New from Ozone - THE SUBMARINE
Published on:
09 Aug 2021
The World Cup Superfinal is underway in Disentis, Switzerland, and three of our team pilots are flying a radical new harness design: The Submarine.
Ozone designer, Luc Armant, shares, "The idea behind this project was to drastically reduce drag by creating a fully inflated enclosure around the pilot without compromising safety.
I made the first version in 2006. It was a funny little yellow proto which I flew in some local competitions and people started calling it “the yellow submarine”. This was before I came to Ozone -- at that time I also designed one for Bruce Goldsmith which he used for the World Championships in 2007.
We restarted the project again in 2017, and there were major structural and aerodynamic problems to solve in order for it to be a viable product. A huge amount of computer work and modelling was carried out by co-designer, Fred Pieri, to develop and test prototypes.
We barely managed to finish three harnesses for the Superfinal before our factory had to close due to Covid. We haven't had much time to train with them or fully evaluate the performance but we feel this generation is finally ready to be tested at the highest level of competition."
We anticipate that development work on this project will continue over the months following the Superfinal. Cheers from all the Ozone team, and we send our best wishes to all of the pilots in the Superfinal. We look forward to following the race!