Another newbie question: Where I sail it is very gusty - trying to find the right sail size for the conditions is difficult. When a strong gust comes though I find I can sail along fairly comfortably with what feels like the sail really quite sheeted out. I find just sheeting in slightly with the back hand gives me enough power if I begin to drop off the foil. Is this feeling of being quite sheeted out just a symptom of having a sail that is too big for the gusts or am I doing it all wrong?! (obviously with the sail in this position I can't hook in).

Interesting question.
Myself, I foil most steay with a small sail fully sheeted in, like windsurfing.
I have seen foilers go out with windsurf size sails....1.5 to 2.5 meters bigger than me, and foil sheeted out the whole time, except for lulls where I slog.
Can't tell you which is actually better.

Well, ideally, I like to be hooked in, so sail is sheeted in, that is when the wind range matches my sail/wing combination. For me if sail is sheeted way out I am going down wind unhooked in wind that I would be hooked-in if going cross wind or upwind. But I am going to try letting the lines out to the stop knot (see below) next time on a long down wind run because I think it will allow me to stay hooked in while sheeted out.

But I have been playing with my harness line length, and in really gusty conditions I have the lines all the way out to the stop knot (Sailworks quicktune lines, see my review), so in the lulls when standing upright I can stay hooked in and not hold the weight of the sail, and then when the gust hits I sheet out and lean out too if needed while staying hooked-in, that has worked good to conserve energy and for unhooking easily.

The problem with having lines short to stay hooked-in is when the gusts starts to drop I have to get out right away, if I wait too long and the gust passes then the sail can pull me over into the water because it is hard to unhook at that point standing upright on the board with little pressure on the sail and I am no longer leaning out so lines are pulling my hook up higher than it normally is. Just takes practice and paying attention to unhook at the right time.

Yeah, it's work to jump 9" when I drop odd a plane with my 24" lines. I don't recommend it.
Especially on foil where the drop is down to sub 7 breeze, nothing to hold you up after landing that jump.

You could be rigged too big, but chances are you just aren't sailing as high of an angle as you could be. I really only sheet out like that when riding swell.

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TroyMcClure said..
Another newbie question: Where I sail it is very gusty - trying to find the right sail size for the conditions is difficult. When a strong gust comes though I find I can sail along fairly comfortably with what feels like the sail really quite sheeted out. I find just sheeting in slightly with the back hand gives me enough power if I begin to drop off the foil. Is this feeling of being quite sheeted out just a symptom of having a sail that is too big for the gusts or am I doing it all wrong?! (obviously with the sail in this position I can't hook in).

Troy,
Welcome to foiling, am sure you will have a blast.

I also have only gusty (or none) winds, so selecting a sail size is always a guess. 9knots gusting to 15, I use severne foil glide 7.0, 12 knots gusting to 20 or more, I use Duotone idol LTD 5.2. All on Singshot i99 or i84.

When over powered, I steer upwind, or if am too far upwind and need to keep same direction, will sheet out like you described.

If wind was strong and constant, am looking forward to "sheeted in" downwinders like Azymuth describes. One day will get to Perth!

I guess there is no right ore wrong. It's about what you like. I mostly sheet in but I can enjoy leaving the sail open just to fly over the water without any pressure or tention, which is a very nice experience in itself. Sheeting out is also nice when swellriding.
I guess the reason I sheet in most of the time is because you keep pressure on the mastfoot so you remain more in balance. Constantly sheeting in and out results in a constant change of pressure so you have to counter by shifting your weight. Also, going for speed can be fun once in a while.

If you're a beginner you might want to try a smaller sail to get the feel of sheeting in without gaining an overdose of acceleration

This is my take as a newbie so far, so I could be way off . Anyhow.. I'm 140lbs SS 114, I76 foil,5.3 goya fringe. What I've experienced so far is it takes twice the sail power to get on the foil as it does when foiling. If I can windsurf to foil with no pumping, or launch skills, I'm feathering the leech of the sail to not get overpowered/ breech once I'm up. The last time out (7th time), I moved the sail mast forward and focused on using the harness to sheet in and point as high as possible. It's going much better, although I think I'm still over sailed. There are so many dynamics to find that sweet spot. Bending knees, foot pressure, shifting body weight, rear foot position, sail trim. I finally got both feet on the windward rail hooked in to the harness pointing high. Felt great until puff got out of control.. a lot of this is obviously skill and experience. I saw a SS video of highly skilled Greg G, stating he uses a 3.7 sail for 8-18 knots. Hard for me to wrap my head around that. I'm gonna hang with 5.3 for now until we get some remotely stable winds. It's been a nutty spring with storm front winds for weeks. 1-35 knots in an hour.

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TroyMcClure said..
Another newbie question: Where I sail it is very gusty - trying to find the right sail size for the conditions is difficult. When a strong gust comes though I find I can sail along fairly comfortably with what feels like the sail really quite sheeted out. I find just sheeting in slightly with the back hand gives me enough power if I begin to drop off the foil. Is this feeling of being quite sheeted out just a symptom of having a sail that is too big for the gusts or am I doing it all wrong?! (obviously with the sail in this position I can't hook in).

I also sail in a pretty gusty lake (yesterday was 12-25 and in two days it is supposed to be 16-39!). When I started foiling with my infinity 84 foil, I would sheet out and chug along when the gusts hit (like you said, it is very hard to select the proper gear with those conditions). When you sheet out pay attention because you will lose mastfoot pressure so the board will try to rise; this is not a biggie, you just need to put a little bit of front foot pressure for a second to compensate.

but now I am more committed to the harness so I don't sheet out as much as I use to. When overpowered I can still be sheeted in and I point higher. I am using a race foil nowadays, BTW.
bottom line, keep enjoying the sport! I don't think there is anything wrong with sheeting out, especially if you are not going for speed and instead you are either getting comfortable with the gear or you like to play on the swell.

Remember, tuning can affect a sails wind range by at least 7 mph.
A 4.0 tuned for low end can work fine for a 190 lbs sailor on i76 in 12-21 mph wind.
Max downhaul and flat outhaul, same 4.0 would need 17 knot wind to get up on foil, and be comfortable up to 26 knot wind or even slightly more.

I never heard of anybody claiming he is sailing in not gusty wind ;)
I would say that you can either have wind changing significantly for a period of several minutes (typically in trade wind with a squall 12kt becoming 30+kt.) or unsteady wind in rather bad spots (as lake sailing with wind averaging 15k but instantly changing from 5 to 25kt for duration in seconds).
Some use race sail (with or without cam) and keep rather sheeted in. You need a stable foil with nose up tendancy, so you can 'lock' the board attitude between the foil nose up force and the sail nose down force. You need a good stable sail that change in the gust but maintain a rather stable nose down force.
Being a lake sailor (marin d'eau douce) I mostly use the opposite path : I have been tuning my gear to minimize tilt input from the sail :
Wishbone up to pull closer to the sail aerodynamic center (sorry I don't know the english exact terms).
Mast foot really to the aft to minimize arm lever of the down force of the sail.
I use wave sail, and when with small gear (sub 4.5m2) I use very low aspec Naish Chopper (low aero center).
I trim with downhaul about the same as with windsurfing so the top of the sail opens up in gust and is quite flat, outhaul rather just tightened.
Last tuning I tried is to switch for a shorter mast to soften the rig (using a 310m with long extender when 340 is recommended). But I am not yet sure I'll keep that.
I maintain sheeted in, head upwind when overpowered, or really downwind sheeted in fleeing the wind (it reduces the apparent wind), but it is kite more tricky. Definitly, if I need to sheet out, I need a smaller sail. But sometimes it is not practicable.

I don't know the Fringe sails, but I believe it is typically the kind of sail I would used for my style, but probably not for large sail. I'd rather go for 4 battens when above 4.5 to have more sail stability.

So, let's define gusty (tongue in cheek):

If I am foiling along, minding my own business, in 15 mph wind with a 7.0, and BAM! a SHARP gust of 30 mph hits with zero gradual buildup, now that's SHARPLY CRAZY GUSTY. I get this all the time in the Gorge, especially with frontal winds.

If I am foiling along, minding my own business, in 15 mph wind with a 7.0, and I see a catspaw coming, prepare for it, and it increases to 20 mph and stays there for a couple minutes, that is REGULAR GUSTY. A nice "steady" thermal day in the Gorge will feature this.

If I am foiling along, minding my own business, in 15 mph wind with a 7.0, and it stays that way for hours and hours, I call it DEAD STEADY. You get this with the thermal El Norte wind on the Sea of Cortez in Baja. Almost boring, but only almost.

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segler said..

If I am foiling along, minding my own business, in 15 mph wind with a 7.0, and BAM! a SHARP gust of 30 mph hits with zero gradual buildup, now that's SHARPLY CRAZY GUSTY. I get this all the time in the Gorge, especially with frontal winds.

I got smacked with a gust like that and it pulled me right out of the water, luckily it was a recoverable overfoil. Didn't see it coming at all. Around 3:50

Lucky I sail in a relatively more stable wind spot.
Sailing along at 17, 4.2 sail, I see a lull ahead, but the end of a gust is what I'm riding, get smacked by a sudden 22......then into the lull of 10.

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aeroegnr said..

segler said..

If I am foiling along, minding my own business, in 15 mph wind with a 7.0, and BAM! a SHARP gust of 30 mph hits with zero gradual buildup, now that's SHARPLY CRAZY GUSTY. I get this all the time in the Gorge, especially with frontal winds.

I got smacked with a gust like that and it pulled me right out of the water, luckily it was a recoverable overfoil. Didn't see it coming at all. Around 3:50

Ya,
Gotta have your head on a swivel with those crazy random puffs, but at least you have a chance to see them. I hit an alliigator garr last weekend and got launched .

Compared to my home spot the Gorge feels like a gigantic fan.

We have the wind roll around two sides of a hill. So the gusts alternate AND always have a big lull in front of them. I could pump through that sometimes winging but rarely windfoiling.
If you get out of phase on the gusts even foiling you can end up way down the beach if you're lucky.

The name of the game is reading the phase, not trying to pump before the gust arrives and running small sails tuned for power.

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Ha, yeah, the comments about 'define gusty' made me chuckle (its a good question, next time I will take my little anemometer out on the lake and actually put some figures to it! In the meantime I will maintain that it was the CRAZY GUSTY conditions Segler describes above!!)

I'm interested in the comments about sail size and sail tuning, particularly after watching some of Greg Glaisters videos (I'm guessing he is not a big guy?? but heck, he gets the most of the sail he's using).

Lee D you say max downhaul, flat outhaul (does that mean max outhaul pulling the sail flat??). Is there a thread on here for rigging sails for wind foiling ? (I'm still rigging as if for windsurfing and probably not doing a very good job at that - floppy leach, just enough outhaul to keep it away from the boom etc.).

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TroyMcClure said..

Ha, yeah, the comments about 'define gusty' made me chuckle (its a good question, next time I will take my little anemometer out on the lake and actually put some figures to it! In the meantime I will maintain that it was the CRAZY GUSTY conditions Segler describes above!!)

I'm interested in the comments about sail size and sail tuning, particularly after watching some of Greg Glaisters videos (I'm guessing he is not a big guy?? but heck, he gets the most of the sail he's using).

Lee D you say max downhaul, flat outhaul (does that mean max outhaul pulling the sail flat??). Is there a thread on here for rigging sails for wind foiling ? (I'm still rigging as if for windsurfing and probably not doing a very good job at that - floppy leach, just enough outhaul to keep it away from the boom etc.).

There was a good tip in the foil slalom sail thread about leach tightness exerting more downward force on the mast foot. Tighter leach is more desirable for foiling apparently because it puts more pressure down on the mast foot.

There does not seem to be universal agreement on how to rig non foiling sails for foiling: half fall into the just rig them the same way you would rig for wave/freeride, about 25% go less outhaul to create a big draft but rig small. I tend to go min downhaul, greater than maximum outhaul.

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TroyMcClure said..

Ha, yeah, the comments about 'define gusty' made me chuckle (its a good question, next time I will take my little anemometer out on the lake and actually put some figures to it! In the meantime I will maintain that it was the CRAZY GUSTY conditions Segler describes above!!)

I'm interested in the comments about sail size and sail tuning, particularly after watching some of Greg Glaisters videos (I'm guessing he is not a big guy?? but heck, he gets the most of the sail he's using).

Lee D you say max downhaul, flat outhaul (does that mean max outhaul pulling the sail flat??). Is there a thread on here for rigging sails for wind foiling ? (I'm still rigging as if for windsurfing and probably not doing a very good job at that - floppy leach, just enough outhaul to keep it away from the boom etc.).

Thighter (flatter) outhaul compared to rigging for fin massively increase range when overpowered or in difficult conditions, I rig downhaul the same as for finning in pretty much all conditions. Only if really underpowered I might opt for less downhaul, but if possible I prefer more downhaul and less outhaul (fuller) in underpowered conditions because that increases topspeed (compared to less downhaul/thighter leech) and thereby increases odds of flying through lulls and carrying enough speed through jibes (as I went into them with a lot more speed).

To talk some rough numbers (~90kg, 105L board and 900sqcm freerace/freestyle foil, talking base wind, gusts might be 2-3 knots more on low wind days, upto 5-10 knots more on the 20 knot days):
10-11 knots = 4.9 with less downhaul (thighter leech, max -1cm downhaul compared to average "fin" loose leech) & less outhaul (-1cm) - If I possible I would size up in these conditions.
12-14 knots = 4.9 with average "fin" loose leech & neutral outhaul (0cm)
15-20 knots = 4.9 with average "fin" loose leech & thight outhaul (+2-3cm)
In 14-16 knots I can also opt to take out 4.2 (on the light setting), in 16-18 knots I might take out 3.8(also on light setting), all depending on what kind of day I want to have ;).

Where neutral outhaul (0cm) is the point where the outhaul starts applying force to the clew with the sail lying on the ground.

To reply to the topic starters question: there's nothing wrong with opening your sail on a foil, if I'm going across the wind and dont want to go as fast I open the sail aswell. Upwind I have the sail closed pretty much always, downwind it depends on what I'm doing, but overpowered I often have my sail closed as that decreases power if you point deep enough. Having said that, it might also be your power is too much on the backhand (lines too far forward) if you're controling your height by opening & closing the sail.