Ozone Alpina 5

Our Opinion – Ozone Alpina 5 Review

here is the review from the Delta 5; (the wings are the same)

The Delta 5 is a complete new design that has nothing to do with a Photon or with a Delta 4. The Delta 5 is very solid very rigid wing, the Delta 4 and also the Photon are much softer canopies that move much more in themselves. The Delta 5 is quite tensioned, it moves as a block, kind of untypical for Ozone wings.

I did fly a total of 1000+ XC KM (2×200+ and 2×300+) on the sizes ML and L and did a 1h flight on the MS size.

Stability
It is very dampened and very collapse stable, crazy collapse stable! I felt super safe immediately on it. Even the tips are very stable, it’s really hard to collapse them when doing the ears. They really refuse to collapse…only when you pull really far they are coming in. The Delta 5 has more Reflex built in than a Photon or Zeolite 2. That makes it very solid, specially when flying on Bar. The Pressure on the B handles is very light, you can feel that most of the weight is the As. When flying on bar thought turbulence the Delta 5 feels super safe, one should not forget that it can still collapse…that’s how safe it feels. In fact it’s so collapse stable, that Ozone decided to deliver it with the brakelines “too short”, when flying half to fullbar, the brake lines are in fact pulled down already a little bit. This clearly removes some collapse-stability on any wing. But because it is so f….stable, it doesn’t matter and it’s still stable enough:-) I think Ozone wanted to built a 2-Liner that can be flown normally with a half wrap. All other Ozone 2-Liners and most others as well you better fly with your hand inside the toggle (like a skipole) and when thermaling a fullwrap on top. The Delta 5 is better flown with a half wrap with the standard brake setting.

Thermalling
It clearly climbs quit well, like all Ozone wings, which is surprising, because the more reflex you put into a wing, the less it will climb naturally. As always Ozone is king with finding the right balance of all the parameters. The brake pressure is rather hard and the Delta needs a firm pull to keep turning. But it does turn really nicely, you can turn tight with it when you have to and it doesn’t spin when you pull hard to make the turn tighter. Even size L i find turns actually quite nice, also in scattered, broken thermals. The MS is of course more agile than the bigger ones, thats normal. The MS felt very agile to me.

The Delta 5 has clearly a lot less roll then the Delta 4 had, when flying straight it has no unwanted roll at all, neither in trim nor on Bar. I assume the winglets help a lot with this. Sometimes it does yaw a bit when hitting turbulence, but not too much, i don’t mind about it.

When thermalling normally using both toggles, you get a normal amount of feedback from the wing and you also get wiggled left and right in your seat normally. The moment you release the outside brake and rest your hand on the B-Handle it gets more calm. It’s a smoother ride all of the sudden. I assume this is because you let the reflex do it’s job. Because the slight outside brake you have when thermalling removes the reflex and changes the pitch of the airfoil. What is suprising on the Delta 5 is that even with a little bit of brakes (also symmectricaly) it is still very collapse stable, much more than the Photon or the Zeno 2. The Zeno 2 is clearly the weakest when flying with a touch of brake….better hands up on this:-)

In those 1000+ XC Kilometers i did with the Delta 5 i never had a collapse, not even a wingtip that came in. It does tell you whats going on in the air and you can stop collapses really well. I feel really safe under this glider, i feel a lot more in control then with a Zeno that sometimes goes where it wants when it turbulent as f…with the Delta 5 it’s always me in control, it really does what i want it to do even in shitty air. Thats a great feeling.

Stallpoint
On the ML size loaded on top, the stallpoint is very low and the brake pressure is super high before it stalls, comparable with a tandem. Spinning or stalling it by accident is almost impossible. I personally think this is a very important feature. When it gets really turbulent, i’s good to apply a lot of brake to fly active, and not just a little bit. Reflex wings like having either no brake or a lot, but a tiny bit of brake is where they are the most unstable.
Even after thermalling in rain for 15min and the wing being totally soaked, the stallpoint was still very low. Many other wings would have ended up in deepstall or would stall very high, the Delta 5 didn’t seem to care. But remember: Any time a glider gets wet, the fabric shrinks a bit. Every time it gets wet! Also after it’s been wet 20 times it still shrinks more. So your wing will never be the same again. On mine the rods are too long now…because they didn’t shrink as much. So better avoid 2-liners getting wet!

Flying on Bar
The Delta 5 has a better glide at Fullbar than the Enzo 3! It’s true! Because it flies a lot slower fullbar…I think the Topspeed of the Delta 5 is perfect, it’s clearly slower then the other Ozone 2-Liners, but that also makes it a little safer. Here is a rough overview of their topspeeds in about 2500m.
Delta 5: around 56 km/h
Photon: around 59 km/h
Zeolight 2 GT: around 61 km/h
Zeno 2: around 64 km/h
Enzo 3: up to 68km/h
Of course this depends on many factors, so don’t take this too serious! It’s just to get an idea.
The Delta 5 is the slowest, but it’s also the most collapse stable on bar. As long as you keep the weight of your arms on the Bs, it’s unlikely to get a collapse. Only in really sharp turbulence you have to catch it actively. It’s really surprising! That stability makes paragliding quite a bit safer in my opinion, as long as you don’t use the extra stability to fly fullbar close to the ground in gnarly condiitons…

Collapses
I never had one, only a wingtip which popped open straight away. I pulled 2x a 50% and hold it in, it was easy to keep the heading. When you let go, the wing needed some pumps the reinflate. I think that’s a good behavior, wings that don’t deflate tend to snap open after collapsing (Schnalzklapper) which can catapult you towards the wing and make you loose control. I assume the Delta 5 won’t do this, but that’s just a guess. Time will tell. Getting a frontal on the Delta 5 is sure possible, but seems quite unlikely as with all the other Ozone 2-Liners as well. The middle is always more solid than the rest.

Performance
I could perfectly fly together with my buddy on the Zeno 2 ML. The Performance is impressive. In calm air there is a slight difference, but very little. In thermic air you can clearly see the advantage of the higher Aspect Ratio of the Zeno 2…The Delta 5 has enough performance to fly 300km on a good day with ease!

Resume
I think the Delta 5 is a super safe XC wing that makes XC flying safer than ever before. Forget about anything you heared about 2-Liners and give it a try. You will feel safe under it quickly. It requires less active flying than any other C wing i have flown and als less than some high-B Wings out there. I pretty sure collapse will be gentle as well if they should ever happen. That combination of the high collapse stabilty and such a low hard stallpoint make it a very safe wing in my opinion. I think chances you end up loosing control with it are much smaller than with most other C- Wings. But that’s just a guess for now, time will tell.

I think you can easily fly the Delta 5 as your first C-Wing, even when stepping up from a Mid- B when you have enough experience i think you will get a long with it.

On my long XC flights i always flew it on the top 5kg of the weight range and felt great like this. But i think even at the middle it will work nicely since its agile enough. But for flying in the mountains i recommend to be on the top 5kg. It will still perform really well if you are overloaded a few kg if you ever go flying heavy, i tried this myself.

Ask us for an offer, we have the lowest VAT in Switzerland and can offer great prices!

Good to know

• It’s quite heavy, it has no light fabric, but it’s very durable
• You need to pack it nicely otherwise the rods will remember

Tech specs and marketing text

https://flyozone.com/paragliders/de/products/gliders/delta-5?z1=Y&z2=K&z3=K&z4=Y&type=custom#colours

Designer’s note from Luc Armant;

“The work on this project took a long time, with 20 different prototypes and a multitude of platforms in terms of number of cells and line architectures.

The Delta is the most important glider in my heart, ever since the Delta 2, which was an achievement for me as a designer, particularly in terms of what it brought to the industry in terms of handling in thermals and solidity and comfort in turbulence.

The Delta is a very versatile model for cross-country flying in all conditions, and I know that each new model is eagerly awaited by the community.

For this glider, the challenge was very high as it was imperative not to lose any of the handling and ease of the Delta 4 while improving inflation, performance, solidity and control at high speed.

I’m particularly happy with the pleasure the glider gives me in thermals, linked to the great precision at the start of braking but also during re-coring thermals. This was a real challenge for a short two-line structure built from durable and robust materials. I defy anyone to recognize ‘blindly’ that this is a 2-liner, even during inflation.

I’m stoked hearing the first feedback from the pilots as we begin the 2025 season.”