Mobius Flix - Kite review of the Utopia

I have only ever seen the strange form of the Flying Wings Utopia hanging on a wall of stores around the country and never in free air, but thanks to this ones owner Jason from the Up 4 Kiting store in Southend-on-Sea, we now had the chance to put one through its paces.

The Utopia comes in a padded contoured bag with a pocket on the inside for storing the standoffs and a line set and an outer mesh pocket for the comprehensive handbook and boy did it need it. With several sets of standoffs of different lengths and various positions to put them in, and a number of bridle settings to play with, it was getting a bit confusing...ooooh. Jason put it together for us, tensioning the keel and we decided to try it as was... Winds where about 8 - 10 mph, with the kite being rated from 2 - I think 18 mph, take off from the centre of the window was a little sluggish until the bridle was adjusted from the high wind setting. Tracking on the Utopia was very, very precise for a kite of its size and even in the hands of our third test pilot of the day, Bradley aged 6. Cornering was crisp with no over steer, but only required small hand inputs or would snap stall anywhere in the window.

After getting the feel of the kite, my first axle was snagged on the wingtip, but dropped off after a couple of tugs in the air and recovered beautifully, OK, more slack maybe, snagged again and again... What am I doing wrong here, perhaps its me, Neil later had a go and had the same problem. Out came the 6 page handbook of instructions, with dozens of combinations, we decided to set up the Utopia in the all out trick setting. Snap stalls, no problem, even with a side-slide thrown in. Half axle to a fade, needed a bit of effort and attention during the initial start of a fade, but locked in once you got the feel of it, Speed up the kite and just let off pressure and it wound pancake with ease, which was a little disconcerting when you hadn't even tried. Lazy-Susan's where very very difficult with trick line going from almost tip to tip via the keel, being almost in a straight line. Back to the axle, no, I just cant do it, the basis of all tricks just snags the wing tip. While the winds where favourable I decided to get the Gemini out and have some light relief, handing over the Utopia to the back-up test pilot Bradley, seen doing the business above, plus promoting his club on his shirt.