Garage Works - 9/30/2024

The weather was a little funky today, so I opted to stay home from the beach and just get some rest.

After resting for a bit, I felt compelled to get some more work done on No.38

I sanded the laps -

Then I got the first fill coat on.  This is 11.2 ounces of epoxy with white pigment in it.

I'll probably put another fill coat on the bottom, then a couple on the top deck, just to make it a more solid, uniform color.

And I had the intentions of plugging the drain hole I drilled in Roland's Orca board - but it's still weeping water...  sometimes I feel like I'm missing out by not jumping - but then I get these endless repair jobs and I'm good.  Jumping just breaks shit.

Tomorrow I'll get another fill coat on and then probably Foil Drive (new swell coming)

Evening Session - 9/29/2024

And to wash off all the foam and epoxy, I hit the beach with Marlon in the early evening.

Nice full tide, light wind (but wingable at times) and if you were patient, decent waves.

Marlon brought out his new longboard.  He said he caught a few - then he came in to drone.

This is pretty much the go to setup now.

And since we came out late, this was a fast session (48 minutes).

Lots of symmetry!  I mainly went left to avoid taggling with the crowd, but I got to pump out the back and recover some ground.  No double dips today but really I was focused on top to bottom carving turns (SO MUCH FUN!!!!)

And for a short session, 14 waves is a ridiculous count!  That's a wave every 3.4 minutes.

And the rides were super good - the waves would jack up and the turns were incredible feeling -

Seeing as how I've been using No.34 for just about everything, I'm going to try using No.30 to get up on foil using the parawing.  Struggle bus time - but I really want to use that to get into waves...  If I can get the mechanics down with No.30, I should be able to get it with No.34 (and even some of the prone boards on breezy days). 

W:122/PW:2/FD:68/F:4/S:19

Garage Works - 9/29/2024

La was helping out with some races at KYC - so I had time to get some work done on No.38

I started out fairing the track block and getting the boxes set in with epoxy.  And then I got the bottom deck laminates all trimmed.

There's a carbon spine on the blank, then the top to bottom basalt layer, and finally a carbon cap sheet over the block.

I used 21 ounces of epoxy for the bottom deck lamination.  And to make sure I didn't have any off gassing bubbles, I attended to the board while the epoxy was hardening.

After a few hours, I tested the lamination to see if I could sand it - yup!  So I went ahead and laminated the top deck.

Here's the top deck with the laps sanded down and the under layers staged.

And here is everything laminated.  I used 19 ounces for the top deck.

Nice and tight!!!!

I'll sand this again when I get home tomorrow and maybe get the first fill coat on (and if I get it on early enough, I can probably get the opposite side filled as well.  Norm wants this board all white - so that is a thicker fill coat (with white pigment).

Garage Works - 9/28/2024

After the race, I settled into the garage and got through cutting the track box hole.

First was marking the centerline.  I always do this at least twice (and most times I end up adjusting).

I also have to deliberate the actual foilblock position.  I used No.32 as a guide and did some calculations based on the overall length of each board.  I settled on 8.5" up from the tail - and this was where the calcs indicated placement, as well as the eyeball test.

All marked up.  Now it's time to make a huge mess.

And my OCD kicks in - frequent stops to vacuum up the cut foam...

And here it is all cut out.

I didn't take pictures, but I got the block glued in last night.

Bird Shit Challenge - 9/28/2024

I ran a race yesterday - the Bird Shit Island Challenge that was supposed to go several weeks back.

The conditions were nice for the race.  But I woke up late (my head is still somewhere between Japan and here) and for lots of reasons (some not all my fault) I had a bad start.  My start was so bad I even didn't start ahead of the kiters... (but I did beat several of them).  By the time I got up on foil, I was behind Prayot and a woman using an Ezzy (so I think I was absolute last across the line).  As I passed through the buoys I yelled at the boat crew "Did I give everyone enough of a head start to make this a fair race???"

Big wing (Mode Pro 6.8) and smaller foil (Eagle 890).  Nice combo!

The mileage below was way more than the Bird Shit Island run - 

You can see me doubling back at the top of the island - Prayot didn't get out far enough from the island to avoid the dead wind zone and went down.  I hung around until the jetskis came over - there were tons of birds, and they were feeding (which meant there were fish - so there should have been bigger fish....).

And after I finished, I headed back out to see if he was good to go.  I picked him up halfway back out to the island - he was surfing (so I figured I'd surf the swell also - it was way better out there compared to Jump City).

And after all that, I saw a guy on a BRM Parawing.  I pulled up to him and saw he had a 4.0, a narrower board, and no harness.  I didn't get what foil he had on underneath.

I'm going to have to setup my narrow 7'0" board...

Super fun day (even though my race sucked (against the official race time - outside of that I had a great time making the run).

W:122/PW:2/FD:67/F:4/S:19

Evening Session - 9/27/2024

I am back from a business trip - it's been a week since I've been in the water.

The wind was up and down - but Marlon had the intent to go surfing, so I also went to surf.

He ended up taking pictures instead. 

I had heard there was a swell in place - so I brought the Seaside and Beyond.  I should have brought the longboard.

But I did manage to get some decent rides!

I caught 5 and called it.  I didn't want to overexert myself the first day back.

Surfing is not easy -

Roland was out also on a surfboard.

Prayot and Duke came out later on prone foil gear.

It was really nice to get back in the water!

W:121/PW:2/FD:67/F:4/S:19

Evening Session - 9/18/2024

Got in an evening Foil Drive session today.

There was sufficient wind to wing, but I wanted to test the AFS Silk 1050 using it with the Foil Drive.

No.34 is back in the rotation.  And I had the bolts setup right where the ART Pro 1001 was marked.

Norm, Prayot, Roland and Paul all pumped up bigger wings (to wing obviously).

The Silk 1050 worked perfectly in the position I initially bolted it on.

The wind ended up being up and down - with the wingers having to sit and wait for gusts to come through.  But the wind was strong enough to chop up the surface and it definitely made Foil Drive-ing a little challenging. 

Going left, I could have gone for way longer than I did - pretty much a downwinder.

But going right, I could carve the face top to bottom, turn after turn for relatively long rides as well.

From the chart, I had 14 rides in just over an hour - that roughly a wave every four minutes.

So in this realm, the AFS Silk did not leave as good an impression on me as when I winged with it.  It turns, it takes off early, it has pump and glide.  It just wasn't exciting to use in this application.  I may wait to see how the enduro will perform.

W:121/PW:2/FD:67/F:4/S:18

Wing Foiling Session - 9/16/2024

Beautiful day at WPB!  Good strength wind coming from the E, but the waves were pretty small.

The tide was high - so the lineup was a little surgy again - but launching and landing were really nice.

Having ridden Prayot's AFS foils and really enjoying the superb performance, I wanted to take today's session and make a back-to-back comparison to the F One SK8s.

I bolted on the SK8 750 using the Classic mast and used No.36 (to get the further forward mounting position).

Zach and Kalani were the early crew.  Roland, Prayot, Duke and Derek all came out later.  Derek was out earlier with Robby testing a Manta foil drive (then put Eli on it and came back out on a 4.5 wing).

I pumped up the Nova Pro 5.0 (figuring I could dump the extra power if any into the smaller front foil).

Today's session was pretty much half of yesterday's marathon.

The SK8 turns out to be really similar to the Silk - but the Silk felt like it turned harder and a tad bit more fluid.  I'd say the SK8 was 90% of the Silk.

For the first half of today, the wind was stronger on the inside - and the surfers were not out because of the wind so I (and the others) rode closer to the inside.

As the session progressed, the wind seemed to get better outside and the group migrated out.

There were some good sided waves if you were patient and your timing was good.

I went in earlier than the others - I didn't want to swim in and with the SK8 750, I really didn't want to chance it.

There were some ups and downs - but that's standard fare around here.

W:121/PW:2/FD:66/F:4/S:18

Garage Works - 9/15/2024

I got the coarse sanding (maybe the only sanding) done on No.38

This is the top deck

And this is the bottom deck

I'll cut in the slot for the track block tomorrow and get it glued in.  Then I can get started on glassing this blank.

I also got the patch completed on No.34

The enamel clear coat didn't like something on the repair - that's fine, I don't need to chase ghosts.

And while the crew was winging today - every time I passed Prayot, it sounded like a 747 was going through a landing sequence.

And here it is going through a tuning to try and get rid of the really loud noise.

There were a couple of deeper gouges - I filled these (some twice) and sanded to 1000

And here it is all sanded.

I'll look at the front foil (AFS Pure 900) tomorrow and see if it needs some sanding.