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Piano (Elliott)

DESIGN/CONSTRUCTION
The Piano is very well made, with good quality sewing and straight double folded seams. The sail is nicely designed with curved panels and is fairly flat with little depth even on the trailing edge. The trailing edge is held tight with short GRP standoffs and wingtip pockets. The nose is thin and well finished. The connectors re Elliott's own make. The external standoffs have to be watched as they move along the spreaders. There is no reinforcement at the top spreader/spine junction. The carbon fibre is fairly flexible. There is no leech or trick line.

FLIGHT QUALITY
It was difficult to make the Piano's wing-tips grip a hard surface to stand up. The kite flew stably but care was needed not to over control the kite and to keep it tracking straight. It over steers slightly when exiting a turn. Angular turns were clean but not perfectly sure, but it spins very tightly. It stops well if you move forward quickly to keep pressure out of the sail. It showed a tendency to lose balance when stalled but this was easily corrected.

FREESTYLE
A standard axel is very easy. The Piano has a tendency to axel slightly tail down, but it recovers itself quickly. Initiating an axel is simple and does not require too much nursing. Rolling and double axels are also easy. A half-axel is fairly easy, although the kite as a tendency to go nose up if taken too fast. The axeI takeoff is again easy, but the Piano really impressed us with its flat spins and 540s. The kite bellied out well, turning very flat before popping up again and flying if. The Piano will pop into a turtle and descends the window slowly in a flat position. It was happy with pancakes but not with yo-yos - much more difficult to achieve. No problem for the coin toss.

The Piano is a true beginner's trick kite. It behaves well when not doing tricks and is a pleasing kite to fly. The kite's aptitude for stopping made it a good starter's trick kite, indeed it showed good ability in almost all the tricks attempted. A trick line would prevent many line wraps.