The name Rhino ‘06 stands for performance in all respects. It means big low end, huge range, quick, consistent turning and, above all, excellent jumping ability.
The Rhino ’06 offers:
Maximum lift & hang time
Smooth, fast, stall-free turning
Powerful low end & huge range
Light but feedback-rich bar feel
XXXL Rhino `06 18qm and 20qm different panel layout for more lowend
In short, the Rhino ’06 is a well-rounded but demanding kite for pros, experts and ambitious advanced riders.
The most obvious change from our test-winning Rhino ’05 is the addition of our revolutionary and patent-pending CamBattens. Because of the improved canopy stability and drag reduction afforded by the CamBattens we‘ve been able to reduce the number of ribs in the Rhino from seven to five while at the same time going to a deeper, more powerful canopy. This deeper canopy combined with a round entry profile gives better stall resistance, which yields not only better low end power but also better hangtime.
Combine the safety, convenience and arc stability afforded by the 5th Element with the low drag and profile stability provided by the CamBattens and you have a kite that is without peer in its combination of safety, performance and beauty.
Our Rhino `06 XXXL 18 and 20 qm kites have a total different panel layout and optic. This is due to the optimised panel layout to create and even better low end and make the Rhino ´06 XXXL to the ultimate light wind machines. The combination of safety and performance is optimised for a real light wind performance with no compromise.
Interview with Ken Winner, the designer of the Rhino '06 :
What are the design aims of the Rhino ‘06?
The Rhino is and has always been the go-to kite for thousands of kiteboarders around the world. It´s the kite with the latest improvements in shape and materials. It´s the kite that can work in the widest range of conditions. And it´s the kite that has the greatest jumping ability. I should point out that we’ve always improved the Rhino through steady, incremental steps, never wild,
risky leaps. We balance innovation with caution so that existing Rhino riders know they can trust the new Rhinos to be a manageable step forward in safety, performance, and handling. This mean the Rhino is also aimed at the no nonsense rider – the one who recognizes BS when he sees it and prefers to avoid the smell.
What type of rider fits the Rhino ‘06 best?
The ideal rider for the R6 is someone with experience, skill and discerning taste in kite performance. Perhaps most importent, the R6 is best for an aggressive rider who rides predominantly in flat or choopy water and loves big air.
The Rhino ’05 won a lot of magazine tests. What does the Rhino ‘06 do better?
When we set out to design the R6 we didn’t expect really big improvements over the R5. We were hoping instead for fine-tuning types of improvements. Surprisingly, the use of CamBattens permitted us to make major gains. Briefly, In head-to-head jumping tests against our top kites from 2005, riders on R6 prototypes consistently jumped higher and stayed in the air longer. In kite looping comparisons, the R6 prototypes turned faster and more consistently, never stalling
If you want more detail:
1. Lift – due to the better lift-to drag ratio made possible by cleaner, more precisely and smoothly shaped canopy entry, R6 kites give higher, more vertical jumps.
2. Hangtime -- since we’ve gone to a more structured canopy and smaller leading edge, we’ve been able to make the canopy profile deeper without getting too much drag. This profile depth combined with the fuller, more precisely-shaped canopy entry gives more power and thus better hang time.
3. Speed – since the canopy is cleaner, the kite has less drag and thus better speed through the wind window. This gives the rider better speed across the water in underpowered conditions, better upwind ability, and better apparent-wind-induced low end.
4. Power – since the canopy profile is deeper yet smoother, the kite has more built-in power from canopy depth, as well as more apparent-wind-induced power from pure speed.
5. Quickness – since the R6 is a smoother, cleaner shape, it can have powerful tips with a slightly deeper profile than in the past. This combination of clean canopy and powerful tips gives the R6 amazingly quick turning speed. The full entry also helps the R6 to turn smoothly and avoid stall during kite loops.
6. Range – all R6 sizes are designed to take advantage of better canopy shaping by being more powerful at the low end while losing nothing in net range. The idea here is to produce the most powerful kite possible in the smallest, lightest, least costly, fastest-turning package possible. The Rhino ’06 12, for example is significantly more powerful than the Rhino ’05 12.
7. Bar feel – we wanted the R6 to have a moderate bar feel, neither too much pressure nor too little. Too much pressure is tiring. Too little pressure means the rider gets too little tactile feedback from the kite. We also wanted the R6 to resist stalling when oversheeted, and to depower quickly when sheeted out. We achieved these goals through the round canopy entry and finely-tuned shaping permitted by the combination of CamBattens and Vertex HexRibs.
Which design innovations make these improvements possible and what is a Cam Batten ?
When we were setting our design goals for the Rhino ’05, we pegged the leading edge (LE) tube as a major source of drag and decided to reduce both its diameter and length. We reached this goal, and in the process discovered an interesting fact about kite design: The entry shape of the canopy -- always
crucially important -- became even more important as LE diameter became smaller. Failure to maintain excellent entry curvature in the profile of the canopy resulted in poor low-end performance and a tendency of the arc to have too much of a narrow inverted "U" shape. Granted, a kite designer can eliminate wrinkles in the canopy entry by removing cloth. Unfortunately,
this approach makes the entry too flat and results in the situation where a kite that looks great in that it has no wrinkles can be bad in that it has no performance. Simply stated, you can make the entry of your kite flat, but then your LE tube has to be big. Make the LE tube big and you lose performance
potential. Make the LE tube smaller, however, and you have to make the entry curve of the canopy quite round and full.
While we've always known that the entry of the canopy was of key importance to kite performance, our experience in developing the R5 convinced us to work on improving the canopy entry even more for the R6.
After considering and testing several approaches, we settled on our patent
pending CamBatten as the lightest, simplest, most aerodynamic, durable and
cost effective approach to solving this problem. With a CamBatten at every
seam between the tip ribs the R6 constitutes a quantum jump above other
kites in both its fidelity to design shape and its performance. In particular,
there is no longer the tendency of the canopy to wrinkle and fold in its
sharply curved forward 20%. Instead, the canopy is so smooth and true it
looks like it was built of sheet aluminum rather than fabric.
The first question we had to answer when using battens at the canopy entry was how to get the batten to curve in the desired way. Manufacturing battens with exactly the right curve for each position on each kite size struck us as too complicated and expensive, so instead we hit upon the trick of bending straight battens into the desired curve by subjecting them to two forces acting in different directions.
The inflated leading edge makes the batten tend to stand up and point away from the kite, but the canopy pulls the batten back along the curve built into the seam.
Finally, we determined that the structure imparted to the kite through the CamBattens would allow us to use fewer inflatable ribs. Therefore, unlike Rhinos from the previous three years, the Rhino ’06 has only five ribs.
Once we had tested a few prototype kites with CamBattens installed at positions between the ribs, we observed that the canopy shape was not perfectly fair and smooth where the ribs were located. We therefore decided to change rig design in a way that would allow us to put CamBattens at the seams where the middle three ribs are located. This required a rib redesign
effort that eventually resulted in our new VertexRib design. The main advantage of this design is that it permits CamBattens at every seam between the tip ribs and thus gives the kite a perfectly fair and smooth shape from tip to tip.
What do you think of some of the wilder competing designs, such as flat kites?
Like every other kiteboarder in the world, I’m attracted to the idea of a flatter kite, but fortunately I have enough experience with design work to know that nothing comes free. I’ve spent quite a bit of time testing flat kites and have found that they have have several safety, convenience and performance
drawbacks.
Look, I was in windsurfing for 24 years and I’ve seen it all before. Heck, I’ve done a lot of it before. Wing masts, football fins, sails with radical leech cutaways, boards with 8 concaves. There’s always someone trying to sell snake oil and there will always be naïve customers willing to buy it.
Bottom line, two words: Recon, Spanline.