A lot of bars from most major brands easily exceed the 500 Euro mark nowadays. And some of us don’t even prefer these bars. So a very common question is Can I mix up a bar from brand A on a kite from brand B? A quite interesting and easy way to safe some money, Since there are alternatives which are not even 300 Euro’s .
We wrote about it before but again we shortly sum up all details. From obvious (and agreed on) to more tricky (and less unanimous) to make sure that your kite will fly as it is intended to:
Make sure the original and the alternative bars have:
- The same amount of lines (usually 4 and get some pig tails for a few euros to get the knots right, if necessary)
- The total length of the lines (every couple of meters difference gives a clear difference in reaction time for example)
- Roughly the same width of the bar (usually not big of a deal, but don’t be too far off. In general a bigger kite works better with a bigger bar)
- The same safety system (or advisable to have a single flag out system)
- F-one standard bar hasn’t got it, but most major brands from roughly 2015/2016 onward have it.
- Same split point? That isn’t so clear!
If you really need to have a bar that has the same height or distance where the power (front) lines split. For example:
- Best, Slingshot, Cabrinha, Airush and Naish usually have low split points
- F-one medium height (around 4m)
- North one of the highest (roughly 6m)
We wrote before that it isn’t such a good idea to mix up a North Dice with a low split point (since North has one of the highest split points, also called  “V” or “Y”) bar. But some people did not agree on that. So we asked you guys to vote on it by setting up a poll.
Split decision on the split height.
75 people reacted; And some interesting results came up.  First of all not much people (almost half) seem not to know about the different split point heights. Seconds, and this may just confuse those people more, the people that do know about it are split up about how important it is to get an equal height with the alternative to the original bar; 45% of the remaining voters that have an opinion on it wouldn’t advice to use a low V bar on a North Dice, but the other 55% don’t think it will be any issue. So a split decision on the split point height…
A few final tips we will give you on this split subject are;
- Up to a couple of meters difference probably doesn’t matter too much
- It is very likely you will need to alter the length a few cm. So make sure you have some pigtails around and test the kite in some moderate winds.
- Lowering the split point usually make the kite a bit more steady but also slower and more fit for freestyle moves.