We are in a period of rapid design exploration in foil masts, fuselages, and wings. But with each manufacturer inventing their own attachment designs, it becomes hard to test alternative wings as the become available. I don't know which design is currently 'best', but I would be keen for some kind of standard, especially for the long term growth of the sport, resale and cost control.

Hear, hear.

As well as that, Its kinda critical with foils and the loads exerted on everything that everything fits (solidly), what ever system is decided on. No having to alter things to make them fit.

Development continues on different paths, as it should.
Who's to decide the fuse length in front of the center of mast?

next you'll be wanting Holden parts to fit your Ford

IMHO forget about using tuttle mounts for foiling. The tuttle mount focusses all the load to the front of the box hence why some fail.
Track mounts are both lighter, spread the loader over a larger area and allow way more adjustment so it a win, win win in my book.

I reckon most brands will all move to track mounts over the next few years
Note:This is just my opinion

Do track mounts also allow a little bit more adjustment for and aft ?

Tend to agree with bender's view for reasons of getting the foil front wing relative to the straps perfectly set up the tracks make a lot of sense ..my only concern/ comment would be if the tracks can carry the same loads as the Tuttle for the more racing style foils ?

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normster said..
Do track mounts also allow a little bit more adjustment for and aft ?

yes massively so

Pretty sure the thread was actually about the mounting of wings and foil masts to fuselages
And yes it would be nice if it was a perfect world and there was a standard good universal solution adopted by all however I think this is unlikely

As for the board interface I do agree that tuttle is flawed and not as good a solution for most foil use cases as tracks however tuttle boxes are definitely a better idea for race foils than tracks having that connection through the board of the deck and the bottom is great for stiffness and strength

Just to shake up the discussion:

I've sailed both track and tuttle, and both have advantages. Tbh there is an "ideal" position of the mast, which is under your backfoot but slightly aft. Racing foils are all designed to be setup in this way. The track is the way to go for freeride I think, but it isnt everything because if you move it too far forward (I crave maximum frontfoot preassure always) you get a seesaw effect around the attachment point. Having the mast further aft and wing forward is way more stable, therefore tuttlebox, or at least a fixed way to set it up would be better in my opinion especially for racing. Especially since I've found foil/board combos have practically only 1 correct position after which I never change I'd rather just have a fixed attachment point and move the straps / mastfoot to find ideal trim.

Lastly I see a problem with raketrim arising with the trackmount system. Ofcourse shimming would still be possible, but in board design the tailkick would be suboptimal I think because it has to be straight along the entire track (cuz otherwise the foilrake is wrong), leaving you with loads of kick in the tail which wont do planing any good. Or youd have a normal rockercurve along the rail, resulting in the nose going down as you shift the foil forward, which seems an even worse idea to me, also kind of diminishing the effect of shifting the foil forward because the front foot is lowered (lower frontfoot results in less front foot preassure).

Standard wing/fuselage/mast attachments are never going to happen...well maybe within a racing class but certainly not industry wide.

RE box, As the others have said I think for the race foils the deep tuttle seems to be the go, I've never had a problem with mine (factory foil box) and as said you can adjust mast rake easily which is super important for light wind take off and they tie the deck to the bottom which is very stiff.

As has also been mentioned moving the front wing is a dangerous game. If you move it as a whole assembly, as on a foil track it can have unintended consequences, IE way less stability. The mast is effectively your directional pivot point, you want to keep it right at the rear for maximum directional stability and move the front wing accordingly for desired lift position. It's why all the race foils have a standard mast position (at the back) and different fuselage lengths to move the front wing forward or back relative to mast position. They have tried forward boxes, it does not work well. Might be ok on a freeride foil where a bit of looseness is ok or even an advantage but on a big power race foil setup, it's sub-optimal

Mast further back for directional stability makes intuitive sense. It's similar to moving a fin around in the US box. But tracks can be mounted just as far back as tuttle boxes; the Fanatic Stringray is an example. Tracks definitely offer an advantage in regards to adjustments, which is most important if you want to mix and match foils and boards. I just put tracks into a board after seeing that replacing the power box with a foil box did not do the trick - the wing ended up too far back. Tracks may be a bit heavier than the box, but distribute the load over a much larger area.

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WhiteofHeart said..
Especially since I've found foil/board combos have practically only 1 correct position after which I never change I'd rather just have a fixed attachment point and move the straps / mastfoot to find ideal trim.

I agree, but it is worth noting that the "correct position" depends on rider preferences. When my wife used my setup a couple of days ago, she thought the front wing was too far back. She prefers foiling with minimal power, while I prefer a bit of pull from the sail. She's also more used to lots of front foot pressure from freestyle.

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CJW said..
RE box, As the others have said I think for the race foils the deep tuttle seems to be the go, I've never had a problem with mine (factory foil box) and as said you can adjust mast rake easily which is super important for light wind take off and they tie the deck to the bottom which is very stiff.

I'm wondering how many manufacturers do the same with a tracks. For boards that have both foil box and tracks, the tracks can be attached to the foil box. But if it's just tracks, they may "swim" and the EPS core. When researching on how to put in tracks, I found plenty of stories about tracks causing delaminations near the track ends. I think at least some of these were from non-sandwich boards like big SUPs, though.
For the track install I'm currently doing, I put a PU plug to the top sandwich in to create a firm connection. The back is glued to the foil box so this may be overkill, but better over- than under-engineered.

I have about 750 hours foiling, the vast majority of those on my deep tuttle masts. My favourite mast has 350 hours. I would have to be dragged kicking and screaming to consider plate and track mounts.

The main reason is the sheer elegance and convenience of the deep tuttle mast. I do a full assemble/disassemble every session.

The mast pops into the slot, two screws and job done. The taper ensures the connection is tight and reliable. The screws don't need to be clamped up tight. Theoretically it would hold together without screws. There are two more screws holding the fuselage onto the mast.

With no plate at the top the mast sits dead flat in the back of the car. I have my main mast and 2-3 others I use for specific purposes. I can have them all sitting in the back of the car with other gear plonked on top. For all intents and purposes they take up zero space in the car.

My usual riding stance is with the front foot in a strap and the back foot on top of the mast. As conditions get gnarly (big chop and strong wind) my back foot comes forward. Smooth water and steady wind and the back foot goes back.I move my feet all over the place. My back foot is in the strap for going fast upwind or jumping. Not once have I thought, I have to move my mast.

The deep tuttle box is completely bonded to the top and bottom surfaces of the board and fully enclosed in high density carbon. It is ridiciulously over engineered for the purpose. There's no reason you couldn't do the same with track mounts.

I have only encountered a couple of negative issues with the deep tuttle mount. Your board needs to be thick enough to handle the box and the head of the mast. That precludes just dropping a box into your favourite surfboard. I did add a box to a SUP and that worked ok. And of course, you can't adjust it if you want to.

When you think about it, almost all hydrofoils have tuttle mounts. The top of the mast is flat and fits into a slot. For plate mounts the slot is the bottom of the plate which is clamped onto the board. For deep tuttle the box is fully integrated into the board.

Apart from convenience and elegance, there are stories of foils falling out of track mounts, and stories of the tracks being chewed out by the screws. Both of those things are almost impossible with deep tuttle mounts.

Every kitefoil is twin US box.
No problems.

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LeeD said..
Every kitefoil is twin US box.
No problems.

The stress on a kitefoil and board is different than on a windfoil. For example, upwind, they are pushing pretty much against the wing straight through the board. In windfoil, we have someone like AA 40-45 cm out on the edge of the board levering the heck out of the foil attachment.

Watch at 24:02 if you want to see how much a stress there is on a foil mast. Yeah, I know not everyone races but there are a lot of big boys freesailing foils. btw, if anyone didn't catch the Engadinwind live streams on Youtube. they're amazing to watch.
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I wish I had more green thumbs for Gorgo - yep, two screws and I'm done. If I need to tweak, I have footstraps, mast base, boom.

I bent a platemount once.. nothing is perfect. I feel the tuttle is also better for jumping.

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WhiteofHeart said..
I bent a platemount once.. nothing is perfect. I feel the tuttle is also better for jumping.

Did anything come loose or did the mast/mast plate joint bend?

Nothing came loose, the plate itself bent. I think partly due to the surface under the plate being really concave, so the plate was only supported by its sides. Add waves and jumping.... (maybe something moved a little aswell)

for convenience I'd say the plate wins. Yes, there's four fasteners instead of two. However they slide into place needing many fewer turns. And I find it much easier to put the board on it's back for the line up and attachment.

Having used plates for kitefoiling and windfoiling I prefer Tuttle. With plates I would end up siliconing the brass bolts into the tracks once I found the spot I liked because it was such a PITA setting them in manually each time I wanted to go foiling. I love the simplicity of the Tuttle box. The only application I can think of that I'd want for a plate system over Tuttle is one where I'm using a board for multiple sports like SUP surfing and windfoiling.

Or testing different foils and riders of different size...

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PaulUK said..
for convenience I'd say the plate wins. Yes, there's four fasteners instead of two. However they slide into place needing many fewer turns. And I find it much easier to put the board on it's back for the line up and attachment.

Stainless torx screws and a t-handle wrench. The t-handle acts as a flywheel and spins the screw in. It's faster than an electric screwdriver and there's no risk of cross threading. So far the torx heads show no sign of wear.