Calling all SABFoil experts: Help me troubleshoot my foil setup

[lifeinthehood]

I’m in Progreso, Mexico for the winter and the wind conditions are generally pretty good for kitefoiling. I’m still a beginner but started figuring it out in my first few sessions here. But started having some troubles in my last couple of sessions when I changed out my setup (I’ll explain why in a moment). I thought it would make it easier but it’s become harder and so I’m wondering what I got wrong.

My weight: 70-72 kg.
Wind conditions: prevailing ENE onto a N facing shoreline. 10-12 knots.
Water: 1-2 ft chop.
Kite: OR Roam 8m
Bar: Reedin Dreamstick X w/24m lines or Cloud CCS w/20 m lines.
Board: Kanaha Shapes 42”
Mast: Project Cedrus 90 cm.
Fuse: Stringy custom (basically a Sabfoil 710 with mast insertion moved forward about 1.5 inches)
Front wing/stab: started off with 633/483. I shimmed the 483 with a +1 degree shin to tame the lift. Had a lot of success. Can go to my left pretty easily. But because of the wind and shore setup, had to quickly work on going to my right. Finally had success in going to my right. It’s maybe 80% as comfortable as going to my left.

BUT, I spent a lot of time and energy getting back to my board because the setup floats on its side and doesn’t really drift downwind even with the chop pushing it. So, I also brought a 799, 679. For stabs, I also brought a 430 and 380. Got them because SABFoil says they are their most stable stabs.

So then I switched to the 799/430 combo (no shim at first), because it sort of floats for a little bit but then sinks. But I struggled. Partly because the foil sank and so I had to figure out how to water start much faster. But also because once I was up, it had a tremendous amount of lift almost instantaneously. The amount of power required to pull me up onto the board gives me too much power on foil. If I put my front foot as far as possible it would stay down, but if I leaned back even the slightest bit, it would rise so quickly that my weight goes back which only accelerated my lift. If I try to stomp on my front foot, it does go down but then too hard and then my board is under water. On the plus side, I’m getting good practice at recovering.

Then added the +1 shim and it helped a little bit - I was able to ride for about 5 seconds instead of 1 - but I still struggled. There just seems to be too much lift for me to control. I thought by switching to a smaller stab, there would be less lift, but perhaps the increase in speed then increases the lift again?

So now I’m a little bit puzzled as to what combination to try next. Should I switch the 430 stab back to the 483 with shim? Should I switch it to the 380 (haven’t tried this stab yet)? Should I go to the 679 with 483? I know that combo sinks. Change to the 380? I would think with smaller stab, you would get less lift, but that doesn’t seem to be the case with the 799 unless the 799 has THAT much more lift than the 633.

So all you experienced SABFoil people, any thoughts on what I should try next? Or just stick to this setup because I just need to find the right foot position?

[grigorib]

If you can move your mast back - it’ll help

[lifeinthehood]

If you can move your mast back - it’ll help

I have the eccentric plate mount and yes, I can move it back 2 cm more. If I keep the same foot position, it would mean my rear foot would be slightly in front of the mast. Do I lose any roll stability doing this?

[grigorib]

If you can move your mast back - it’ll help

I have the eccentric plate mount and yes, I can move it back 2 cm more. If I keep the same foot position, it would mean my rear foot would be slightly in front of the mast. Do I lose any roll stability doing this?

Roll stability is mostly impacted by AR/wingspan and little things like winglets

[jakemoore]

I'm using almost the exact same Kanaha/Cedrus/799/430 combo except the Cedrus lightweight plate and a Sabfoil fuselage. I'm content without a shim but find the front foot sits almost at the front of the pad. I would agree that the amount of lift is a little surprising at first. Also there is lift and comfortable riding at almost zero speed but you need a bit of speed to get enough stability to switch feet for example.

I would stick with it a session or two to find the foot position. You might also try a narrower stance with the back foot a little more forward almost to the gap between the front and back pads or even on the gap.

[Peter_Frank]

I like your way to go for this lifeinthehood.

You are correct in your view. when it floats it is difficult to bodydrag up to your board, when its heavy it takes more skill (strapless at least) to get the timing right when waterstarting.

And a smaller stab should give you less front foot pressure (= feels like less lift)

Shimming the stab up a tad, meaning it will not lift down as much, will also give you less front foot pressure yes.

A paradox you can not get the smaller stab to work, but the bigger (although shimmed a tad) works.

I can read you are fairly new, meaning foil muscle memory is still building, so you get longer and longer rides.

My take on your situation is, that a smaller stab, eventhough it shifts the balancing point rearwards, is a lot less stable.
And if your muscle memory isnt "smooth" yet, you will get the kangaroo and too much lift very easy

I might be wrong, but I would just use the bigger shimmed stab for a while, and when you feel more "solid" in your flight, you can try with the smaller stab again.

Others here are correct, you can set the mast all the way back, and stand more forward or more narrow - but I have an idea above is your challenge now.
And it will disappear over time with experience

I havent checked the area of these stabs, but most experienced will go with a lot smaller stabs for waves and freeride fun.
But even experienced might struggle a bit when carving and switching feet, when they use a small stab for the first time

I use a 170 cm2 for my 1200 cm2 frontwing now.

Peter

[Smeagle]

I would suggest to stay at one (proven) setup at first and LEARN and only start to fiddle when you are really experienced. Only thing I would change in the beginning is finding a good mast position, for good balance between front and back foot.

[Jyoder]

Just move your back foot forward until the foil stops acting pitchy.

[lifeinthehood]

Okay, so I went out again yesterday afternoon and was MUCH more successful. I did 4 walks up the beach and kept repeating mini down-winders to try and figure it out and each walk lead to better and better results. I'll document my process and what I think led to the improvement for any future beginner foilers who come upon this thread. When I become decent at foiling (someday I hope!), I'll write up a guide for other beginner foilers on things that I wish were better explained to me when I started. There's a LOT of stuff that really isn't well explained to beginner foilers in YouTube tutorials or even on websites. Which is understandable because there are so many different variables and it's pretty much impossible to write one general how-to guide that applies to everyone. Most people seem to figure out things by trial and error with only general principles in mind, but IMHO the finer details are lacking. A beginner foiler has to figure out a lot things that are specific for just THEIR situation (weight, wind conditions, equipment, etc, etc). Based on YouTube tutorials, I think a lot of experienced foilers take it for granted what beginners struggle with.

So before my session, I changed multiple variables in my setup. It's probably a better idea to change only one thing at a time, but I don't have the patience to keep changing one equipment variable with each session and trying to determine whether that equipment change made a difference, or if it was the conditions, or if I simply didn't get enough sleep that day, or whatever.
1) To start with I moved the mast back 2 cm. For my PC mast, I have the eccentric plate. With the 633 setup, I had it positioned at -10 mm (from center). That worked well. With the 799, I moved it to -30 mm. That's the maximum I can move it back to. Yes, I could just shift my stance forward but that would put me very close to the top edges of the pads and I'd like a little more space to move my feet around.
2) Switched the 430 stab with +1 shim to the 380 stab with +1 shim. Trying to decrease the lift as much as possible.

My session conditions: 10-11 knots ENE wind (side onshore), 1 foot chop, from a NE direction.
A couple things that I learned trying to do strapless waterstarts in these conditions. It was more challenging to waterstart to my right than to my left because of the direction of the waves and wind. The waves would push me towards shore, causing me to lose a few knots of apparent wind and causing slack in the kite lines AND simultaneously push the board away from me so that I could not release the board without the board almost instantly drifting away from me. The same was not true going to my left because I was able to essentially partially block the waves so that it pushed me, but not my board and so I could apply pressure to the board with just my feet. To adjust for this, going to the right I had to point the board directly downwind on my left hand side and keep the kite at 11:00, then push hard on my rear (left) foot to turn and drive the board across to my right, quickly diving the kite while I had some tension. It was still tough because in the light wind, the kite turns pretty slowly. I had a tendency to dive it too hard in an attempt to get it to move faster, resulting in me flying over the board. But my success rate improved over the next couple of hours. Going to my stronger side - the left - it was easier to get water starts, and initially I had less trouble than yesterday, but the foil would still rise up and breach as soon as I got going even a slow speed. Just more gradually. I had a hard time applying enough pressure to my front foot. I shifted my whole stance forward which led to less lift, but I still struggled to keep a level pitch. It would either dive into the water or rise too much with VERY small shifts in my weight.

That's when I remembered something I read in jakemoore's post just before I left. I brought my rear foot more forward AND my front foot back. Essentially narrowing my stance. I would have thought that would make me less stable. However, a bit surprisingly it suddenly clicked. I got some good flights in and was able to maintain reasonable balance in my pitch. And it also gave me enough time to adjust when I did get a little off balance. So then by my 3rd and 4th walks up the beach I was getting good flights to my left and starting to get short distance flights to my right (when I succeeded in waterstarts). The only trouble was that with the ENE winds going to my left took me into very shallow water pretty quickly. Yes, I could go out further to my right but that would mean a VERY long walk back up the beach. Going upwind is still not a "problem" for me yet since I'm spending so much time in the water trying to waterstart or chasing down my board.

I had to think about why things improved when I narrowed my stance because at first it seems a bit counterintuitive. However, I remembered when I got a balance board last winter, it reacted similarly. I struggled in the beginning when I tried to keep a wide stance. But when I narrowed my stance, it made balancing MUCH easier. Up to a point. If you go too narrow. It becomes harder again, and even dangerous because it's possible for one foot to cross the fulcrum point which then cause the board to violently slip out to one side. My thought is that it is similar to the control bar and how beginners like to hold the control bar at its widest point, but experienced kiters know that the kite is better controlled with hands close to the center. It gives you enough leverage while giving you more fine tune control of the kite's steering line tension.

Thus, I think a narrow stance (barely wider than my shoulders) made it easier because it gave me more fine tune control of my pitch and allows me to shift my weight more easily. I don't have to throw my whole body forward just to get over my front foot. If you think of your body as a lever - standing more upright gives your upper body greater ability to influence the weight shift. Consider an extreme - stand with your feet as far apart as you can. It becomes very difficult to change the amount of pressure you can apply to each foot because you can't use the weight of your body as effectively.

One more note about the stance. I have noticed that lot of beginning hydrofoil tutorials tell beginners to stand essentially along the center line of the board. But watching a lot of foiling videos, I've noticed that experienced foilers tend to have an offset stance. Some of them are VERY offset. Meaning that the rear foot is actually closer to the toe edge and the front foot is closer to the heel edge while also being at a 45 or even greater angle. In my own experimenting around, I have found that this offset stance does seem to result in far greater roll stability. The rear foot being closer to the toe edge helps to avoid "hinging" over the toe side edge of the board, while the more forward facing front foot helps to give even super fine control over the front foot pressure and where it gets applied, while balancing out the heel side.

Okay, that's it for now. Hopefully I get another chance to practice this afternoon. But I think I have found a good setup now that should work. Just need to work out the ideal balance point - I'm getting there. I didn't expect it to be so different from the 633 since I have read a lot of people saying the two are similar in their characteristics. Granted, that may also be at least partially because I changed the stab.

[1234567Simon]

Give your Setup to someone your weight, to Test IT.

The 633/483 is used soooo often, there can Not be anything wrong.

I struggled in the beginning. But the Foil did not fit to me.
After Somebody tried it, I knew that it was not only my fault.

Give yourself more time!