Which foil should I buy ?

Slingshot seems more common at shops in my area.

Where are Starboard foils manufactured ?

TIA

Starboard are made in China, can't remember the exact name but something like Shockwave Composites, it'll come to me in a bit

sonic composite
(think it sort of belongs to starboard)
makes the f4 also

Pretty sure sonic make naish as well

For me? Supercruiser or Naish. Slingshot just isn't durable in salt water.
Or else the Starboard Freeride Plus.

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Grantmac said..
Slingshot just isn't durable in salt water.

You keep repeating this ^

How do you explain our local Slingshot group's 5,000+ sessions in the ocean (yep salt water ) ??

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azymuth said..

Grantmac said..
Slingshot just isn't durable in salt water.

You keep repeating this ^

How do you explain our local Slingshot group's 5,000+ sessions in the ocean (yep salt water ) ??

Explain every local here (who hasn't switched brands: ie most) on their 2nd or 3rd wing and many on 2nd fuselage due to corrosion, some on entirely new foil due to hardware failure?

Honestly the designs aren't fantastic and the build quality is junk.

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Grantmac said..

azymuth said..

Grantmac said..
Slingshot just isn't durable in salt water.

You keep repeating this ^

How do you explain our local Slingshot group's 5,000+ sessions in the ocean (yep salt water ) ??

Explain every local here (who hasn't switched brands: ie most) on their 2nd or 3rd wing and many on 2nd fuselage due to corrosion, some on entirely new foil due to hardware failure?

Honestly the designs aren't fantastic and the build quality is junk.

Whatever
Looking forward to seeing a vid of you carving swells on your "superior" gear

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azymuth said..

Grantmac said..

azymuth said..

Grantmac said..
Slingshot just isn't durable in salt water.

You keep repeating this ^

How do you explain our local Slingshot group's 5,000+ sessions in the ocean (yep salt water ) ??

Explain every local here (who hasn't switched brands: ie most) on their 2nd or 3rd wing and many on 2nd fuselage due to corrosion, some on entirely new foil due to hardware failure?

Honestly the designs aren't fantastic and the build quality is junk.

Whatever
Looking forward to seeing a vid of you carving swells on your "superior" gear

Based on the videos you've posted we have a similar skill level here, nobody is Balz but carving some swell isn't exactly difficult.

My Starboard gear gets exactly ZERO maintenance and looks new a year later. Slingshot stuff falls apart in months under those conditions and wobbles around from the beginning.

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Grantmac said..Based on the videos you've posted we have a similar skill level here, nobody is Balz but carving some swell isn't exactly difficult.

My Starboard gear gets exactly ZERO maintenance and looks new a year later. Slingshot stuff falls apart in months under those conditions and wobbles around from the beginning.

Awesome, I'm stoked, we figured there must be frothers riding waves/downwinding swells world-wide - surprised that nobody else uploads any vids.
Sounds like your crew are a level above us if you find carving swells easy, we find ocean downwinding in 25-30 knots and 2m swells pretty challenging.
Post up some videos please, sure we can learn heaps and we might be able to see design advantages of your gear.

Unfortunate that you've had problems with SS gear - we had a few early wings delaminate and a few fuselages snap but my guess is if you did an hours of use comparison taking cost into consideration, all freeride foils would show similar failure rates.
We've seen issues with other foils but I don't think it's cool to bag other brands.

Slingshot gear seems to be lasting just fine in Florida's hypersaline warm waters (the worst conditions for corrosion you can find on planet earth). If, that is, you do reasonable maintenance. By that I mean reasonably frequent disassembly, rinsing, inspection, and greasing of all mated parts.

"Reasonably frequent" for me means one a month since I go down there for one month in November and one month in March. Each time involves complete disassembly, rinsing, inspection, and greasing. My i76 is going strong, as are the myriad Infinity foils of dozens of other riders there.

Slingshot Infinity foil gear may not be the most high performance stuff out there, but it just works. No, I'm not a SS team rider. At home I ride on Moses, AFS, and LP. Tower of Babel.

Yeah I've had my slingshot gear ~1 year now in FL and haven't had any corrosion or durability issues. I initially did marine grease plus teflon tape but since switched to Tef Gel except for the mast/tuttle connection which I marine greased at the interface. Bolts seem fine other than some rounding of the heads, but got a replacement set.

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azymuth said..
Unfortunate that you've had problems with SS gear - we had a few early wings delaminate and a few fuselages snap but my guess is if you did an hours of use comparison taking cost into consideration, all freeride foils would show similar failure rates.
We've seen issues with other foils but I don't think it's cool to bag other brands.

I highly doubt that all freeride gear of similar cost "would show similar failure rates". There ares rather large differences in engineering and quality control. I still like my Slingshot foil, and appreciate that Slingshot has been very responsive the two times I contacted them about warranty issues. But the issues with screws coming loose at the mast-fuse connection persist, and there have been multiple reports of similar issues, including bolts breaking. IMHO, the root cause is poor engineering. Compared to the connections on Armstrong foils (twice the price but full carbon and half the weight) or the Starboard GT-R (very similar price), the SS system is really not great.

For another example of questionable engineering, check out this picture from the "light" SS connector after using it a couple of times:



Both back "ears" starting bending after one or two sessions, because there just is not enough aluminum for the forces in play. The same plate may work well enough for a 70 kg guy with a foil in B position, but failed rapidly for this 90 kg guy with an i84 in C position. No harm done because I discovered this before anything broke, and Slingshot replace the piece with the more solid standard piece under warranty. But definitely an example of questionable engineering (or perhaps quality control .. but I cannot see how four little pieces of aluminum, about 0.5 cm wide, could possibly hold up in the long run).

As I said, I still like my Slingshot foils, and recommend them to beginners when asked. They are a lot of fun when carving in chop and swell, they are easily available from lots of places, and Slingshot offers the short masts we often need at reasonable prices. But my winging wife never once used her SS foils after getting an Armstrong, and I probably would have fewer session on it if there actually was a larger Starboard front wing like the freeride 1100 available in the US.

Here's another picture that shows the issue with the mast track adapter a bit better:

Wow! first of all bit disrespectful regarding the Aussie crew shredding on SS in the surf, its not easy at all and if anything their skills and equipment are making it seem effortless. To me its inspiring to watch everyday foilers on good solid equipment rip it up!

Pretty much all manufactures will have issues and its a numbers game, not many use Armstrong for wind foiling??

Foil selection depends on global location, I have never seen a Starboard foil in 5 years but I'm sure they are sold somewhere and have corrosion issues if not maintained on the regular.

Yesterday I rode my SS infinity 76 wing (bought in 2018) still using the original 2018 fuse and the 90cm was replaced last year as I bent the other one landing sideways.

As others have mentioned Florida is unbelievably salty and now rinse everything and re-grease the main bolts every 2-3 weeks.

I am 90 kg using the new SS mast plate in the video from yesterday.

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CoreAS said..
Pretty much all manufactures will have issues and its a numbers game, not many use Armstrong for wind foiling??

That's probably because of the fuses that are available. It's easy to get the foils, our local store stocks a lot of them for wing and kite foiling. Judging from what's in store and what wingers use, he sells a lot more Armstrong foils than SS foils. But the only available Armstrong fuses are 60 and 70 cm long, and those place the front wing quite close to the mast, so they won't work well for many windfoil boards. There were rumors and reports of a longer fuse for windfoiling, but our store does not have it, and the Armstrong web site did not show it last time I checked.

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CoreAS said..
Foil selection depends on global location, I have never seen a Starboard foil in 5 years but I'm sure they are sold somewhere and have corrosion issues if not maintained on the regular.

Starboard (and other brands) appears to use stainless steel screws that go into steel inserts. Compared to stainless screws going directly into aluminum, that reduces corrosion issues quite drastically. No galvanic corrosion without a difference in galvanic potential! Anodizing aluminum can work well enough in general, but won't hold up for load bearing screws. The stress creates micro fractures, you get pitting corrosion, and end up with all the lovely white aluminum oxide on your screws. No need to take my word for it - check what the people say who make their living selling fasteners: "Stainless Steel & Aluminum: Why You Shouldn't Use Them Together" (www.albanycountyfasteners.com/blog/stainless-steel-and-aluminum/). They list as an exception "If the environment is very dry, sheltered from weather and dirt then you may try using metals together", but that really does not apply to foiling.

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CoreAS said..

Stoked to see you back in the ocean riding waves

I think I had one of the first few dozen SS foils in 2018. Fuse (2nd one, first couldn't even mount a wing) died of corrosion within 15 months. I know this because it was 3 months out of warranty and they wouldn't do anything. Ended up polishing it and kept using, except that corrosion also wrecked the socket on the wing.
Along the way tried the m10 to m6 adapters, last one ride then a foil on the bottom. "Titanium" was a horrible choice there. Thankfully only 20 feet deep but ruined the threads. Good thing I'm a machinist and did what they should have done by fitting stainless barrel nuts.
Bought the I76 foil, looked immediately second hand because literally any contact chipped it. You guys must sail off the softest sand.

Finally managed to sell it. Bought Starboard, year later haven't touched a thing and looks better than the SS after a half dozen uses.

We used to have a bunch of SS riders here. All are now either winging it on Starboard stuff except for a newbie or two.

I've owned the Starboard Race and Supercruiser. I speak only to what I've owned. If someone has a question about RRD, F4, Fanatic, etc I've got no input. But I certainly know the problems with Slingshot.

Just for the record, and since I mentioned my doubts on the Slingshot engineering before in this thread, here's a picture of my Slingshot setup after yesterday's session:

The fuselage broke at the front screw. On the GoPro footage, it looks like the foil breached just before the crash after which the front wing was floating on the water. Apparently, this involuntary "jump" of perhaps 5 or 10 cm was too much for the fuse (I foil without straps, so I don't jump).
I had another SS fuse break before, but I had added an extra hole for a "D" position to that one, so I blamed the modification. But this fuse was not modified. Sure, it's relatively cheap to replace, and I even have a couple of extras since my wife switched to Armstrong foils for winging, but I think I'll switch to foils that seem more solid.

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boardsurfr said..
Just for the record, and since I mentioned my doubts on the Slingshot engineering before in this thread, here's a picture of my Slingshot setup after yesterday's session:

The fuselage broke at the front screw. On the GoPro footage, it looks like the foil breached just before the crash after which the front wing was floating on the water. Apparently, this involuntary "jump" of perhaps 5 or 10 cm was too much for the fuse (I foil without straps, so I don't jump).
I had another SS fuse break before, but I had added an extra hole for a "D" position to that one, so I blamed the modification. But this fuse was not modified. Sure, it's relatively cheap to replace, and I even have a couple of extras since my wife switched to Armstrong foils for winging, but I think I'll switch to foils that seem more solid.

That set up looks much less draggy than the original!

I'm a happy slingshot user. I do suggest replacing the 'titanium' bolts with stainless steel for the head/mast and mast/fuse connections. The engineering isn't sophisticated so it does rely on the bolts particularly at the mast/fuse connection. Never seen a break like the one boardsurfr posted, incredible to see it break like that.

Good suggestion to replace the titanium bolts with stainless bolts, since there have been multiple reports of broken titanium bolts. The bolts I used were stainless, and they were still tide after surfing in with the front wing on top of the board.

There have been other reports of broken Slingshot fuselages. The one at www.iwindsurf.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=34907 shows a break at exactly the same place. Two other people responded that they had breaks at exactly the same spot, with one of them posting pictures at photos.app.goo.gl/u9pR79LnvJ6rHdWR7

The first time I had a Slingshot fuselage break, I had added one hole to the fuselage 5 cm behind the second "C" hole to create a "D" position. This left one empty hole (the front "C" hole) between the mast and the front wing, and that's where the fuse snapped after about 50 sessions. I blamed myself for drilling another hole, but the fuse snapped at the original hole, not the one I had drilled.

It's important to remember that Slingshot initially developed the fuselage to be used in "A" position, where the mast is directly under the front wing. In this setup, there is (almost) no torque on the fuse, so it will hold just fine. But the "A" position does not work well for windsurfing, especially with the larger wings (i84 and i99). So they drilled more holes into the fuse further back, first just for "B", later also for "C". Both of these positions increased the torque a lot, but the fuselage design remained unchanged.

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boardsurfr said..
It's important to remember that Slingshot initially developed the fuselage to be used in "A" position, where the mast is directly under the front wing. In this setup, there is (almost) no torque on the fuse, so it will hold just fine. But the "A" position does not work well for windsurfing, especially with the larger wings (i84 and i99). So they drilled more holes into the fuse further back, first just for "B", later also for "C". Both of these positions increased the torque a lot, but the fuselage design remained unchanged.

One thing I noticed is that dimensions between B and C position are such that you could actually just drill one extra mounting hole behind the B position and that would replicate position C exactly without the need to flip the fuse around. It seems the reason they flip the fuse around is to make it stronger. Switching between A and B or A and C is really quick. Switching from B to C or back requires a completely disassembly of the fuselage and wings.

I'm not the right type of engineer for designing fuselages etc, but I do dabble in CAD and 3D printing, so earlier this summer, I was thinking about what I would do to design a better fuselages with this type of adjustability. I think I would add a piece that connects the fuselage to the mast and the fuselage would actually slide through that part and use relatively small set screw to lock the position of the mast to the fuse.

Windfoiling still uses Tuttle boxes a lot, so I suppose the adjustability can be useful. Wingfoilers are pretty much entirely using twin US box tracks now, so an adjustable fuse would just decouple the mast position relative to the wings and mast, which doesn't seem quite as useful.

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JuriM said..
One thing I noticed is that dimensions between B and C position are such that you could actually just drill one extra mounting hole behind the B position and that would replicate position C exactly without the need to flip the fuse around. It seems the reason they flip the fuse around is to make it stronger.

I actually suggested something similar to Slingshot (adding an extra hole for a "D" position). The response was that this would weaken the fuse too much, and that earlier prototypes of the fuse made with different alloys had broken a lot.