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I've recently got hold of a second hand board (see other thread) and when I bought it, I knew that one of the fins had been replaced, but when i looked the fin up it appears to be a windsurfing fin. and also 2cm shorter than the fin on the other side.

Can windsurfing fins be used as replacements (they certainly seem to be cheaper!)? I can't notice any cant on the 'other' fin if that makes any difference, it appears to be a straight fin.

added pics:

Other issue you may have is that those fins are power box fins , very popular in sailboards 10 -15 years ago and still used to this day,. Every kite raceboard I have seen in the past 3 years has Tuttle fins ,( seems that kiteboard and fin manufacturers have used the Tuttle box pattern as a standard).this may make it a bit of a bitch to track down some decent 2nd hand kite board fins.

You will be able to ride on the straight none canted windsurfer power box fins
But the front fins at least have to be the same size.

I have a board I built about 4-5years ago which runs straight power box fins and it rides ok , but it's got nothing on my Mikeslab with techtonics.

For windsurfing the normal upper limit for powerbox fins is 40cm. They are probably less loaded on a kiteboard but it may be difficult to get over 40 cm fins.

Probably you could get one that worked well as the rear fin

Alex Aguera used to use canted front powerbox fins on some of his earliest production series boards.

Cheers guys, very informative

could this be a good option?

http://www.windsurfingfins.co.uk/prod5. ... rod_anchor

True Ames are a good make of fin.

According to this, you might be best getting the front fins sorted first and maybe go for 42cm fronts with a 38cm rear.

http://ristafins.com/kite/fin-selector

peet wrote:Cheers guys, very informative

could this be a good option?

http://www.windsurfingfins.co.uk/prod5. ... rod_anchor

i have some great fins for sale
cheap shipping too!

Selling some brand new Vector Fins (same exact fins pro rider Joey Pasquali rides)

3- 38 VX tail
1-39 VX tail
2-VX 41 3 degree cant
2-VX42 3 degree cant
4 - sets of kite race CF 42 cm/ 39 rear
2 - sets of kite race CF 44 cm
2x42 CF
1x37CF
1x36 CF
1x36 VX
1x38 Volt II
1x40 Volt
1x44 Volt II
19,19,19,19,21,21,22,22,23 Delta
1x20 Delta Weed Speed

They are all brand new and real competitive!!
they are fins from vector that got made, however never got shipped!

Are those fins powerbox or tuttle? I'm after P.B

Powerbox race fins are hard to find. I had done some searching back when I had my 2011 Cabrinha raceboard with powerboxes. I wound up finally finding some from a used listing on ikitesurf.

I think you can still order new sets of Rista fins with powerbox, but for not much more money you could buy a newer used board with fins included

Out of interest, how do you know if your fins are the right size?
I guess if they're too big, the board is always wanting to flip windward rail over leeward?
How can you tell if they're too small? Should you feel 'fin torque' but not too much to cause board flipping? or is this a totally undesirable effect?

i suspect my 38 rear and 34/36 fronts are too small, but don't know - it seems to ride ok to someone who's uninformed (me ).

Yeah, that's pretty much it.

The original fins for my 2011 59cm wide board were 26 cm and 24 cm (I think). They were too small. It was difficult to ride the board flat. The heel side was always lower in the water no matter how much I pushed against the fins/put weight on my toes.

Then I picked up a set of used Rista fins 37cm and 33 cm. These were from a 65cm wide board and were a little too big for my board. In light wind they worked great, much better upwind, but I got overpowered pretty quickly. When I got too much power in the kite, the fins would get loaded up too much and the windward rail would pick up out of the water. Then the whole board would foil up, the fins would ventilate, and I'd lose a lot of speed. Made it tough to control.