dede2008

It's a full reflex test (and not recommended buy any company) Let the trim fully out so you in max reflex and with full speed bar then apply brake you will see/feel the wing tips start to deflate however in the paramotor mag teat the wing tip of the speedster did not deflate. thats why paramotor mag testers then asked Ozone what is the percentage of reflex in the speedster their reply was: Hi, not the kind of test I would be happy to do on a full reflex wing myself... I believe the famous paramania GT (?) heavy collapse shown on youtube a while ago was generated this way? Full trim full bar and breaks applied.... or was it maybe trim in and speed bar applied? I would be happy enough to see the Speedbar behaving like the video I posted above, on the ground full trim out and holding the wing by the speed lines and see if you are able to collapse or tuck or if it just go past you all in one piece. That is a good sign of so called full reflex prpfile to me, morgy you said you tested it this way, I suppose you were trim out and holding by the speed lines right? As for Dudek and Paramania's, my understanding is that they are both full reflex wings but only with trim out while both will be in non reflex configuration when trimmed in. The Speedster is something that elude my understanding on paper as it doesnt seem to have the limitation of a full reflex profile (use of tip steering in place of breaks while trimmed out and no use of speedbar while trimmed in), yet Ozone claims it is a full reflex profile.

mmm 57 souls reading and no comments? Are all you Speedster owners just fly the wing without any further doubts that when you release the trims it is actually going to be almost as un-collapsable as any reflex should be? Or there are only so few Speedster owners/who tried the wing out there?

Hi, I have Icaro TZ model and I think it comes pretty close to that. The only difference is Opt. II instead of III (but I think you can easily ask for that), as for connectors, you have to choose the type you want when you order the helmet and for iphone I think it can be easy fit with some sort of adapters that you buy separately or, if you have any simple DIY ability, you just replace the radio cable with anything that suits you. Plus the helmet is darn sexy http://www.icaro2000.com/Products/Helme ... n-01-L.jpg

Just a tech question: does anyone know if the Speedster has a full reflex profile in the like of Dudek and Paramania's, or is it somehow different? I know that on Ozone website they claim its a full reflex wing, but I was wondering what their "reflex" profile means as they used in the past the "reflex" concept for the Viper 2 which is to my understanding a sort of hybrid profile. For example if tested with the classical ground handling full reflex test, will the Speedster behaves like the wing on this video? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkv9e6ZYv24 My main doubts are the use of speed and breakes troughout the entire trim range, something that makes me think its more like the Viper than a tipical full reflex? Any thoughts/comments? Anyone tried to test their Speedster in this way?

mmm... good old pocket mirror looks prehistoric stuff? Just remember what you are flying. Fuel monitor on PPG... the next thing you'll want to fit will be a IFR Transponder

;9 Yes I think I got it now, well if it is the habit you need to fix the only advise is practice practice practice (Not easy especially if you still fly Cessnas eheh). I think the best way is to get your brain to learn with practice that they are two different things, and automate your reactions so you don't have to think about it anymore.

Thanks for the (much appreciated) input. I agree, it is bonkers. During my training (on a Revo1 28) my landings were great, and I really thought I had it cracked http://www.paramotorclub.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4078 (I'm afraid the vids been moved, but you can see the comments) But since I got this 26 Revo 2, I've been touching down sooo fast. My trimmers cannot be pulled in any further. It's got to the stage that I dread coming in because I know it's going to be traumatic. I'm wondering if I'm unknowingly trying to land like I used to land the Cessna ie gently pulling back on the yoke, almost trying not to land until the aircraft lightly touches down. (600hr habit) Maybe I need to be a little more aggresive with my braking action in order to utilise the energy. When I was learning PPG, although my landings were good, I was just doing what and when I was told via the radio link with the instructor. Oh, one other thing is that the wing will never fall back after landing, it always shoots past me. I got Pierre (PAP) to have a go and it did exactly the same to him. This suggests that the brakes are to long, but I've measured and adjusted them as per Paramania's updated instructions. Hi Poz, your story tells me there is definitely something wrong with the way you land or learned to land. You probably had no problems with your training kit as it was oversized for you, so you touched the ground like a butterfly. You should not try to land the way a cessna lands, gently slowing down (applying breaks) till the wheels touch the ground. It just doesn't work like that, you need speed to be able to land and flare correctly a paraglider. So, as Simon said, hands up starting at about 50 feet, get some speed, and then flare at 5 ft with energy. The fact that the glider is always shooting past you is an indication that there isn't enough speed in your landing. You have to get used to the feeling of it, at teh beginning you feel like you are crashing to the ground at speed, but soon you understand that the speed is needed for better flaring. I wonder though why you haven't learned this basic rule during training... Were you sleeping over the lessons eh?

I think you mean tracking NOT balancing?? Yes of course, my mystake We use the same word in italian but I actually meant tracking, thanks for pointing it out.

Hi, I have to second nylock nuts: 150 Hours on my miniplane so far and never had one propeller nut go loose. I like the wired DIY bolts, but I guess that is working only when the bolts go straight to hard metal. If they have nuts on the opposite side like many propellers do, then we are back to square one since a chain is only as strong as its weakest point. I don't like to put semi-permanent locktight or similar products because you need to adjust prop balancing once in a while by micro-tightening the bolts on the unbalanced side.

I think its even more surprising to see what pilots watch on internet and decide to share when the weather is crap

This rule is fine if you are not an absolute beginner. But it's really difficult to assess your equipment when you've got that whole adrenaline pumping through your veins thing going on, like you have during your first few post-training flights. You're just thankful that the wing got you back to earth safely. As I said it was about 10 hrs that I realised how much more fun it would be with a bit more of a dynamic wing. However, I certainly do not speak for all newbies. Just me I will try the wrap to see if that gives the wing a bit more ooomph, although I can't work out how to wrap with a throttle in my hand. What size of Revo 2 have you bought? Maybe you should have tried a smaller size for a more dynamic response, without going up to a top advanced wing (Fusion) straight out of training...

ahah, well... I forgot to mention one critical thing but it seemed so obvious to me: your choosen field has to be an uncultivated one! You are not going to mess around with farmers on cultivated fields or you get exactly the behaviour you described Besides, they are useless to us, who wants to takeoff from a 6 feet crop field, except a paramotorist who likes to fake crop circles? An alternative would also be to choose a field used to make hay, you just do the trick when the grass is cut and collected and if you play it well you get back with permission to use it when the grass is short. Italy is full of uncultivated/hay fields, I suppose England is too P.s.: what is a farmer use of aerial photos that might raise interest? Just pride?

Ok, I will explain my technique to securing a site, I still have to get a failure You take off from your usual field, maybe even half an hour or more away, and you go towards the choosen field. Once there you start making circles, playing around. Chances are that the owner and/or his family is there working the ground, maybe also his little kids or grandkids are there too playing in the nearby garden. With a little patience you will find both. While passing, kids are usually the most curious and will start to wave at you. "Perfect! Good sign!". You wave back at them and start doing 360s. If they are not waving first, you do it and they surely wave back all happy. You keep doing this for a few days and soon you'll be a familiar presence to them, some unkown flying friend. When this happens... you are ready for the second move! You will land straight in the choosen field when they are there, take everything off and go have a chat with them (if you are not already surrounded by them by the time you touch the ground). After you have "trained" them to get used to your presence, everything will be much more spontaneous and easy, they will be open minded. At this point it will be very easy to say something like: do you want to see a paramotor takeoff? It probably was already one of the questions they asked, and you will be ready to grasp it and use it to your purposes: to show them how to takeoff with a paramotor! You will now have new friends that you can go visit by paramotor, and the first step is accomplished. Your mileage may vary, it all depends on how well you play your cards... sometimes more than one visit is necessary, some other times you go back the very same day with a permission to use the field whenever you want, but in all cases, you will get there eventually! It all comes down to psychology at the end, and for me this technique worked the best, much more than asking formally or politely, offering money or gifts. You have to focus on curiosity, we are indeed curious beings I am a psychologist, can you see that?

Well done, thank you for your time, greatly appreciated. I am wondering at this point, putting aside the marketing hype, what would the results be for a pilot with a more conservative ( ) weight. Don't get me wrong, you obviously got the right wing for you as per manufacturer's claim, which happens to be the largest ones available. It would be interesting though, and you noted it as well, to see how these two wings perform when loaded at the same wing load - and, I add, one generally considered as proper for that size. For example, I'm 70kg naked and I've always been free flying 26 size gliders, normally rated for 75-95 or 80-100 kgs. When flying paramotor certified wings, I always got 26 size as well, just with extended weight range. Wondering now if I should expect the same figures I'm used to when testing a 26 size Revo 2 and/or 27 size Nucleon (since they don't make 26) or there is clearly a performance difference - glide ratio and sink in particular - compared to both non-reflex 26s and between themselves...

Hey acquatix, can you elaborate a bit on fuel consumption and sink rate of Revo 2? What is your experience and tests, how much difference you found out between Revo 2 and Nucleon on your particular weight/wing size?

You guys miss a very important piece of information here. Of course he is more than capable of flying the Mantra under power. His first name is Chuck, Chuck Norris!

A quick advise for your friend and anyone using cameras: 1) do not play around the camera while wearing the helmet in flight. Better to get it off for few seconds, do what you have to do and put it back again. 2) Never fully trust the 3M tape nor the clips. Use a backup line going from the camera to the helmet or whatever you are attaching the camera to. I use an old glider line in a loop. 3) The camera went through the net? This shouldnt happen. Consider changing the net to a better one! Nice to know the camera survived and everything went reasonably well!

Right good thing you corrected yourself with the last post Simon, as I was almost ready to jump on your double fail (The first one being not saying anything, as an instructor, about the kind of equipment Colmain is trying to use and instead point him towards the check point, in a way encouraging him). Back to the question, Colemain, any basic paragliding wing is 99% adaptable for paramotoring. If you go to any paragliding company website, you will find they have a paramotor version of their basic gliders. The problem is that if you ask the question in a paramotor forum, you will likely get an answer a little biased towards paramotor wings (with reflex technology). Although there are some you can go paragliding with, do not expect too much from them. It all comes down to what your needs are: if you plan to do a lot of paragliding and less paramotor: choose a paragliding wing suitable for paramotor, there are dozens of good ones. If you go paramotoring most of the time, get a reflex wing that you can use for paragliding - but again - don't expect great results, as they are very dampened and they don't give much feedback of the air movements, a must have when paragliding in order to follow thermal lifts. Have fun then but get it done the right way and don't improvise

I don't want to sound unpolite, but someone needs to tell you this: you are trying to use a 16 years old wing. Even if you manage to get it out and inflate it, and for some reason the porosity is miraculously still within margins, you are talking about a wing whose glide ratio is less than 6 without motor, probably 4.5-5 with a motor. My advise: make a good sets of windsocks with it and don't risk trying to do anything on air. Just get a much better glider, there are a lot of beginner wings on sale for as low as 500 £, and in good shape. I just bought a skywalk mescal 2 for a friend for about 450 £, year 2007 and about 40 hours on it. Regards, Dave

Hi Patrick, It all depends on wind intensity. If it's still air or pretty still, you can reasonably be safe in landing close to potential rotor spots. It is when the wind starts to pick up that you can be in troubles. How much and what does that mean? It all comes with experience, but if you are unsure of your judgement while in the air, its simply better to avoid such landings. The good thing about this sport is that you always have a second chance, if you find yourself over.flying the target, push the throttle, get some height and try again, or choose a nearby field and be prepared for a little walk back to the car. Regards, dave

Hi Richard, I dont know which statement you were referring to, but if it was mine stating I've never seen 4 paramotor collapses, then there is little to argue about, it's a fact I havent seen that much collapses That doesnt imply anything about paramotoring safety, though. Its true that a collapse while paramotoring is an event you probably experience only once in your lifetime, but as you said already, its because of the calm conditions you normally fly with compared to free flying. Now, it has probably been said already million of times, but calm air is normally the rule to go flying with a paramotor. There is a misconception about reflex wings for example, in that some people might think they allow to fly in conditions you would not even open your wing normally. That is wrong in my opinion. Reflex wings are great, because they allow you to do more things in the condition you normally fly (you get more speed, travel further and have a wider safety window in case condition become stronger), not to do the same things you normally do in much stronger conditions. This just raises the risk bar to unconfortable levels and one should be always aware of this. Cheers d.

Right you got me worried there Alan thinking it was paramotoring collapses you were talking about. Never seen 4 collapses in paramotoring in the same day (or year, or my whole paramotoring career for that matter Now free flying is a different beast altogether, so everything fits in place. Your collapse looked quite a serious one, of maybe it was just the camera perpective. Was it on Eden 4? What kind of collapse was it? It must have been a really tubolent day as I have flown an Eden 4 myself free flying in turbolent air and it behaves impeccably, I have put myself into quite bumpy spring alpine air with it testing the collapse resistence and I have to say you can throw a lot to it without major consequences! Fun and nice wing all in all! Looking forward your tests!

Hey Alan, any updates on your tests? Did you try it at the end? Let us know!

Thanks for your comments. I was just reporting the conclusion of a long thread from pilots who tried the paramotor (and the rest of us just speculated about it). Mark, your reply was quite informative, albeit, obviously since its your job, a bit on the promotional side.

Hi all, we had a discussion about this frame in the italian forum and we concluded that its well done and great looking, but its not for the average pilot. The frame is made of carbon and hard plastic with a central alluminium engine support. The fact that the main frame and not just marginal parts (i.e. cage) has parts of carbon means that, just like any carbon built equipment, is fragile and will not stand harder-than-average landings (or bad handling for that matter). Its the same with carbon frame bicycles, many riders will take extreme care of them and, in the event of them falling even in the garage, some will consider changing the bicycle. The carbon is keen to micro-fractures in case of bumps, invisible to the eye but compromising the whole strength. So this is a frame for advanced pilots who will never have to deal with bad landings and in case they do, replacement parts will be needed even though they look fine to the eye. We would have liked to see the main frame in aluminium or the like and just the cage and outer frame in carbon, that would have made a light paramotor for everyone. With this caveat anyway, the paramotor is still great and will give the experienced pilot many pleasant flights!