Agree on why not. But if someone finds a deal on a used BRM or can only get the BRM they should not hesitate in my opinion
Iāve only flown the BRM on land in marginal wind so I have limited experience with itās depower but I have plenty of experience on the D-Wing. I canāt imagine why anyone would prefer this folding behaviour to simply flying off the front lines like a depower kite does. Iāve seen videos of the BRM very over powered and it just flops open / closed / open / closed. Depower on to the front lines is intuitive and works the way any other kite has worked for the past 20 years.
Iāve owned both the Flow and BRM, much prefer the depower style of the BRM. Yes, once overpowered itās a dog, but thatās when you should be on a smaller wing anyway and the Flow is no fun when overpowered either.
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Just throwing this out there, but couldnāt the coloring issue be solved easily with some t-shirt ink from a craft store? You could color your lines and you could color your leading edge whatever color you wantā¦ Havenāt tried it, but I have some Speedball t-shirt ink and it works great on, well, t-shirts. 
My Takoon parawing arrives this week!
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Analysis on upwind performance of the Ozone Pocket Rocket:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DIXJrj6SZ1X/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
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weāve gained important understandings in optimizing performance that are fundamentally different from what had crossed over from paraglider design and are specific to uniquely different parawing riding applications
Burn!!
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Link to the new Brm:
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Oh wow, has āseason twoā started already for BRM? I completely missed season one. What was that, seven months?
I need to shorten my attention spanā¦ again.
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Ha! I am waiting for V3, to pair with my V2 hollow board
I think Iāll wait another season until everyone figures it out then buy gear.
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Tried my friends Gong 5m pw today, it definitely went upwind way better then my BRM 5m. It was the bottom end pw in the gong range(Plus). The Gong was way more technical to fly than my BRM. You had to hold the bar in the middle otherwise it would overfly and collapse the leading edge . It also flew more off the front lines, similar to how it appears the Flow rides, so I finally experienced the unresponsive dives into the water that I see in clips with people struggling with the Flow.
Once I sorted it though I was really stoked to be able to go upwind so easily. Could definitely see doing upwind/downwind runs now with a pw that goes upwind this well.
In the end the canopy material is just too heavy for me to recommend it though. You could get used to it perhaps in higher winds but I think itās going to be very frustrating and possibly scare people away from the sport.
But a pw with similar upwind abilities and a light weight canopy would be pretty epic, great pw for the money honestly. If I had to choose between the gong and the BRM for riding in place I would take the gong even with the challenges. But for dw, BRM is still great.
I also tried my new ozone pocket rocket 3m but there was not enough wind to get on foil. Flys nice though and hopefully will have similar upwind ability to the gong.
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It seems these generally are pretty light, I am surprised heavier material is a significant downside. Does it change the flight characteristics/handling when using it or that it doesnāt stash as well?
For a usecase where it is not stashed often, say unwinding with it, packing it down then paddling DW. Would the heavier material be an issue?
As long as you have nothing to compare it to itās probably fine, but it just felt like more to manage in general. The heavier material makes the pack down significantly larger, made it more of a handful to sort out when relaunching, and most challenging in lighter conditions it made the pw less responsive and more likely to just fall out of the sky.
But as I said above it went upwind significantly better then my BRM so if choosing between the gong and the BRM for upwind I would choose the gong. But there are a lot more options to choose from now and the used market is starting to build which I expect to continue. Learning to PW can be intimidating and I suspect a lot of people will decide itās not for them.
After comparing the BRM v1, Ozone, and Flow - I would say the material choice matters - but especially at the 3M size the bridles are as bulky as the canopy material. In 3M - any material is probably fine, but 4M and above, we are already at the max of what can easily be tossed into the belt.
The better your conditions, the less the bulk will matter, because you will be more on autopilot on swell. For really bad/small conditions, the lighter weight parawings will have clear benefits.
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Update on my BRM Gong comparison. I got out with a little better wind a few days later on my BRM and I was able to go upwind as well as an average wing. I think I might retract my statement about preferring the gong for upwind. It might actually point slightly higher but the ease of use of the BRM wins out. It just flys so much nicer. An added benefit of the lighter material is that it is way more forgiving and responsive in transitions. Even if you do out run it and it collapses(much harder to do that) just a quick cut upwind and it will catch the wind quickly and redeploy. The gong which is heavier needs more wind to reinflate.
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Iāve flown the Gong Plus 5m on the beach and the material is crazy thick and way too heavy to use in a 5m unless you weigh over 100 kg.
I can get on foil with my 4.2m D-Wing in 11 knots so when Iām looking for a 5m it needs to fly in 8 knots. The Gong Plus will be a nightmare to launch and keep in the air in 10 and under.
If you are a bigger rider and donāt care to go out in less than 14 knots it could be fine, it actually packs away small considering the material and the sqcm because it doesnāt have the semi-rigid battons in the LE, itās just some sort of thin rope.
How to pack your trash bag!
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In the latest video from Duotone, one of the Spencerās says the Stash is made from 30 gram NYLON. We know from Gavās Youtube review, the Duotone is the only wing that packs up like the BRM. Iām going to guess the BRM is also 30gram NYLON.
This difference of using Nylon ripstop instead of Polyester ripstop explains in my mind, why there is such a difference in pack down with the 32 gram Polyester wings from the other brands. I donāt think 2 grams more is the whole difference. Itās Nylon versus Polyester.
I started kiteboarding in 1999 on Concept Air Nylon ripstop foil kites. At the time, F-One foil kites were Polyester rip stop. There was a big difference in those two kites. The Nylon kites were softer material. Better pack up. But this Nylon material wetted out quicker when the kite touched the water. Polyester seemed to be more naturally water resistant. I had to put lots of tent water proofing and 303 protectant on my Concept Air kites to help them relaunch. Iāve heard guys are doing this with the BRM. They have to be using Nylon too.
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Can anyone else with experience with Gong Neutra comment? I tried one yesterday and the material seemed a bit sticky for water. you had to shake it off to get it off. While wind was not good for flying, coudlnt literally shake of the impression that the material was not very hydrophobic. if the wind is stronger then it obviously doesnt matter. it also wanted to fold and made me think that perhaps installing a Flysurfer POW like pulley in the second set of main lines might help to prevent collapses.
but once flying, it does fly high in the window just a bit sensitive to the angle of attack. should work decent for upwind as long as you learn to manage the angle