Go on rusty tell us how many peanuts you paid for your kites being a team rider????

it's one thing to get a heads up on potential issues with kites but this really seems like an unlucky one-off that should have been dealt with between you and your dealer. that steve, halfway round the world, should be dealing with this is a bit silly methinks. good on him for trying to set things right but who did you buy the kite from? did you ask them to sort it before going public?

My dealer is sound as pound! Bought loads of other stuff from him and will continue to support him never had any problems with him at all and I am always buying lots of new stuff. He is new dealer of ozone kit and hoping to bring it back to our local area. I was trying to get demos of ozone stuff in our area for many months before he took them on but was never able to.
There is no problem with the kite it just came with one of the bridle arms not being connected to the end piece of rope as explained, I simply wondered if the bridle was connected right after trying to relaunch the kite in lower winds, which I can do! But because the kite is alot harder to relaunch in lower winds than most and the bridle arm was off made me wonder.
I didn't buy my cat that came in the wrong colour from my new local dealer. That was from else where and so was my zephyr.
There is nothing for steve to sort for me! But I am very grateful for his input and the further tips for getting the thing off the water. Many thanks steve.

Received my 9 and 13m2 quiver last week.
Tested the 9m2 this weekend in Wissant (France) with gusty winds between 20 and 25 knots on choppy water.
Level & style = intemediate, old-school
Not sponsored, but Ozone you can always PM me

First impressions :
Positve +
- Has EXTREME boost and hangtime, I am kiting now for almost 9 years and did already some mega airs in the past with my old 2006 instincts but this one is definitly going to take me higher then ever !
- Upwind performance is amazing ! I takes you way more upwind then all the fellow riders on the water.
- Absorbs gusts OK but not as good as the 2006 instincts.
- This kite has a lot of power, I had good strong wind this weekend so could not test the low-end but I did feel the kite has heaps of power.
- Quality is rock solid like you expect from Ozone, no problems with the bridle system here !

Negative -
- Turns slow, and wen I say slow I mean MEGA SLOW ! 9 turns like a 11-12m. For a 9 the speed is OK, but I hold my breath for the 13m2...
- Does not deliver the constant power like the 2006 instincts did, maybe it is because of the higher aspect ratio of the kite.
- Bag is too small, it just had room enough to put the 9 in without the bar. The bag of the 13 has the same size as the 9 so it is going to be very difficult to pack it up I think.

Could not test the water relaunchebility because I did not drop the kite but because of the very high aspect ratio (kite looks like a banana in the air) I am afraid it is going to be a pain in the ass.

Conclusion => For old school riders like me it is great kite, it goes big and you have plenty of time in the air to grab your board, take out one or two feeth and pull out the biggest board-off you ever did (just enjoy the "OOOOhhh'sss" and the "AAAAhhhh'ssss" at a 10m+ altitude from the crowd on the beach )

Had the 7m out last Thursday in all the high winds. Blowing from 22 to about 35 knots very gusty and with very choppy water.
Session ended abruptly with more of my apparent bad luck with one of my nearly new ozone front lines snapping mid air and the kite looping many times back to the water at Poole. Luckily it wasn't the safety one though and no harm done! Bit of a bummer though as a lad had just leant me his north select carbon board to have a play with and never got to test it after that.

Positives -
Kite pulls very fast once you get it going. Steering was quite quick as expected with any 7m kite.
Boost was awesome and fairly stable for such a small kite though when landing I found the kite needed careful re direction to land properly.

Negatives-
I didn't think the power was very smooth on the 7m lots of yanking when gusts hit. Not as smooth as my 9m smoke in gusty conditions.
Needed to sign the kite a little to get it going but then it pulled hard and was fine.

Conclusion -
I've flown the 13m now several times in good winds and I really like it. The boost is massive on both kites though I didn't feel that comfortable on the 7m especially when landing but love the 13m.
The 13m in my opinion is a great kite but it needs to be in mid wind conditions and despite the slating I got for daring to say the kite relaunches crap in low winds by the boys that get there's for freeeeeee
or pay peanuts for them I still say beware if the wind drops off suddenly the 13m is still very tricky to relaunch in low conditions but ok in 15 knots or more.
The 2010 50cm bar is way to small for the 13m kite but ok for the 7m.
In my opinion the edge is great in the bigger sizes but I think I would of prefered something different In the smaller one.

Not saying your lying... but I've onwed three ozone sports for 2 years now, fly all three off the same bar, and haven't had a line snap yet.
So either you're doing something wrong or you've got the worst luck in the world.

Got to agree agree with you on that Beersy, I've had Ozones for years and the only line that's snapped was a leader line on the bar.

That took a whole season to wear through. The bar has improved a lot since the old 06-07 styles.

That's some pretty bad luck.

Well i must have incredibly bad luck cause i sure ain't lying and wouldn't about something as serious as that!
The line snapped.
My mate has checked his lines on his new sport 09 he bought two months ago as an end of season bargin and his fixed front line has heavy wear in and fraying in exactly the same place as mine snapped. Ozone will be hearing about it shortly as he only checked his this aft after i told him about mine.
My fixed front line snapped approximately 2 and a half foot or so from the bar so is it really possible to be doing something wrong when the bar came set up and was purchassed new and arrived at the beginning of april this year? less than 4 months old and only around 20 uses.
Also my zephyr bar purchased with my zephyr in February this year and that arrived with the kite to me beginning of march as new with last years 09 54cm grey handled bar and the small centre hole which i have spoken to Ozone about (lots!) and was told that that was the bar the 2010 Zephyrs would come with despite 3 of my mates having bought Zephyr kites since, and all have come with shiney new 54cm 2010 red and blue bars with lovely v core centres!, came with a cleat on it that the safety slips through now and is very dangerous should the wind pick up as you can't depower it. This bar and cleat has again only been used about twenty times in total as i have only just started using the Zephyr properly over the last two months, while the wind has been low. Guess thats my bad luck again as well hey???
I am quite happy to post the pics of the broken line and even the dodgy cleat for any one that is interested and yes i have spoken to my dealers about these issues and it would appear yet more emails need to be sent.

Bosstyle, why are you posting this on the Australian forum when you live in the UK?
Why hasn't your dealer done something about this issue for you?
If you were unhappy with a bit of the kite you purchased here in Oz, it would be swapped out no questions asked, IF there was a legitimate issue.
I've never heard of anyone breaking an ozone front line, they are extremely strong and rated at approx 800lb, you must have damaged the line somehow?
Cleats can wear prematurely, if they are used when the cleat or trimmer line is sandy.
Its an easy fix though, and once again your dealer should be able to sort this for you quickly and easily. A dremmel can be used to sharpen up the teeth on the cleat in 5 mins!

Post up the pics if you want, (they need to be high res and in tight focus to be useful) but really these things need to be examined by someone experienced if we are actually going to get the issues sorted for you and your dealer is the place to take this, not a forum in Australia. I'm assuming you actually do want to get them sorted ?
Who is your dealer, have you got an email address or phone number you can send me please?

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Bossstyle said...

Well i must have incredibly bad luck cause i sure ain't lying and wouldn't about something as serious as that!
The line snapped.
My mate has checked his lines on his new sport 09 he bought two months ago as an end of season bargin and his fixed front line has heavy wear in and fraying in exactly the same place as mine snapped. Ozone will be hearing about it shortly as he only checked his this aft after i told him about mine.
My fixed front line snapped approximately 2 and a half foot or so from the bar so is it really possible to be doing something wrong when the bar came set up and was purchassed new and arrived at the beginning of april this year? less than 4 months old and only around 20 uses.
Also my zephyr bar purchased with my zephyr in February this year and that arrived with the kite to me beginning of march as new with last years 09 54cm grey handled bar and the small centre hole which i have spoken to Ozone about (lots!) and was told that that was the bar the 2010 Zephyrs would come with despite 3 of my mates having bought Zephyr kites since, and all have come with shiney new 54cm 2010 red and blue bars with lovely v core centres!, came with a cleat on it that the safety slips through now and is very dangerous should the wind pick up as you can't depower it. This bar and cleat has again only been used about twenty times in total as i have only just started using the Zephyr properly over the last two months, while the wind has been low. Guess thats my bad luck again as well hey???
I am quite happy to post the pics of the broken line and even the dodgy cleat for any one that is interested and yes i have spoken to my dealers about these issues and it would appear yet more emails need to be sent.

ozonekites.com/products/water-kites/zephyr

Zephyr bars are NOT red/blue, the Red/ Blue bars you speak of are the newer 50cm bar for the C4 or the contact bar for the Catalyst and Edge, so if your friends have red/blue bars then they are the 50cm bars which are certainly too small for the zephyr.

Unless the air you kite in is full of glass shards then these line wear issues you and your friends are having is not from "just kiting along" Ozone lines are one of highest quality lines on the market.

Peace

Had my first ride with the 13 last week and light wind conditions (10-12 knots)

In my previous post I could not tell something about the low end but now I can say the kites have heaps of grunt because I was almost the only one that could stay upwind ! and that packed with 100kg of pure muscles
Still could not test the water relaunchebility...did not drop the kite once...

The kites are slow but that's something I got to live with I am afraid.
But overall I like these kites a lot !

The kites are not slow, they are fast, they are a race kite, they have been winning races.
Here's some links from people who think they fly fast too.

ozonekites.com/water?source=rssfeed

www.flyozone.com/kitesurf/en/news/headlines/16162

www.flyozone.com/kitesurf/en/news/archive/2010/03/15838/

I think the reason people say they are slow is that they sweep turn, they do a wider arc turn than a lot of kites.
They really suit old school freeriding, big boosting, and racing and they are easy to relaunch, just pull one rear line.
They are not an ideal beginner kite they have limited bar depower, but still have that Edge big wind range for experienced riders who can edge hard.

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Kitepower Australia said...
With good techniques they jump huge and give good hang time but the C4 or Catalyst are a lot easier to jump.

Could you expand on that?

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KnutH said...

Kitepower Australia said...
With good techniques they jump huge and give good hang time but the C4 or Catalyst are a lot easier to jump.

Could you expand on that?

... Firstly just confirming ..These kites are not slow... they are very fast, they fly way foward in the window and like to be flown at speed to get the best out of them.

..Some kites all you really need to do is pull in on the bar and up you go. Norths for example jump easily with out "good technique". As with nearly all kites the more you can hold your edge and load up the the lines the better you will jump. So "good technique" is correct speed holding your edge, throw your kite from the right place to the right place (not to low and not to far), edge hard up wind and let the kite lift you then add some pop off your back foot as you lift off the creast of a wave. If you execute this well the flight characteristics of the edge will reward you with huge air and massive hang time. As kurt mentioned somewhere this kite tends to fly you up rather than rip you off the water. My last sesh on my 13m, the wind came up to very gusty 30 plus knots quite unexpectedly. The BOM reported 35 max. It was bloody scary the power the kite developed the boosting was massive but the hangtime way longer than I have ever experienced before. Screwed up my timing something terrible so the landings were a bit stray. I was getting 3 or 4 lifts by redirecting the kite, something i had not experienced before
I will add landing the kite in this wind was also bloody scary( just ask Lyette, who was trying to catch it) . I think 35knts is the top end for this kite for 100kgs rider after that you can't really hold it. I was getting lofted 3 or 4m just walking up the beach.

^^^ Sick!

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KnutH said...

Kitepower Australia said...
With good techniques they jump huge and give good hang time but the C4 or Catalyst are a lot easier to jump.

Could you expand on that?

C4 for me is like a C kite to jump, you can swing it back from lower in the window than the other 2 kites, just like a C kite. Turning on the C4 is the tightest of all 3 kites, so if you have good technique and feel, ride fast, hit a ramp on takeoff with good timing, you will go huge on a C4 too, but the Edge will hold you up there longer.
The Catalyst turn speed and tightness is a bit less than the C4 and still a bit quicker and tighter than the Edge, it still jumps well and is the best all rounder and most suitable for unstrapped wave riding.