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Hard time getting board specs?

 
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proletariat

Since 22 Feb 2013
102 Posts
Denver, CO
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PostFri Jul 15, 16 7:48 am    Hard time getting board specs? Reply with quote

Is anyone else irritated about the lack of details about boards?

I'm mostly interested in some measure of rocker, surface area, weight, volume, and a few other things, but I have a really hard time finding those specs. Is there any company that's good about that?

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Matt V

Since 26 Oct 2014
462 Posts
Summer- OR Coast, Winter - My van near good snow
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PostFri Jul 15, 16 8:21 am     Reply with quote

I feel the same way about kite specs. I love that Switch has projected area charts like North used to. But even in kites, a slight tweak in bridal placement can make a kite feel completely different with the same specs. Maybe they could come up with an "average center of effort of front bridle attachments" specification.

But again, specs kind of lie to you a bit with how something feels. On a board, the bottom contour, fin placement, how/where the rail transitions from hard to soft, rocker placement, and tons of other nuisances that would be a nightmare to turn into a real spec, are the real features that make a board feel a certain way. The simple of it is that a board with the same published specs down to how much rocker the board has, can feel vastly different than another board with those same specs.

That said, specs along with the shapers explanation would be a great starting point for us not full time at a kiteboarding destination where we can try out boards.

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kitenomad

Since 09 Aug 2016
10 Posts

 



PostMon Aug 15, 16 10:46 am    Re: Hard time getting board specs? Reply with quote

Proletariat wrote:
Is anyone else irritated about the lack of details about boards?

I'm mostly interested in some measure of rocker, surface area, weight, volume, and a few other things, but I have a really hard time finding those specs. Is there any company that's good about that?


North? Core?

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JeffT

Since 07 Jul 2012
238 Posts
Deep Southern Portland
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PostMon Aug 15, 16 1:01 pm     Reply with quote

A kiteboarding review site should step up and provide these specs using common & consistent measuring techniques. That way, we not only have detailed specs within a single manufacture's line, we can compare multiple mfg's against each other.

Standup paddleboarding has the same problem.

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ldhr

Since 21 Jul 2009
1470 Posts
Hood River
XTreme Poster



PostMon Aug 15, 16 2:23 pm     Reply with quote

You guys are funny.
Kiting is a very small industry - who's gonna pay someone to collect all that equipment, pay for the measuring tools, pay for the time to do all the measurements, host a website, pay labor to maintain the data and website.
Only to provide all the data you need to go and copy their design.
I don't think there's any profit to be realized.

I was involved with a magazine kite test - it was very hard for them to get the kites from the manufactures. The manufacturers are not interested in having people test their gear and reverse engineer their designs making it easy for someone to copy their hard work.

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voy-tech

Since 08 Apr 2014
372 Posts
Seattle
Obsessed

CGKA Member


PostMon Aug 15, 16 2:47 pm     Reply with quote

ldhr wrote:
I was involved with a magazine kite test - it was very hard for them to get the kites from the manufactures. The manufacturers are not interested in having people test their gear and reverse engineer their designs making it easy for someone to copy their hard work.


That is a very funny argument - I would imagine that if a competition (who already makes kites) has a $2000 in cash to buy the kite they want to copy without getting access to freebies for a magazine review/test.

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user124

Since 02 Aug 2012
390 Posts
Portland
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PostMon Aug 15, 16 3:27 pm    Kite and board tests Reply with quote

I'd love to hear some frank industry commentary, but my guess is most kite and board companies hate kite comparisons and data-driven evaluation of their products. They rely more on marketing than anything to drive sales year after year. Most annual redesigns are more of an incremental adjustment and new colors, but marketed as massively improved range, upwind ability, pop, hang-time blah blah blah. Not to say there isn't any good R&D and innovation going on in the kite world - but my cynical hunch is that marketing budgets dwarf the R&D budgets for all the major kite brands. Data and honest comparisons would just serve to expose this and would hurt sales as people would feel less inclined to buy new gear every year.

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Matt V

Since 26 Oct 2014
462 Posts
Summer- OR Coast, Winter - My van near good snow
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PostMon Aug 15, 16 9:52 pm     Reply with quote

Quote:
I'd love to hear some frank industry commentary, but my guess is most kite and board companies hate kite comparisons and data-driven evaluation of their products. They rely more on marketing than anything to drive sales year after year. Most annual redesigns are more of an incremental adjustment and new colors, but marketed as massively improved range, upwind ability, pop, hang-time blah blah blah. Not to say there isn't any good R&D and innovation going on in the kite world - but my cynical hunch is that marketing budgets dwarf the R&D budgets for all the major kite brands. Data and honest comparisons would just serve to expose this and would hurt sales as people would feel less inclined to buy new gear every year.


Flippyinin dead on! No more to add to it.

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