Starting to see a lot of videos. Of people putting foils in their boards, especially over Europe way!

Any idea where these are made, or can be purchased? Some specs would be ideal

I'm very keen to buy one, or I'll get dad on the case and we may possibly build one haha

Not looking for overall flat out speed just a bit of fun cruising around. And something a little different and new to try out... Testing would be done in an old slalom 92l and 4.5m wave sail and see what happens.... I've had plenty of time on a hydrofoil, air chair behind a boat (currently learning to backflip it) the lift on that is unreal!

www.horue.fr/produits/

Is that going to rip out the power box of my board? I've got to give one a go. How about everyone at Kyeemagh throw in $50 and we buy one?

At 1450 Eu I would get in the shed and start building.
A nice project for winter !

Try one in Huon pine ? It would look beautiful...

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Harrow said...
Is that going to rip out the power box of my board? I've got to give one a go. How about everyone at Kyeemagh throw in $50 and we buy one?

I be in that! We past the hat around down at the 1st carpark kyeemagh next summer.

I'll be interested it looks like fun

why are these foils always so long. Does a board have to ride so far above the water ?
Is it that the foil has to be a distance under the water to be stable ?
Why does a moth have to foil so far out of the water is it wasting energy riding so high ?
I dont know myself just throwing it out there as I have been pondering and foiling windsurfer for a while

I await your learned commentary

I noticed a few kiters on the river last Saturday. Glide nicely, look good. No issues with waves.
You need a bit of a water though..and a lot of money...

I have been looking at Foils for quite some time & there has been quite a surge in activity since the Americas Cup last year. Most of the development has been for kites but I'm sure some of these foils could be adapted for a windsurfer. The best one I have found made specifically for windsurfers is from France - from Horue located near Toulon. Some of the guys at Horue are actually windsurfers, which helps. Their foil is available with Tuttle or deep Tuttle head. I think that the price is quite reasonable considering the amount of research & development that has gone into it. AHD had a similar foil available last year that was about $5000 (not including the board). The advantage of the Horue foil is that they come apart and you could put different sized foils on the base - of course you would have to make them yourself. If you don't want so much lift sail in lighter winds or use a smaller foil.

The big advantage of foiling is that they seem to get going in very light winds. I have seen some videos of them "planing" in under 10knots using about a 7 metre sail. Not bad!

Here is a pretty comprehensive list of foil makers around the world.

kitehydrofoil.com/equipment.html

You will notice that there is a company in Melbourne who also supplies foils. www.kitefoil.com.au
Might be worth a call & see if they can put a Tuttle head on one!

7m and 10 knts? That would be nice. Wouldn't envy kiters so much for being able to sail in low winds.

Any indications on the board size? Weight? Should the boards be floaters?

Wonder what the stance should be. A strap location would make a difference then.
May pay more attention next time on how they do it.

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Obelix said...

Should the boards be floaters?

You'd want a floater to go in such light winds, but once you were up on the foil you wouldn't even know what type of board you were riding, since only the foil touches the water.

The price seems okay to me. Don't compare it to fin, compare it to a new board. If volume of production increases, and the copies begin to come out, price could easily halve or even better. I wonder if we'll all be riding these in a few years?

Gybe looks fun, but I really want to see a tack while remaining on the foil.

The AHD board is 112.

The board I did it on was around 95-100, didn't need to uphaul it ever because there is so much lift -- bet you could go smaller.

I think the price is OK too for the horue one, if this extends you down to 7 knots or so

Alex Aguera has been doing it in Maui, not sure if he is gonna release a ws version as a commercial product, but he's busy supplying boards and foils to the kiters.

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alohahugo said...
why are these foils always so long. Does a board have to ride so far above the water ?
Is it that the foil has to be a distance under the water to be stable ?
Why does a moth have to foil so far out of the water is it wasting energy riding so high ?
I dont know myself just throwing it out there as I have been pondering and foiling windsurfer for a while

I await your learned commentary

its all about leverage for the moth. the higher you get your boat out of the water the further you can roll it to windward and get your vessel away from the centre of resistance and power up the sail more, like a giant lever. however the further your boat gets out of the water with a longer foil you loose stiffness in the foil and therefore gust response. the moths have found a really sweet balance point and doesn't really need to change. i'm guessing the windsurfer foils have a similar thought in mind except they don't seem to be sailing with much windward heel which kind of defeats the purpose. the reason i think they have such generous height out of the water is for a safety net, the higher up you are the further you have to come down for your board to engage which gives you more time to adjust trim etc... with no flap control like on the moth your ride height is controlled by your board/sail trim so your ride height will be fluctuating quite a bit. hence the need for a comfortable height out of the water

im just spit balling here and i could be totally wrong. i'm just some guy on the internet and you probably shouldn't listen to me

If they were around a $1000 or so, I'd buy one.... And still may do. Dad and I are in the making of building one.. So will let you know how it goes very excited on trying it!

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Rustbucket68 said...

Looks unreal, the other sailor to windward is clearly going faster?

There are a couple of guys with foils here, under 10 knots they will be planing, with a quite small sail. As on the video, as soon as there is enough wind to plane on a traditional board, the "no foil" is faster. But those things drive upwind like crazy.

Used to be the same with the kiters on foils and now some of them (one in particular : Manolo Barlet, ex pro windsurfer) is kicking our ass....

So shouldn't be long until the windsurfing foils become competitive.

I wonder if a foil with a flying wing fixed to the strut would work.I have 3 rc flying wings and they fly well with or without a motor.No fuselarge or rear wing needed.

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seanhogan said...
, with a quite small sail. As on the video, as soon as there is enough wind to plane on a traditional board, the "no foil" is faster. But those things drive upwind like crazy.

Formula board angle ? More ?

With kitesurf foils, there is a 20% gain in performance when racing. I don't think windsurf foils will have a similar advantage, although Sailrocket has done 68 knots and is more like a windsurfer than a kite board.

Because the windsurf foils are kept level, whereas the kiters can tilt theirs to push on the foil, the best system for windsurfers may be something more like Sailrocket, where the board is on a couple of foils, one at the nose and one at the tail and there is a J foil to windward of the board.

Here is the Owlone Seaglider in action. You can imagine it being bolted onto a windsurfer and used to try for the world speed record.

this thing takes up too much real estate on the water

as Russell Peters says, " Someone is gonna get hurt, really bad!"

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joe windsurf said...
this thing takes up too much real estate on the water

as Russell Peters says, " Someone is gonna get hurt, really bad!"

Yeah, see one of those, I'm gonna break out the machete.

That sea glider made me think a bit of those fat tourists being pulled up with a parachute behind a speedboat.
I am sure that we'll soon see the video gag version, or worse in the news...

Again why do they need to be so long?

I have been wondering about retro fitting a old board with the more traditional semi elliptical foils that you see on the ferries etc. Wing off the fin box at the back and one just forward of the mast foot. Not sure about he physics of going up wind or gybing? However it would be more or a distributed force across the board and a more of a conventional sailing position. 300mm off the surface would be enough I would imagine?

A lot of kite foiling is starting to show up where we windsurf, and most of us windsurfers are not real happy about it, they require quite a bit more room than your average kiter.
One of these days there will be a collision and it's not going to be pretty, there is a reason that people are starting to call them guillotines.
But there is one positive, they can't wave ride very far towards the beach, risking serious damage to the foil if it hits the bottom, so they tend to stay out past the breakers.

Check out translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.windsurfing44.com%2Fforum%2Fviewtopic.php%3Ff%3D15%26t%3D512%26sid%3D7b064b5b6bfc37cb5c090a63dd2818c0&edit-text=&act=url

(french translation link from www.windsurfing44.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=512&sid=7b064b5b6bfc37cb5c090a63dd2818c0)

There was a thing like that proposed in the Penguin Book of Kites published in the 80s.

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Harrow said...

Obelix said...

Should the boards be floaters?

You'd want a floater to go in such light winds, but once you were up on the foil you wouldn't even know what type of board you were riding, since only the foil touches the water.

The price seems okay to me. Don't compare it to fin, compare it to a new board. If volume of production increases, and the copies begin to come out, price could easily halve or even better. I wonder if we'll all be riding these in a few years?

Gybe looks fun, but I really want to see a tack while remaining on the foil.

Do we even need the board anymore? Serious question.

edit: I can't be the only one that has had the SeaGlider idea in my head... well obviously not because there is the SeaGlider.
Now it needs a method for having only the minimum amount of foil in the water.

Actually how does that thing stay in the water!? The foil I imagine it would pop out with enough speed, up being the direction of least resistance. Oh wait; wings. Apologies for thinking out loud.

Calling propellor heads (GPS forums): Which is faster in theory? A kite where the force is coming from way, way to leeward, or a windsurfer where the sail leans windward? SailRocket seems to be both.

So a kiter needs to people to launch, how many for a seaglider?
3?

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evlPanda said...

Harrow said...

Obelix said...

Should the boards be floaters?

You'd want a floater to go in such light winds, but once you were up on the foil you wouldn't even know what type of board you were riding, since only the foil touches the water.

The price seems okay to me. Don't compare it to fin, compare it to a new board. If volume of production increases, and the copies begin to come out, price could easily halve or even better. I wonder if we'll all be riding these in a few years?

Gybe looks fun, but I really want to see a tack while remaining on the foil.

Do we even need the board anymore? Serious question.

edit: I can't be the only one that has had the SeaGlider idea in my head... well obviously not because there is the SeaGlider.
Now it needs a method for having only the minimum amount of foil in the water.

Actually how does that thing stay in the water!? The foil I imagine it would pop out with enough speed, up being the direction of least resistance. Oh wait; wings. Apologies for thinking out loud.

Calling propellor heads (GPS forums): Which is faster in theory? A kite where the force is coming from way, way to leeward, or a windsurfer where the sail leans windward? SailRocket seems to be both.

Yes the board and rider are not needed, Just the kite and the foil.

Check this out Izaak www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/Windsurfing/General/Foils-Again-Future-for-Light-Wind-Boards/
Cheers
Marty