lemat forum posts in last 60 days

TWCustom said..
A new board from us costs about 3200 USD. My idea is that a rich guy can purchase a new one when he wants by returning the old one and pay half price for the new board. Then we fix the old board and sell it for half price.

We can do this since carbon repairable an infinite number of times and the breathable foam always stays light. 2-300g extra for an 85L board when it is repaired the first time. Subsequent repairs/accidents ads no more weight in the foam. So the board lives forever. This is not some plan, we are doing it now.

For everyone else with traditional foam boards I suggest you drill holes. It is real easy and all boards both production and custom boards are over-engineered. Remember the holes are there also to make it possible at all to dry up the traditional foam. If you can save 200g, you want it. Strip paint and sand to carbon. Use epoxy+carbon powder instead. That is 150g. Replace all pads. That saves 100g. Use FCS II Skindog 18cm (7 inch) aircore fins always. They are US and superlight. If you can, replace thrusters with FCS/Future boxes. The white ones they are 20g and use aircore fins her too. Never use 4 fins. The FCS/Future box (yes two-brands-in-one) are strengthened with to 10mm divinicell plates, maybe 8cm across. These get very strong when glued in with microspheres reaching the top deck.

About the hip-harness. It costs nothing and the patent is there just to stop industry stealing it. So images of converted old harnesses on our old website does make me loose any sleep. All you need is a little rope and the longest harness lines you can find. Your old board and rig really improves. And remember, seat harnesses are really bad. The hook is actually still to high. It should point exactly to Trochanter Major. Google it and good luck.

We make light boards and go out with info so as to kill windfoiling and kiting. We really don't like them on our waves.

enjoy
// Thomas - from the other side

Mark _australia said..
Cost. Foam makes new models easy to produce .. but slight tweaks for costly mould changes made it hard to have a range of hollow boards.

then labour cost maybe for more complex layup, trimming halves and then bonding halves properly.
I think foam sandwich is the best blend of cost vs durability vs ability to change shape if needed and that's why it's prevailed.
I've seen some great DIY hollow boards but I think the current mass production of them is a response to the trendiness of wing / DW and wanting to have something new that the other companies don't have. I hope it doesn't translate to $5000 windsurf boards soon.

Brent in Qld said..






As an ex-AC builder and having built plenty of other racing/aerospace parts, I can confirm the level of paranoia around weight saving is very real and borderline absurd at times. But you can't deny the results when you get it right, weight savings = top line performance.

Durability and cost of course are very different conversations. Then there's the human factors involved in getting the most out of nice lightweight kit without destroying it with brute force and ignorance.

Grantmac said..
I'm not saying it would be the lightest but I've often thought about using something like a US box track for footstraps. Very fine adjustment and you can replace the threaded component easily.

Gestalt said..








It depends on the type of stainless steel screw being used with the brass. both brass (sanded) and titanium (Flikka) are excellent in saltwater environments. I specify lights for coastal architecture and use a local company that specialises in brass fittings which offer good warranty.everything else just falls off the buildings.

titanium is even better..

the issue is galvanic corrosion between the stainless steel and brass insert.. marine grade 316 is ok but the brass will corrode over time. I think Flikka uses all titanium so that's not going to experience galvanic corrosion. You don't want to use titanium with brass. Flikka also use titanium because it's light.

got me thinking whether brass screws for the brass inserts would be strong enough.

Edit..looks like m6 brass screws are available with hex head. Maybe with deox r81 anti seize.