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Flexifoil Bullet 2.5
Low lift (supposedly) foil traction kite designed with the buggyier in mind. Excellent quality piece of kit though the smaller sizes are renowned for being rather twitchy and unstable.
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Reviews
A Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 review by Kitefan:
I should say a little about me before I add this review I guess. My current flying experience includes beginner to intermediate level land boarding with a Bullet 2.5, a Bullet 3.5, a Blade III 4.9, an Ozone Frenzy 03 9.5 and a Peter Lynn Guerilla 13m. I'm about 11 stone, which is 154lb or 70kg.
The Bullet 2.5 is excellent! It's the kite I first owned, and the kite I learned with. When it arrived on my birthday I was grinning for England.
The kite comes with dyneema lines, quad handles, kite killers and a rucksack. The standard lines are suitable for recreational flying only, and not board use - though I've done both on my set and had no problems at all.
Out of the bag the kite looks excellent, with the usual high build quality you come to expect from Flexifoil. There's Velcro clips on the trailing edge to hold the lines and when new, there's a cardboard instruction sheet attached there also.
Setup is the same as with any quad-lined kite and handles. What they don't tell you, though, is where to put your stake when staking out the kite. The answer is through the loops at the back of the handles. Maybe obvious to some, but as this was my first kite, I didn't know any better.
In flight. It's a twitchy bugger in stronger winds I can tell you! And don't believe a word of it if someone tells you the Bullets have no lift!
On my second outing I was lofted about 5 feet while I had the kite stationary at zenith (It was in my early flying days though, and I have
no idea what the wind speed was). Because of it's speed through the air and incredible turning speed, you can get it to develop quite a
good deal of power in quite low winds. It's not the best fun, but you can work it like a mule and get going on a land board in anything from
12mph! Quite an achievement for such a small kite! Jumps are possible with it also, by taking it through a sharp 180 turn just after it reaches
zenith from either the rhs or lhs of the window, you can really make it tug! Once the wind does pick up you can really get going with it and
upwind progres is no problem at all.
Landing is extremely easy in good/light winds. It can be reversed in flight by applying the brakes. A similar technique is fairly easy to employ if re-launching after a nose dive. BUT when the wind picks up it can be a struggle to maintain the right amount of break on each side and spins can be involuntarily entered into. She's a feisty little one!!!!
I'd say that this is a completely different beast to the Bullet 3.5 which seems a lot slower to turn and as a result, if worked, seems to pull about the same as the 2.5. I didn't find the 3.5 quite so much fun.
Overall this is a great little kite and a useful piece of kit in any land boarder's quiver for when the wind starts to pick up. (can't comment on buggying, it's supposed target audience, as I've never been in a buggy). I'd love to be able to offer comparisons between this and the Ozone Little Devil but I have yet, unfortunately, had the pleasure.
Kitefan, 20/02/2004
A Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 review by Pauln:
I had the opportunity to fly Kitefan's, Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 recently only for
10mins or so but here are my first impressions. This is a very different kite
from my Buster 4.0m. The wind was probably 5mph gusting to 15mph, takeoff was
easy and the speed surprised me, it was very quick up to the zenith. Speed was
the name of the game as the session continued, it was very fast to turn and very
senitive on the handles, nothing was going to keep this little beastie still.
It raced around the sky as if it was trying to fit a lifetimes flying into 10
minutes.
I have to say this was alot of fun to fly static but can imagine it being a
handful in a buggy. One thing I did notice is that brakes reacted very
differently to those on the Buster. If only a little brake was applied this
seemed to strengthen the pull quite dramatically, as the brakes were then
tightened further the power fell off and it could be reversed or landed, this
does not seem to be as apparent on the Buster.
Pauln, 26/02/2004
A Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 review by Paul:
Just read a review of the Flexifoil bullet 2.5 by kitefan 20/02/04 and he says he would like to compare the bullet to a 2.1 little devil, well having
recently purchased a brand new 2.5 bullet and also the owner of a little devil 2.1 I feel I am qualified to pass judgement on the two kites.
I bought the little devil as a second kite to my bullet 3.5 for those really high wind days and this was early in my kite flying career.
The little devil has proved to be an excellent learning kite but as my experience grew and technique developed I outgrew the little devil but
that's not to say I didn't have lots of fun and can remember days when it has taken two of us to harness its power but when the wind is strong
it seems to lose stability, so I decided to buy a bullet 2.5 for those high wind days which has far more stability and gives you more confidence
through its better handling.
I will keep hold of the little devil and keep it handy for those times when you pass a field and wish you had a kite in the car and wont forget
how much I learnt to fly with this kite but summing up it is better to spend a few extra quid on a more stable kite such as the bullet.
Paul, 15/04/2004
A Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 review by mx5alan:
Second chance to fly one of theses types of kite. This time the new 05 version. The new re-designed kites is much improved and makes the kite far more solid during the turns. When executing pivot turns the
wing tips folded far less if at all compared to the previous version. Speed and performance of the kite was similar to the PKD Buster all except the Lift generated, this IMO was very low in the wind speed I
was flying in (<10mph). Kite performance in much higher wind may be better. 2.5m is now the smallest Bullet for 2005. Prefered this new 05 model far more than the earlier version. Black and Gold coloured kite is the best...
mx5alan, 26/05/2005
Click below to add a review of this Flexifoil Bullet 2.5 and we'll add it here.
My first kite was a Bullet 2.5
Jeff, 30/08/2005
I have both the 2.5 and the 4.5 and i find the 2.5 performes better overall than the 4.5 and in some cases it provides more power, just not for quite as long. the 2.5 is a very manoeuverable and fast. ive had it pick up 4 people and throw them a meter forward in strong wind all at once.
Chris, 04/12/2006
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