On several boards I noticed some cracks roughly 2" long. These were adjacent to the daggerboard cutout. I'm not sure whether they're causing any leakage but I'd like to repair them just in case. I thought I could use a Dremel with a small wheel to grind them out and carefully fill over them using epoxy mixed with fiberglass powder and white coloring so it blends in.

I'm wondering if this will be adequate or if a better repair would include feathering the cracks wider and applying fiberglass cloth for more strength. I don't think fiberglass powder mixed with epoxy has any structural value yet at the same time I worry about making this into a bigger problem than it already is.

What's the board? if it's old polyethylene moulded 1980s thing then nooooo nooo don't

This board is a Bic Nova about 6 years old. Around the cracks you can see grey coloration which was from applying silicone sealant "just in case". Maybe that wasn't such a good idea if I'm going to try to glass it. I'll have to be sure to completely remove it.

To the right of my finger are additional smaller cracks. I also found cracks similar to the larger cracks shown here that are at the edge/corner of the Tuttle box. But they were slightly smaller. When I was very young I spent some time working in an autobody shop (which inspired me to go to college instead). My point is, I'm quite familiar with DA sanders, sandpaper and even fiberglass having worked on some Corvettes. Where this is different is that the fiberglass on boards is much thinner. I assume they typically use a 2 oz or 4 oz cloth for these repairs - unless they can be done just with epoxy and fiberglass powder.

Hard to get anything to stick to that plastic. The Nova is plastic over glass I think
Silicone has just made it completely unfixable and you will never remove it well enough now. You don;t even know if water is getting in (?) so I would continue with the silicone just in case approach.

Are the cracks growing? I seem to recall seeing similar in a virtually unused Bic and wonder if they aren't more of a relic of having to bend the plastic cover around the sharp bend. The plastic is for scuff/ding protection, the glass skin underneath is where most of the strength is.

And... I could just be wrong. However, those look too regular sized to look like typical cracks which would be more hairline-like.

I haven't been using this board much for several years. Recently my "go to" board has been my Techno 185L. This makes it hard for me to say whether the cracks have grown. I know some (if not all) have been there for a long time.

At 68 yo I've found bigger sails to be a pain - loss of upper body strength plus I don't do water starts. We often have weather forecasts of 8 mph but the reality is that it's usually 10 to 13 mph instead. It's almost as though the forecast is for minimal wind speeds. I thought it would be worth moving into my bigger sails: SW Flyer 8.5, SW Retro 9.0 and I found myself doing too much swimming using the Techno with the bigger sails which is why I thought I'd try to Bic Nova 240D which I refer to as my own personal container ship. This Nova has a swept up bow and the darn thing seems to be close to 1 m wide making it very stable. I was so intrigued with how stable this was that I thought I might play around with it and use my bigger/biggest sails. I wish I hadn't put the silicone on it because after reading Mark's post I'm thinking medium or thick CA might have been a better fix. I didn't know they had a plastic skin.

I had one of those once for the kids. If yours has the eva foam deck, it wraps too far on the rails and inhibits early planing. Once on a plane it's a rather fun board and had it planed reasonably early, it would have stayed in the stable.

Obligatory foil content warning: You have a Flyer. Does that mean you also foil? A foil is going to get going a lot sooner than a Nova and with a smaller sail.

Sounds like you need a raceboard.

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Paducah said..
I had one of those once for the kids. If yours has the eva foam deck, it wraps too far on the rails and inhibits early planing. Once on a plane it's a rather fun board and had it planed reasonably early, it would have stayed in the stable.

Obligatory foil content warning: You have a Flyer. Does that mean you also foil? A foil is going to get going a lot sooner than a Nova and with a smaller sail.

I have a Slingshot Levitator 160 as well as a Flyer 7.0 and a Flyer 8.5. A few years ago I thought I'd give foiling a try. After looking at YouTube videos and reading the manual I gave it a try. I foiled for maybe 10 to 15 seconds 3 times. The last run was the best but ended with me fishtailing left, right, left, watching the nose breech and suddenly going for a swim. No injuries. Months later while vacationing further south I took a 2 1/2 hour lesson which wasn't cheap. I didn't foil once during that time. I can honestly say I feel I learned absolutely nothing from lesson that in terms of technique for foiling. I found that episode to be very frustrating and demotivating.After almost zero windsurfing last year, I did take out my slingshot gear this week. Winds were light and I decided to use my shortest foil mast, perhaps 42 cm, knowing I would not actually foil (not enough wind) but I would gain TOW just maneuvering on that rig. I used the Flyer 7.0 that day. I absolutely felt that I started to get the feel of the rig as the foil would try to generate some lift. Did I feel the board raise 6" above the water? I think so. As expected there wasn't enough wind that day to successfully foil but I believe I started getting in sync with the board/sail/foil. With 8 to 10 mph of wind, I didn't expect more than that.

It seems to me that the Flyer needs the boom higher than my Ezzy non-foiling sails.

As a french man y know well bic and repair many.
Epoxy glue correctly on scuff ASA cleaned with aceton that lay asa surface sticky. So make a microfiber epoxy mastic and it will do the job. A flexible epoxy is better to match asa elasticity.
Old Nova 240D had same bic od hybrid design 308x32 a compact hybrid raceboard with parall?le outline. Latter Nova 240 297x92 were more oriented beginners.

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Shipmate said..

Paducah said..
I had one of those once for the kids. If yours has the eva foam deck, it wraps too far on the rails and inhibits early planing. Once on a plane it's a rather fun board and had it planed reasonably early, it would have stayed in the stable.

Obligatory foil content warning: You have a Flyer. Does that mean you also foil? A foil is going to get going a lot sooner than a Nova and with a smaller sail.

I have a Slingshot Levitator 160 as well as a Flyer 7.0 and a Flyer 8.5. A few years ago I thought I'd give foiling a try. After looking at YouTube videos and reading the manual I gave it a try. I foiled for maybe 10 to 15 seconds 3 times. The last run was the best but ended with me fishtailing left, right, left, watching the nose breech and suddenly going for a swim. No injuries. Months later while vacationing further south I took a 2 1/2 hour lesson which wasn't cheap. I didn't foil once during that time. I can honestly say I feel I learned absolutely nothing from lesson that in terms of technique for foiling. I found that episode to be very frustrating and demotivating.After almost zero windsurfing last year, I did take out my slingshot gear this week. Winds were light and I decided to use my shortest foil mast, perhaps 42 cm, knowing I would not actually foil (not enough wind) but I would gain TOW just maneuvering on that rig. I used the Flyer 7.0 that day. I absolutely felt that I started to get the feel of the rig as the foil would try to generate some lift. Did I feel the board raise 6" above the water? I think so. As expected there wasn't enough wind that day to successfully foil but I believe I started getting in sync with the board/sail/foil. With 8 to 10 mph of wind, I didn't expect more than that.

It seems to me that the Flyer needs the boom higher than my Ezzy non-foiling sails.

At some point, head across the hall to the foiling forum and let's get you sorted. Foiling (water depth allowing) offers much more light air potential than the Bic Nova. The Nova is a nice board and pre-foiling, I'd encourage you further. But since then, a lot has changed. Sorry about the lesson disappointment - that can certainly leave a bad taste in the mouth. If you don't want to post publicly, message me.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Select to expand quote

Paducah said..

Shipmate said..

Paducah said..
I had one of those once for the kids. If yours has the eva foam deck, it wraps too far on the rails and inhibits early planing. Once on a plane it's a rather fun board and had it planed reasonably early, it would have stayed in the stable.

Obligatory foil content warning: You have a Flyer. Does that mean you also foil? A foil is going to get going a lot sooner than a Nova and with a smaller sail.

I have a Slingshot Levitator 160 as well as a Flyer 7.0 and a Flyer 8.5. A few years ago I thought I'd give foiling a try. After looking at YouTube videos and reading the manual I gave it a try. I foiled for maybe 10 to 15 seconds 3 times. The last run was the best but ended with me fishtailing left, right, left, watching the nose breech and suddenly going for a swim. No injuries. Months later while vacationing further south I took a 2 1/2 hour lesson which wasn't cheap. I didn't foil once during that time. I can honestly say I feel I learned absolutely nothing from lesson that in terms of technique for foiling. I found that episode to be very frustrating and demotivating.After almost zero windsurfing last year, I did take out my slingshot gear this week. Winds were light and I decided to use my shortest foil mast, perhaps 42 cm, knowing I would not actually foil (not enough wind) but I would gain TOW just maneuvering on that rig. I used the Flyer 7.0 that day. I absolutely felt that I started to get the feel of the rig as the foil would try to generate some lift. Did I feel the board raise 6" above the water? I think so. As expected there wasn't enough wind that day to successfully foil but I believe I started getting in sync with the board/sail/foil. With 8 to 10 mph of wind, I didn't expect more than that.

It seems to me that the Flyer needs the boom higher than my Ezzy non-foiling sails.

At some point, head across the hall to the foiling forum and let's get you sorted. Foiling (water depth allowing) offers much more light air potential than the Bic Nova. The Nova is a nice board and pre-foiling, I'd encourage you further. But since then, a lot has changed. Sorry about the lesson disappointment - that can certainly leave a bad taste in the mouth. If you don't want to post publicly, message me.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Thanks Paducah,
I'm trying to get much more TOW this year and in fact I'm pursuing both activities. When we have winds below 12 mph, I'm using Bic Nova and anticipating sub-planing. I'm hoping it'll make me more comfortable handling bigger sails all the way up to my biggest which is a 9.0 SW Retro.

As for my slingshot gear I'd love to be foiling but rather than trying to slog around in 8~10 mph wind, I'm saving that for days when we have a bit more breeze. My local wind surf area is an estuary with no sharks, no gators, no crocs but we do have 3 knot currents due to tides and at low tide the river is only 2' deep. Our tides are typically 4.5 to 5.5 feet. I've spoiled myself in launching at the beach that's only 100 yards away. The problem is this beach is on a narrow river and in some areas it's a challenge to tack into the harbor beyond the mouth of this river. My record was about 35 tacks to get to the harbor due to the current on an incoming tide. I believe trying to windsurf in this little river has been counter productive for me.

Tomorrow morning I'm hoping will be my first time testing a new approach. I plan to rig my sail and board, then get my boat that's located about 800 yards away and carefully drag my windsurf gear to a sandy beach in the harbor where it's wide and has more wind (no obstruction from trees or buildings). However, there's a spit of sand creating a peninsula that blocks larger seas from Long Island Sound which are often 3' to 5'. Sorry for such a long winded reply.

The pin showing 8 kts is where I usually launch. It's a nice reach to the Clinton Town Beach. Prevailing winds from the SW 90% of the time. Getting my board into the inner harbor between those piers with tides flowing can be quite a challenge.