Monday, August 6, 2018

Slow Progress on the Surfing Hydrofoil this Weekend

I didn't have much time this weekend to devote to progress on the hydrofoil, but Marlon and I did move the needle forward a little.  Got the base plate and mast cleaned up.


Here the bead has been poured along the leading and trailing edges.



Then got the divynicell strips epoxied together (base structure for the mast track box reinforcements).  Marlon is learning the sequence to mixing epoxy (he even corrected me about re-taring the scale before adding hardener - I'm going to have to give him credit for a composite material course - HEY I'M A HOMESCHOOL TEACHER!!!


Next step here will be to cut the two groupings into the near final top to bottom dimension.  Then trim the unused sides off.  Finally epoxying the top and bottom pieces together.  Then I can drop in the mast track boxes.  I've got enough d-cell here to make 2 sets of 2 boxes (enough for 2 foil boards).

Linking the last post with this one, I have a big, wide SUP blank coming in.  Originally I was planning on making two prone foil boards with the blank - one at 5'2" and the other at 5'5".  After looking around the Kailua shops and a little on the internet, I'm rethinking the plan -

I may now go ahead and make a 5'2" (or even a 5'0" - after the learning curve, most people are converging on shorter prone boards - I still want a board that has float to make catching waves easy, but now I'm thinking the shorter the better since I'm going through all the effort to make a foil board from scratch).  But the second board can likely be a 6'0", as wide as possible foiling SUP/Windsurf Foiling board.  I'm comfortable now with placing a mast track in the top deck, and am not apprehensive about the boxes that would need to get dropped into the bottom deck for to support the foil - so why not???  Inexpensive option to get to try out the "holy grail" I was referring to earlier...  It's is at least worth the thought...

No comments: