Some refurbed Spotz2 Masts with brand new wings going cheap in the buy/sell section if lads are looking for a low cost entry to foiling.There quite a few board builders now also making great boards locally in Aus for around 1k. UniDrive (melboube), Bischops Boards Perth, and a guy down in Margs River just made awesome bambo decked boars for a local here.

dachopper said..
All those guys wondering about how to avoid galvanic corrosion with carbon parts.

Simple answer is to use titanium. And if your paying 3 to 4 grand for a foil board, I would expect at a "minimum" - they would use 20 grams of the stuff, and add $20 to the board price.

Aluminium + carbon = asking for trouble, a cheap way to get performance, but you need a real barrier solution

Aluminium foil are more between 1-1.5 grand. They usually come with laminated FG wings or G10. At 3-4 k you get a full carbon construction.


Not much point to use Titanium for entry level, plus I guess the weight would be greater too. Aluminium foil are already between 3.5 and 4.5kg which is already fairly heavy.

dachopper said..
All those guys wondering about how to avoid galvanic corrosion with carbon parts.

Simple answer is to use titanium. And if your paying 3 to 4 grand for a foil board, I would expect at a "minimum" - they would use 20 grams of the stuff, and add $20 to the board price.

Aluminium + carbon = asking for trouble, a cheap way to get performance, but you need a real barrier solution

I didn't think galvanic corrosion was a problem between carbon and ss, or is it? Only with aluminum and carbon or so I thought based on a Zeeko post about why they won't do warranty work on their alu foil if paired with carbon wings.

On the entry level foil topic,

I tried out the Liquid force Fish foil and board a few months ago - with no lessons or any foiling experience.

Day 1 I went for only about an hour, and got the hang of getting up and riding on the board, and " kicking" the back up to get onto the foil at slow speed.
The footstraps were not installed, so I also notice that my stance was significantly forward of where the footstrap positions were when just cruising cracked off the wind ( for both feet )
I ended up riding with back foot 90 degrees to forward motion, and more towards the toe edge for balance, and my front foot along the heelside rail pointing forwards - which gave good control for balance when riding upright - which was all I did on day 1 - sort of felt like balancing in a skateboard while being towed by a kite.

Day 2, more wind, and another ~ 2 hours of riding, I was comfortably getting up and cranking upwind or floating downwind with relative ease, and could pretty easily control the ride height. I tried a couple slower speed gybes, basically by turning the board down, hang 10 when you swap feet, and then twist it around, and managed a slow speed foil gybe on one occasion.

Overall - an easy to use foil for me, seemed simple enough, only negs are that the board was a little difficult to fit into the car I had, and don't know if there are smaller boards out there, but once your up and riding, I really cannot see the point of such a long board.

Nick

dachopper said..
On the entry level foil topic,

I tried out the Liquid force Fish foil and board a few months ago - with no lessons or any foiling experience.

Day 1 I went for only about an hour, and got the hang of getting up and riding on the board, and " kicking" the back up to get onto the foil at slow speed.
The footstraps were not installed, so I also notice that my stance was significantly forward of where the footstrap positions were when just cruising cracked off the wind ( for both feet )
I ended up riding with back foot 90 degrees to forward motion, and more towards the toe edge for balance, and my front foot along the heelside rail pointing forwards - which gave good control for balance when riding upright - which was all I did on day 1 - sort of felt like balancing in a skateboard while being towed by a kite.

Day 2, more wind, and another ~ 2 hours of riding, I was comfortably getting up and cranking upwind or floating downwind with relative ease, and could pretty easily control the ride height. I tried a couple slower speed gybes, basically by turning the board down, hang 10 when you swap feet, and then twist it around, and managed a slow speed foil gybe on one occasion.

Overall - an easy to use foil for me, seemed simple enough, only negs are that the board was a little difficult to fit into the car I had, and don't know if there are smaller boards out there, but once your up and riding, I really cannot see the point of such a long board.

Nick

Useful tips. Bigger board helps learning to cruise out of nose first touch downs. I had thought that the foil fish was one of the smaller boards. The slingshot alien air seems massive in comparison.

dachopper said..

$40 for a liter of epoxy aint bad, you would probably use 100 grams on a mast.... $4.

+ the carbon.... definitely less than 1000 feet of 12K... that's $22 per pound roll

+ a couple expendibles = les than $40 easy

sollarcomposites is who I use. specially for the 12K carbon, they are CHEAP !

Haha, you are talking about making a hydro foil shaped key ring, right? I make only boards but knowing how the foils are made, I would guess at least 1 to 1.5kg of resin goes in the build, and that does not include the waste between the many steps.

dachopper said..
1 kg of resin..............what are you building, a 1 inch thick solid carbon pole???.

Comes down to the process u use. I would bet 2 to 3 mm skin laminate thickness would be all that's required. You could drive your car over it, and it wouldn't break. That would use about 100 g. Of resin or so. No where near 1 kg. !

I'm using a process of squeegee rollers to get the right laminate / resin ratio. It works extremely well.

I think you just have no idea what you are talking about.... The "process" of squeegee rollers sounds impressive!!!!!

I might be wrong though so maybe you can build one and let us try it....

dachopper said...




When you're in the boat building business, you really have to think outside the box to make something like this, about $50.

I did get a quote from a professional business before making my own, it was $240 from memory.

coxy31 said..


$400 maybe not $40
I'm a boatbuilder/shipwright of 16years and do nothing but carbon composite work

That's about right. Most of the people I know who made their foil said they spent about $500 for the material only.

When I started to build my boards, I spent over $1000 for the equipment (router, planer, orbital sander, sander/polisher, surforms, sanding pads, cutting compounds, vac pump and gauge, vac valve, c-lockers for vac bag, vac bagging consumables, clamps, dust and chem mask).

As djdojo mentioned, most of the manufacturers have solid carbon masts, generally between 10 and 16 mm. The challenge for a 10mm thick is to maintain stiffness. A 16mm will be stiffer but probably a lot slower.

dachopper said..

djdojo said..
The main companies' carbon foils have masts of solid carbon - hence they can be strong and stiff enough at 13mm thick, and they use more carbon and resin than you're budgeting for. You'd have to go a fair bit thicker if you just wanted to wrap a foam/balsa/pawlonia core in carbon.

It sound like its more down to the way they are having to make it, rather than a smart design in choosing a solid carbon component. The strands in the center would be doing stuff all at keeping it stiff. Imagine a meter long strip of 2mm carbon laminated. It bends, and that's all the central 2mm of a solid core would be providing, unless they are doing something rare with their layup.

Dude, just make one then let us have a go. Since you seem to know things that the other manufacturer don't, you should be able to make those products more affordable for all of us....

What is your background?

flyingcab said..

dachopper said..
All those guys wondering about how to avoid galvanic corrosion with carbon parts.

Simple answer is to use titanium. And if your paying 3 to 4 grand for a foil board, I would expect at a "minimum" - they would use 20 grams of the stuff, and add $20 to the board price.

Aluminium + carbon = asking for trouble, a cheap way to get performance, but you need a real barrier solution

Mate adding 20 grams of titanium won't simply make it $20 more expensive. The manufacturer will need new tooling, moulds, dies etc. Not only that but these will all need to be stronger as titanium alloys aren't as easy to work with and there is far less available knowledge and skills.

There is no doubt that Ti is more $ than aluminium, I was simply saying that for those that do use a carbon construction, since you cannot make carbon bolts, that titanium bolts and inserts made more sense, than carbon, protective layers / gels and aluminium.

Up to manufacturers with which path they go down, but for the prices some of them are charging......

you would be surprised what you can make in your garage these days - Can you tell which technique I used on that tube? I'll give you a clue to unthrow you - I sprayed it with clear after to test the finish level , but it wasn't finished like that to begin with.

Anyhow,

Once I've made mine, I'll take some pics, weigh it, use it, try to break it. If it fails - I'll up my price and say it would cost me $400.

Im surprised one hasnt been made with a 3D printer yet.

So an all Alloy foil with Stainless bolts needs a touch of Tef Gel every cuppla three weeks and everything is fine. Sounds like there is lot of hullabaloo to try and reinvent that wheel.
This thread is about entry level foils for beginners. Not a Carbon fibre workshop.

F a beginner doesn't want to fork out $2850 for a Carbon production foil then they have the choice to pay $1450 for an Alloy foil.
Shovel shaped front winged foils are slow and lift very early, and are old tech. Higher aspect modern tech wings lift pretty early too. And go way faster when you want.
Put Carbon fibres in direct contact with Aluminium alloys and you get bad corrosion.
Put stainless bolts in direct contact with Aluminium then you need the Tef Gel.
For free riding on foils, weight is not a real issue. Stiffness is an issue.
Alloy foil masts with 3 bolting internal sleeves are stiffer than the 2 sleeve versions.
Alloy foils using welded sections will crack along the edge of parent metal closest to weld where the heat weakens it.
Starting with a long board helps control the beginners nose dives.
Anything else that I have missed that pertains to choosing an entry level foil for beginners, please feel free to add.

Hope this works it's a copy from a kite forum post

Rather than having a
Make sure the brand you sell is there to be tested.
At any rate the test compares the foils that are tested. So can be used as such.
I just like how the Zeeko Alloy is shown to be great value for your performance Buck.