought about making one but then came across the Peter Lynn lifter. Its a 2 sq mtr kite which will be more than big enough for the little dragon. At $60 US why would l build. Comes in a little bag about the size of a footy. Real easy to store anywhere. Thought ld get Thomas to plank for size. Got the ldea from JH.? Kite unfolds out to be quite a good size. Once you pull out all the bridle work you realise this is a very well made kite. As you would expect from the Peter Lynn makers. Has 8 bridle points all sewn into kite so very strong. Will from Peter Lynn tells me it will fly up to 30knots. Has a velcro tab at the top so your bridles wont get tangled when packing away. 5 tail attachment points at the rear for whatever tail you would like. And on each side at the rear a small hole to release a small amount of air or sand. Lets fly it.? Best Bit. Had a stiff breeze about 25 knots for its first test flight. Tried to inflate it but seemed fold in the middle. Realised that i had attached the wrong bridle point to the wrong line. Once rectified jumped into the air like it was made for it. Kite was stable even though it was gusty conditions. Flew it for a good hour to see if it had any funny characteristics. Did great came down once but that was more to wind and the trees behind it. Overall this kite for the price and what you can use it for is a great buy. I would definitely get more of these. Well done PL.

Test Report on the Peter Lynn UNIQ QUAD Single-skin power kite, 4.5m2 version on 2 handles/quad lines Just for something different, I tried a single-skin kite, this one an offering from the Peter Lynn stable. Photos courtesy of Peter Lynn Kitesports (On account of I was too lazy to photograph my own-same size, same colour) TEST LOCATION & CONDITIONS Inland NSW, on a large, open sports complex Temp 27ºC Wind E to NE, 1 to 12kts, mostly around 5-6 kts. Static flying only. No buggy or board COMPARISON KITES HQ Toxic 5m2 Zebra Z1 3.5M2 The kite is promoted by P/L as being compact, lightweight, relatively cheap, stable, easy to fly, crash-damage resistant, very manoeuvrable and very powerful for its size. It also comes in a 2-line version or a 3-line on a bar FIRST IMPRESSIONS The kite bag is VERY small, particularly for a 4.5m2. (It looks like something you’d use to take a bottle of champagne to a party) Everything necessary to rig and fly is supplied and packed into the well-made main bag; The kite itself Quad 18m x 200/100kg Dyneema pre-stretched, colour-coded lines and padded handles A soft drawstring cloth bag for the lines and handles 2 x P/L Kite-Killers (nice bit of kit) A plastic P/L anchor stake in a well-made fabric sheath. (Sand use only. It’s next to useless trying to shove it into grass or dirt. The HQ version is much more versatile) (You’ll have fun trying to stuff everything back into this bag after flying, although the kite certainly does wrap up into a very small bundle.) All stitching and line attachments are of the usual very high P/L standard. The main (200kg) and brake (100kg) lines look very similar in size, but fortunately are colour-coded and labelled. LEADING EDGE? As this is my first single-skin jobbie, I admit to having a few Senior’s moments trying to find the leading edge due to the absence of those lovely big holes that normally identify the LE. The kite plan form is a low-aspect design, which keeps the span quite short for the area. RIGGING This is quite conventional using the supplied line number matching and lark’s-head knots. IN FLIGHT As expected, the kite fills easily and lifts almost instantly. Once line tension is steady, the leading edge shape becomes apparent and the kite flies normally. Some early observations are; The kite is not particularly fast, compared to most double-skinned foils It is quite agile, allowing for the lower speed The wind window is somewhat smaller/narrower than double-skinned foils The kite won’t overshoot and collapse at the zenith because it doesn’t really get that close to it. Approaching the edges of it’s own wind window, it just slows and either stops or drifts back until it’s back in a sweet spot. Quite neat! (Note: I refer to the zenith as a point directly overhead the flyer) This 4.5m2 pulls very hard in gusts (10-12kts) and is happier when it’s kept moving. Pull is at least equal to the HQ Toxic 5.0m2 Tight turns are best made with just a light touch on one brake. Main line pulls produce a much slower, wide and smooth turn Backing down to the ground is very easy and controlled using the brakes Reverse launching was easy I tested turbulence behaviour by standing in the lee of a large light tower just upwind of my flying position and this caused the occasional tip tuck which easily un-tucked itself with a tug on the lines Overall, it was not quite as stable as the delightfully mild-mannered Zebra Z1 3.5m2 Pumping the lines to keep it up in between soft gusts had markedly less effect than with a double-skin foil The kite showed little or no lift at the zenith, due mostly to the slightly narrower wind window MEETING PL’s CLAIMS Now that I’ve flown the kite, I thought I might match up my experience with the claims P/L have made: Virtually indestructible Pretty much correct. You can dive it straight into the ground at any speed and it just crumples up briefly, then is ready for an easy reverse launch Incredible wind-range. Not sure about this claim. It seemed to behave much the same as any double-skin foil with regard to pull vs. wind speed variations Supremely easy to fly. Overstated a bit. It is easy to fly, but nothing to get too excited about Great performance, more pull per size than any comparable ram airfoil while needing much less wind. The kite did pull very hard in very light conditions, although truly objective testing would be needed to see if it really out-pulled an similar sized double-skinned device at the same wind speed A lift to drag ratio that is easily equivalent to modern foils, excellent handling and instant power. Yes. The kite certainly powered up very quickly in a gust No overflying, no collapsing or luffing, ever. Not quite, P/L. Any turbulence in very light conditions will induce mild tip folding, but it certainly didn’t want to overfly FINAL OBSERVATIONS Is it suitable for a beginner? Certainly, although there are perhaps better beginner options like the Skydog Power-Foil, Zebra Z1, HQ Beemer, etc.. Is it suitable as a static fun/workout kite? Absolutely! It does fly well, inland or coastal, where it’s lightness and the tiny Pack make it a must-carry anytime. Not too good for jumping Is it useful as a buggy engine? Yes. So long as you can live with losing some wind window width. It certainly pulls hard at lower angles and has very low lift at the zenith, which is safe. On a buggy trip, it’d be very easy to carry one as a compact, spare larger kite in case the wind drops

The Peter Lynn Vapor currently at the time of writing this is most likely the best-known race kite, however when I first started flying the Vapor it was the new kid on the block. After years of flying a large variety of race kites I consistently find myself coming back to the Vapor for it’s predictability and ease of use resulting in much more confidence in flying the kite in its upper wind range. To really get to know how a race kite performs you really do need to fly it at its upper wind range as they just come alive. Lets start with the Kite Bag, it’s simple and I love it. It looks nice, it lists the kite and size on both the front and sides which is great when sifting through a pile of them and it breathes via a mesh window on the side of the bag giving moisture collected in the sail/canopy somewhere to escape. The graphics of the Vapor have been cemented in the minds of many race pilots throughout the world with its bold top-skin colour scheme that quite shines through and the distinctive splash of colour on the bottom white skin on most Vapors. The colours whilst highly contrasted in this edition of Orange, Blue and White also complement each other stunningly in the sky. The shape of the canopy is rather interesting, in the air it looks like a regular race kite with a uniform shape and it continues this look somewhat when laid out on the ground. However once you flip it upside down and take another look there’s a very distinctive trailing edge to wingtip contour that actually makes the kite look much wider in the middle than what it looks like in the sky. Compared to some race kites, laid out upside down it nearly looks like it’s verging towards a mid-aspect kite. However the look of it being lower aspect completely disappears once in the air. The Vapor also has quite a considerably open leading edge, which makes inflation and bringing the canopy up to pressure really quick. I’ve found the power delivery of the Vapor coming out of a corner is produced much quicker than some kites that take a noticeably longer distance to build their power. The bridle on the Vapor compared to the older generation of race kites is quite minimal and nearly all the connections are bridle line spliced in to itself and looped. The result is the kite’s bridle no longer catches on itself anywhere near as much as a cheaper conventional bridle that’s just knotted and stitched. Some will argue the benefits of reduced drag, I see the reduction in bridle complications during a kite luff or mishap a bigger winner. Bridle points on the wingtips are fully reinforced and across the trailing edge the bridles start about an inch in from the trailing edge. The rest of the build is well finished, both inside the kite and out, and includes the standard little things like dirt-outs in the wingtips etc. Like most performance kites however it's built incredibly well technically, however it's also built very lightly and leans towards performance over longevity. Less bridles, lighter bridles etc will all lead to the kite needing adjustments in the future. Now what makes this kite so special is it’s flight characteristics, it’s power and how it delivers that power to you. The Vapor in its lower to mid wind range is an incredibly easy kite to fly, in fact I would say it’s probably the easiest low-wind race kite that I’ve flown personally. The kite is incredibly forgiving for a race kite and if you brake input isn’t 100% accurate, even if isn’t 80% accurate the kite will still fly and forgive you in low winds for those errors. So whilst you may not get the best performance out of the kite, it is s a kite someone unfamiliar with race kites can pickup and fly, as their skills progress so does the reward in performance that the kite delivers. However typically we don’t fly race kites under-powered, and it’s in the kite’s upper wind-range that it really comes alive. The kite is incredibly stable for a race kite but that’s not to say it’s boring, infact its stability is one of the most exciting things about this kite because it gives you the confidence to push further and further in to it’s upper wind-range limits. Being slightly over-powered on a Vapor is an exhilarating pleasure, unlike flying it underpowered you can’t make large mistakes however the kite will forgive those little inadvertent mistakes you may make that with other race kites have consequences. The Vapor heavily forgives a lot of those little errors in judgement and then when you correct yourself the kite continues to deliver an amazing flight experience. The power delivery on a Vapor in its upper wind-range is explosive, like most race kites. However the explosive power is delivered to the pilot in a controllable manner and not a result of the kite surging and moving around erratically. The kite holds incredibly well, and when those 3/4/5knot variable gusts hit you at high speeds instead of the kite bouncing around it continues to hold fairly steady and just produces more power at the handles. The result is more confidence to keep pushing harder when those little wind increases hit. Pushing the kite to the edge of the window when sliding against it yields in a drop in power, but rarely with the right amount of brake input does the kite shoot out of the window. This gives confidence in slowing down for turns much later and closer to the mark, coming out of the turns the Vapor builds power very quickly over a significantly shorter distance than a number of other race kites I’ve flown. Overhead the kite is controllable, making upwind turns somewhat a more predictable event than kites that suffer when not moving through the window at high speeds. Overall this is a very controllable, well rounded and predictable race kite. I’ve never felt the design of the Vapor was the most efficient, the fastest, the most cutting edge for speed or upwind ability, however I’ve always felt that the characteristics of the kite have given me the confidence to try and go faster, try and push further and try to hold on longer. This has always resulted in me flying faster on and on the edge for longer than if I was on a kite I trusted less. The Peter Lynn Vapor was the race kite for nearly a generation of kiters, for many it will be their first and last race kite they ever fly with, for those of us who have the luxury of flying many kites it makes you appreciate just how good this kite is.