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Mr Keen said..


... but new owner is about to sell it back to me for the bigger days

offer half the price !

Ha ha, word at the local is I am paying double

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Mr Keen said..

WsurfAustin said..
I'd like the smallest I can get away with. The 114 will get me home in any condition, but might get a 90 for the big days, and stay close to home. Swimming a rig home..no fun.

I am with you, at 85kg. Current board at 111ltr will float me home. As JJ & Gwarn say there are no disadvantages to a thicker board with compact dimensions. 170?65?16cm.
Largest sail is 5..2 foil freek, smallest 3.3 freek. No need for a bigger sail as I can get going in 10-12 knots. Any larger would diminish manoeuvrability.
Sold my 90ltr wizard, but new owner is about to sell it back to me for the bigger days

Cool, you could do the "JJ" "mod. I wonder if a board like a 90 was thicker, would it still be sloggable, or would the water line be too short to manuver in light wind through large boat waves ?.
I typically get to the edge of the lake where I won't get run over, and drop the sail and wait for the next wind line. 20 minutes Slogging home when the wind dies is not uncommon where I'm at.

I also need to be able to slog sometimes up to 1km from the middle of San Francisco Bay and the end of the session if you get greedy and push it.

My board:
149x73x12.7 and I'm at 90+ most of the time.
This works just fine for myself.

I only go out if it's 16 knots+ I'm blessed as I live in a very windy city.

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Taavi said..
Having a nose on a wind foil board is good. Makes uphauling easy, makes tacking easy, recovers better from touchdowns, and improves light wind performance as well. No issues with the swing weight either (well this one weights just 6.1 kg with 3 foot straps).

Nice videos, you are a quite skilled windfoiler, MB Pegasus are nice boards but they do not make them any more since Balz left the brand, I would have liked to get the 108...I will need to make myself one I am afraid.

what is your weight? what is the lowest wind you can get going, with what sail size?

I know lot of questions :-)

Ciao

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dimacced said..

Nice videos, you are a quite skilled windfoiler, MB Pegasus are nice boards but they do not make them any more since Balz left the brand, I would have liked to get the 108...I will need to make myself one I am afraid.

what is your weight? what is the lowest wind you can get going, with what sail size?

I know lot of questions :-)

Ciao

Thanks! Just 72 kg. 4.8 m2 sail was still OK, and 4.0 was the sweetest. For extra light wind I used a big 2100 cm2 foil, which made it pop up to the foil super early. Wanted to upgrade to mb-boards basilisk 92 real badly, but somehow couldn't talk myself into it. I think they made a 106 L version as well. If you can build a board, take a look at the basilisk, it has the foot straps closer to the mast base, which I'd say is a must have for a wind foil board to get a fun and well balanced ride.



One more clip with the basilisk. Sweet:

www.facebook.com/watch/?v=518981899978570

If I didn't have my custom board on order, I would seriously consider Patrick's AIO 5'9"
www.nbwindsurfing.com/shop/c/p/Patrik-Foil-AIO-Windsurf-x67823899.htm

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Taavi said..

dimacced said..

Nice videos, you are a quite skilled windfoiler, MB Pegasus are nice boards but they do not make them any more since Balz left the brand, I would have liked to get the 108...I will need to make myself one I am afraid.

what is your weight? what is the lowest wind you can get going, with what sail size?

I know lot of questions :-)

Ciao

Thanks! Just 72 kg. 4.8 m2 sail was still OK, and 4.0 was the sweetest. For extra light wind I used a big 2100 cm2 foil, which made it pop up to the foil super early. Wanted to upgrade to mb-boards basilisk 92 real badly, but somehow couldn't talk myself into it. I think they made a 106 L version as well. If you can build a board, take a look at the basilisk, it has the foot straps closer to the mast base, which I'd say is a must have for a wind foil board to get a fun and well balanced ride.

One more clip with the basilisk. Sweet:

www.facebook.com/watch/?v=518981899978570

Thank you for the heads up on the basilisk Taavi.
I think though they had moved towards a design more windsurf friendly vs the pegasus which was more windfoil focused, with more volume on the tail and fat, sharp rails on the back strap; the Basilisk seem to have less volume on the very tail, with a slight less straight rocker line, and a V/double concave bottom which I guess is good for windsurfing to handle chop, bot not really for foiling where you do not care of chop at all. I struggle with the concept of 'do it all boards because at the hand when you foil you use smaller sails even in lighter winds, and when you finally have tto much of a sail for the condition and may be a good idea to switch to a windsurf board you got a too big board, the two seem not to match too much. I believe the marketing at the moment is suggesting to windsurfers to get the option of foiling..you never know, because all of them have dropped windfoiling altogether... apart for the race part of it. The same did Naish by the way.

On footstraps positions, I noticed they also put the foil very much forward, in a position which is compatible between wingfoiling and windfoiling, and the same they have done on the top moving the straps forward and making them common between wing and wind foiling.
this is probablky to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

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dimacced said..

On footstraps positions, I noticed they also put the foil very much forward, in a position which is compatible between wingfoiling and windfoiling, and the same they have done on the top moving the straps forward and making them common between wing and wind foiling.
this is probablky to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

I recently got the freestyle 115 that I've been using for freeriding vs. my foilx 145. The foilx 145 didn't have three strap option, and had limited ability to get the foil far forward (but I could move the mast track back.

I started with similar foil and sail mast positions as the foilx, but with center straps, and kept pushing the foil more forward in the slot until I arrived at the below picture (foil about 3-4cm more forward as well).

The UJ close to the foil makes the sail have much less leverage and act a lot less on foil trim.

The inboard straps make it a lot easier to control heel to toe carving (enough that even I'm getting better at it), and makes some freestyle moves possible or a lot easier (especially those that require getting into switch stance first, which I have been trying to convince myself to try...). For waves the inboard straps makes control way better.

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dimacced said..

this is probably to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

Edoardo,

I am riding the straps close to the mast base, but on my board the straps are a bit further apart, I would love them to be a bit closer together. There is a real benefit of having the mast base close to where you stand - that makes the rig to feel connected to the foil, and not to the nose of the board. The extra tail after the back foot strap makes it a super stable platform in light wind conditions where you are perhaps not foiling all the time.

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Taavi said..

dimacced said..

this is probably to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

Edoardo,

I am riding the straps close to the mast base, but on my board the straps are a bit further apart, I would love them to be a bit closer together. There is a real benefit of having the mast base close to where you stand - that makes the rig to feel connected to the foil, and not to the nose of the board. The extra tail after the back foot strap makes it a super stable platform in light wind conditions where you are perhaps not foiling all the time.

Hello Taavi thank you for your kind reply...is this your light wind board? how is the goya air bolt, would you recommend it? What is the foil you normally use with it?

Ciao

Edoardo

It's a shame Slingshot has ditched all boards wind foiling related, there is a group here in Florida that are now windsurfing, wind foiling and winging (that's a lot of equipment) but no one is investing in new wind foil kit, so it may come down to custom boards soon.

I keep looking at getting a board for just Florida WWF but nothing is coming close from production, you need volume to uphaul on the coast because there is a big wind shadow and very steep shore break, and once out past the 2nd sand bar you need a board that turns well.

You would get your @ss handed to you on a narrow board or low volume and would break something for sure, there is only one beach that provides a run up to the surf and its 1.5 hour drive south,

My perfect board would be 182cm length, 70cm wide @ 120 liters, single back strap and diamond shape tail

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dimacced said..

Taavi said..

dimacced said..

this is probably to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

Edoardo,

I am riding the straps close to the mast base, but on my board the straps are a bit further apart, I would love them to be a bit closer together. There is a real benefit of having the mast base close to where you stand - that makes the rig to feel connected to the foil, and not to the nose of the board. The extra tail after the back foot strap makes it a super stable platform in light wind conditions where you are perhaps not foiling all the time.

Hello Taavi thank you for your kind reply...is this your light wind board? how is the goya air bolt, would you recommend it? What is the foil you normally use with it?

Ciao

Edoardo

Hi Edoardo,

Yes, with a big foil it works well in light wind and gets going easy. I would suggest a good and light weight freestyle rig for the most effective light wind riding, instead of a big heavy freeride rig, but anything works really. In the video above I was using 5.5 m2 leaner sail which is super light and works well enough too. As a big foil I have used this one ( sabfoil.com/en/products/front-wing-tortuga-1100-2 ).

You should probably not listen to me, as I sell these hahahaha. But our riders seem to like it. It doubles as an easy board for learning wing foiling too (the pad on the newer model is a bit longer, making it more comfortable for winging, but the first generation is OK as well).

Here are a couple of them cruising around happily. 105 and 120 litres.



And here is one guy learning winging with a 120 L. 4th day learning, and 1st day with proper long flights.



And with a faster foil you can easily use it for blasting around. 750 cm2 front wing here:



Hope it's helpful.

cheers
Taavi

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CoreAS said..

My perfect board would be 182cm length, 70cm wide @ 120 liters, single back strap and diamond shape tail

The freestyle 115 is pretty close to that. At 94kg I can uphaul a 7.0 foilglide on it.

Tavi, you are an amazing waterman! Thanks for sharing and showing that longer boards can still rip! Thanks for teaching windsurfing too!

I came really close to buying an Airbolt before I decided to build my own. My design was influenced quite a bit by that board.

Reading through the comments above it seems we all agree on most things, here is a summary.

We all want to uphaul, some want or need more of that feature but none are willing to ride sinkers.

Thickness is not a horrible thing.

Many of us are starting to realize that board aft of the foil is not the end of the world, and it makes for a user friendly low rider with few cons to the high end.

Maneuverability is improved by bringing the sail closer to the foil and for a given length swing weight is reduced if the foil is moved forward on the board.

The riders that are pushing short and compact to the limit have access to strong wind regularly and ride at a really high level. The rest of us are happy with a little more float, length and board in front of the mast.

I found it interesting that on Simon's recent custom he kept a really short length but flattend the rocker line forward (thickness) and ended up digging the fact that the board was easier to tack while at the same time there were no cons on the high performance aspects.

On my new board I increased the thickness and volume in and forward of the mast base (realative to the shred sled) to improve uphauling. A unexpected benifit was the abiltiy to pump the sail more aggressivly without nose diving, When I am feeling strong I can fly sooner because of it.

Bummer the industry doesn't want us anymore, oh well it's a ton of fun sorting all this out on our own!

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Taavi said..

dimacced said..

Taavi said..

dimacced said..

this is probably to avoid too much of an option for inserts, don't know what is the feeling on the water. what is your experience on that, is really god for windfoil to have the straps closer to midline and to the UJ? What do you get better by doing so?

Thank you so much.

ciao

Edoardo

Edoardo,

I am riding the straps close to the mast base, but on my board the straps are a bit further apart, I would love them to be a bit closer together. There is a real benefit of having the mast base close to where you stand - that makes the rig to feel connected to the foil, and not to the nose of the board. The extra tail after the back foot strap makes it a super stable platform in light wind conditions where you are perhaps not foiling all the time.

Hello Taavi thank you for your kind reply...is this your light wind board? how is the goya air bolt, would you recommend it? What is the foil you normally use with it?

Ciao

Edoardo

Hi Edoardo,

Yes, with a big foil it works well in light wind and gets going easy. I would suggest a good and light weight freestyle rig for the most effective light wind riding, instead of a big heavy freeride rig, but anything works really. In the video above I was using 5.5 m2 leaner sail which is super light and works well enough too. As a big foil I have used this one ( sabfoil.com/en/products/front-wing-tortuga-1100-2 ).

You should probably not listen to me, as I sell these hahahaha. But our riders seem to like it. It doubles as an easy board for learning wing foiling too (the pad on the newer model is a bit longer, making it more comfortable for winging, but the first generation is OK as well).

Here are a couple of them cruising around happily. 105 and 120 litres.

And here is one guy learning winging with a 120 L. 4th day learning, and 1st day with proper long flights.

And with a faster foil you can easily use it for blasting around. 750 cm2 front wing here:

Hope it's helpful.

cheers
Taavi

Thank you so much, very kind info from you.
I see you got into winging as well, I did too, though, I am not blessed by leaving in a windy place so I managed to get to an intermediate level in windfoiling I would say, I am a good windsurfer, but on the wing I am a total novice and struggling to fit the wing into the quiver..when you have too many things you get in trouble.

What is your experience, how you would compare winging and windfoiling? what are in your opinion advantages and cons if any for the two?

Sorry for throwing other questions to you..pardon me:-)

Edoardo

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dimacced said..

Thank you so much, very kind info from you.
I see you got into winging as well, I did too, though, I am not blessed by leaving in a windy place so I managed to get to an intermediate level in windfoiling I would say, I am a good windsurfer, but on the wing I am a total novice and struggling to fit the wing into the quiver..when you have too many things you get in trouble.

What is your experience, how you would compare winging and windfoiling? what are in your opinion advantages and cons if any for the two?

Sorry for throwing other questions to you..pardon me:-)

Edoardo

Hi Eduardo,

Thanks. And no worries at all. Sorry I feel like hijacking the topic a bit though. To me winging complements windsurfing nicely. Very similar skillset, definitely very easy to learn if already windsurfing with smaller boards too, also people with surfing skills are picking up winging quickly. Not the same with the average kiters though - for them the balance thing on a board is still something they'll need to learn. To each their own of course, but somehow with a wing I feel the bad wind and/or flat water days are more fun than with a wind foil board - you can ride more actively, even in really unreliable wind conditions. It has probably something to do with the physics, the advanced wing gear can just be that much lighter and more responsive. The gear has become ridiculously good and efficient lately. I am often riding that 630 cm2 foil both in the very very small waves and on our flat water lake as well, the big and super-efficient 95 litres board + the foil weights under 8 kg. No sail power or pumping needed, a bit of swell is all you need, and making lots of turns generates enough speed you'll need to keep the foil happy.



But back to wind foiling. See the short clip at 01:45, how lively and engaged the wind foiling can be, given a bit of wind swell. And notice how having a longer nose does not affect that kind of riding at all. I'd say some weight in the nose area even helps, and makes the board's weight distribution better suited for that kind of turns.

Patrik's thoughts on footstap setup / foiling geometry - starts at 16.50