New LEX Batwing

06-08-2003, 4:31 PM

Well I had a original LEX that I sold to my brother. I had it over a year and knew it very well. I got a chance this weekend(Thanks Jake) to ride the new LEX limited with the batwings. The best thing I can tell you is the original LEX is a cruiser. Stable predictable very easy to ride. The new LEX is a whole different story. It is FAST quick and very responsive. It is a little harder to ride but I can see where the better riders and the ones that get used to it will go huge. It is sort of like a very high performance sport car. It also skids a lot easier also. It was a very nice ride. I like them both but you will see people going bigger on the new one. They did a very good job on it.

(garry) · (garry) **Join Date: May 2003** 06-09-2003, 1:38 AM

Spoke to jake last week and i cant wait to get them.

Garry

06-09-2003, 10:11 AM

You will love it. Are you getting the whole thing with the longer strut also?

06-09-2003, 10:31 AM

No disrespect to Jake, but the "Batwing" design has been stolen from Jon Walker of Toxic Foils. Jon designed that wing around 1995 and I used to ride it on my old air chair. He made them out of G-10 and he still makes them today(along with several other designs). Granted, there was no patent so I guess it was there for the taking, but if anyone deserves credit for the design, it's Jon.

(magic) · (magic) **Join Date: Mar 2002** 06-09-2003, 11:24 AM

Jon,

I have looked in the past for Toxic Foils with no luck. Do you have contact information for them?

Thanks!!

06-09-2003, 11:28 AM

IIRC, they are out of business. They were a bunch of guys that were modifying foil designs and got stung by SS and AC.

I could be wrong, but that's what I remember.

(garry) · (garry) **Join Date: May 2003** 06-09-2003, 3:05 PM

As i have a custom made version of the LEX i made the teebar 11/2 inches longer than the sky ski lex 6 months ago.With the exchange rateUS$ to the Australian dollar i could not afford the AU$8000 so i made the teebar and foils.I have riden a LEX and i could not pick the difference between them

06-10-2003, 10:02 AM

Sean, try his e-mail- toxicfoils@yahoo.com
To straighten out some misinformation, he is still making custom foils, front and back wings, several designs of each. Toxic foils was never a "bunch of guys", it was and is just Jon. Years ago, one of the Kinnisons (don't remember which one) was riding his Manta front wing (the one now being hyped as the Bat wing) and the shaft broke and swung around and cut his leg severely. The edges on the wing are quite sharp. This led to all sorts of rhetoric about Toxic foils being dangerous. I still don't understand their logic, the sky ski shaft broke. I believe it was a cast strut.
Anyway, Jon has never turned Toxic Foils into a large scale business out of choice. You can contact him and he will hand make the foil you want, just be prepared to wait a bit. He's in college and working full time.

Sean, if you get no reply from him, e-mail me (airjunky@rescueteam.com) and I'll send you his phone #.

(bill_airjunky) · (bill_airjunky) **Join Date: Apr 2002** 06-18-2003, 5:15 PM

"Stolen" from Toxic isn't quite right in this case. While the shape of the rear edge of the SS Bat Wing front blade is similar, the front edge & winglets are completely different. It also doesn't have the sharp edges that sliced my thigh wide open. Over 70 stitches... want some pictures of it? You can say that shapes were "stolen" about anything.... hey, I think my Corvette body shape was stolen from the old Ferrari designs. The fact is that every single part of SS & AC has been designed from rider input. Want to see all the shapes of wings that never made it to production? Stop by their shop anytime.

The logic was this, Jon..... the weakest link in a stock foil is the front wing. Increase it's size & it will put more force on the t-bar & cause the t-bar to break. We all know of numerous broken AC & SS t-bars with aluminum wings, even been hit by them a couple of times. But all we got was bruised pretty good and never cut by one till this particular case.

BTW, I never tried to pawn this off on anyone since I was the one who rode the ski, installed the wings, threw the roll, etc. I take as much responsibility as anyone else. But every single time I've been hurt, I've taken steps to ensure it doesn't happen again. I wear a helmet, use Cinch footstays, and don't use Toxic Foils, all due to past experience. And I will encourage others to protect themselves too.

Also, note that Walker has a new design that I have never rode. And guess what? He made them less sharp & far safer. Hmmmmm, maybe he stole that design idea from AC & SS.......
--
Bill - bill@nospam.airjunky.com
http://airjunky.com