Another FrankenFoil

[Alvaro]

I just found a very old skurfer, and attached my Hover Glide to it. I am going to try to wakefoil with it.
Do you see anything that is plain wrong in my "design"?
The mast is right below the back foot.
Any comments before i get it to the lake are most welcome.

Thank you

[juandesooka]

Depending on how that foil is balanced, you may find you want to put your back foot slightly rear of mast. It looks like you have one more set of holes, could move back hook to give you that little bit extra room. Or you may find once you get used to it that the rear hook isn't needed, can remove it to give freedom to move your back foot to edge of kick pad. Or maybe you'll find the balance and positioning fine as is.

It will be interesting to hear if you can wakefoil on it, letting go of the rope and keeping riding.

[BWD]

I attempted wakefoil with hoverglide/taxi mast and zeeko carver (full mast) last weekend.
We used a decent but not huge wake boat, inboard with wedge, 18 feet I think.
we towed at 13-14mph and tried to ride wake with slack rope or no rope at a slower speed.

With the carver I could get momentary slack anywhere even way out of the wake at 14, don't think I did with the hoverglide except in the wake.
True wake foiling/surfing was not achieved more than a couple of seconds, probably because we had no idea what we were doing and slowed down to 11-13 and tried getting very close, in strong wake.
Since then I think, based on my memory of momentary slack with the carver at 14, and some stuff i read about wakefoiling in general, I would keep that speed or even 15mph for that foil, so definitely try 15 for the hoverglide.
I didn't ride behind the boat with the carver for long, the 91cm mast made mistakes a bit brutal for me, a novice.
I think I might also try it without the wedge, it just doesn't take much size/energy for the foil to surf.
Short steep chop is a challenge with the kite, don't think beginners need a 3 foot wake behind boat for this.
I think you want a faster, smoothed out wake so you pick up the energy a little sooner and more gradually, and kind of tiptoe into the wake, instead of getting violently lifted only in the critical part.
Likewise, the rope might not need to be that short.

I found the experience challenging, since I 'm often on and off the "throttle" of my kites when kitefoiling to keep height stable, and this tool is not available behind the boat. lots of spills, did learn something though, made my first surface jibe in next session, possibly related.

It's kinda fun, wear your helmet though!

[RadDrDuke]

You're probably going to want to move that rear foot further back, personally I would just ditch the rear footstrap

[Flyfish]

Like others have said, your going to want to remount the foil farther forward. The simple way would be to mount it so the front wing is centered on your stance.
Like others have said also, back strap is pretty much optional.
Good luck!

[grigorib]

Dude, stepping on those nuts is going to hurt like hell. Use t-nuts at least, any proper fasteners store will have four of M8 stainless for you.

Also move the rear strap 2" back and I'd suggest to give a try to 15" mast first

[bragnouff]

You're going to destroy your feet on those hex nuts!
When I frankensteined my Zeeko foil on the Double Agent board, I've used a combo of nylon washer, cup washer, and tapered alen head bolt, (and nylon washer/stainless washer/M8 locking nut underneath) and it is safe for the feet.
It actually provides a bit of something to find your foot position in the transitions, on an otherwise very monotonous deck pad.

[aleks]

Dude, stepping on those nuts is going to hurt like hell. Use t-nuts at least, any proper fasteners store will have four of M8 stainless for you.

Also move the rear strap 2" back and I'd suggest to give a try to 15" mast first

Right on, just what I was going to say

[Europ2]

The mast is right below the back foot.
Any comments before i get it to the lake are most welcome.

Too aft.

The strap mid distance is usually vertical above the (rectangular equivalent) Front wing Center of lift line (1)

My 5 minute MAC (2) method:
1- Measure the projected length of your half wingspan = Dhwspan
2- multiply Dhwspan by 0.53 = D (3)
3- paralel to fuselage, on the front wing, at a D distance from root chord (RC under fuselage is your origin) draw the MAC line on a piece of paint scotch tape.
4- Measure your MAC line length between leading edge and trailing edge. Multiply by .25 = Dqmac or quarter MAC.
5- Place a cross on your scotch tape at a Dqmac distance from leading edge = CLift or center of lift = Mid strap distance point

Then:
Make fuselage top surface perfectly horizontal using a level.
Elevate the Clift point vertically using a laser or make a plumb line go straight down to the Clift line

Let us know how it feels.

(1) which is a line going through a point at 30 to 33% of root chord (RC) from leading edge
(2) MAC stands for "Mean aerodynamic chord".
This MAC line is the chord of a virtual rectangular wing of identical surface that would have the same lift properties as your real elliptical one.
(3) The precise value is 0.528672 but for 1/2 Wspan of (say) 300mm, the difference is 0.4mm so 0.53 is perfect for a kitefoil

Global view:

[Alvaro]

I love it, thank you so much for all the comments.