Why a Wing Board and a Kite is Awesome for the Lightest Winds

[Toby]

[fernmanus]

Cool idea!

He mentioned the kites and sizes, but not the board and wing sizes. There are days when I see no kite wing foilers out and it is blowing 8 to 10 knots. Seems like the locals prefer at least 10 knots are preferably 12 to kitefoil. So, yeah, I am interested in this idea.

[Surfkiternew]

Thats the future of Wing.......kite

[jkrug]

i've tried kiting with a wing board, and one problem is avoiding putting your harness hook into your wing board while getting up. you have to be very careful.

[Peter_Frank]

True, I have been wondering about this many times.

But as it hasnt been mentioned in this video, or anywhere else, I dont think it is a problem.

Have often thought about trying with a smaller kite and my wingfoil board, but as one can ride down to 6 knots on a kitefoil board, it hasnt happened yet...

It is really bad I havent tried it myself, to be able to give input, sorry.

I have kited on wingfoilboards before yes, but not in sub 8 knots.

Maybe Smeagle can tell us about experiences regarding climbing on the board and hook or not?
That would be nice.

Peter

[OzBungy]

I have kite foiled on a SUP foil board in light wind. The hook wasn't a problem, keeping the kite in the air was. I settled on a technique where I would send the kite, hoist myself onto the board, catch the kite and send it back the other way, get to my feet, up and foiling and away. It was quite fun.

Ultimately it was easier to go in light wind using my normal kite foiling gear. It's easier to throw the kite around and keep it powered, and less susceptible to being overfoiled during the water start.

It was kind of fun to kite foil with a very slow speed, high lift foil. Position both feet towards the nose of the board, water start and ride around grinning about how silly it all is. With a little practice it's possible to get the trim and the power adjusted so that decent speed are possible.

A higher aspect foil is a bit easier to get going because it takes a bit more speed. Ultimately there's not a lot of benefit because if you have that speed then you can foil with a standard sized kiting foil.

I have thoughts about revisiting all using a Peak. Any kite that would float in very light winds would do. The idea is to be able to kneel/stand almost stationary then start using normal wing foiling technique except with a kite. Also thinking about making a wing foiling harness that could be used for low power kiting without a hook.

[Peter_Frank]

If you can start on your normal foilboard OzBungy, it is not marginal wind.

And in the conditions we are talking about, only superlight kites, mostly single skins, can hang.

These have less peak power, but it still seems possible to foil in less wind with these, using a wingfoilboard

Peter

[Regis-de-giens]

In theory wingfoil plus large single skin should be the optimum for marginal wind . But in practice this is not my conclusion from personal trials, and despite what seemed to be one optimum configuration possible i could dream of to try it (14m2 single skin ultralight cloth + very big wingfoil 1700 cm 2 + very large board 110 l for my 60 kg and significant experience in marginal wind riding for years) , i could not waterstart sooner than with an optimized kitefoil configuration (18m2 ultralight double skin + 1200 cm2 kitefoil).

See one attempt here :



Nice exercise with interesting discoveries like: in very light lulls , help the kite stay in the air by palming with hands to accelerate the wingboard (surfer method but on your knees) and generate a bit of apparent wind.

It is clearly a way to practice marginal wind for wingboard owners, ok, and you can ride far sooner than with a wing in hands.... But ...no sooner waterstart compared to an optimized kitefoil configuration in my opinion.

Hard to sum-up the reason why, but from my analysis it is a combinatoin of below points:

- even with a big volume board, the drag is significant, so you cannot progressively build a decent speed (say 1 knot to initiate pumping) to foil up below 4-5 knot (in my personal reference)

- without apparent wind , a single skin ( even larger than 13m2) , generates very low power and peak power in such low wind , at least not enougth to accelerate and foil up: loops hardy finish their round and genetate no speed. Double skin kite have faaar more waterstart efficiency.

- the serial Loops of the kite are more efficient on a small/ agile board which you better control the anti-drag plan and optimized it. The fact that the wingboard flots above the water nd can pivot aroud the mat too easily, makes it hard to fine tune the angle to the wind during large kite working and loops.

- pumping the foil at almost no speed is more efficient on a lighter and smaller board which you can move and shake more agressively to pump-up And kiteboard is lighter to foil-up...

- I even tried with "intermediaite" 70 liters wingboard and it was worse. Believe it or not but needed at least 1 knot more than my limit with my optimum kite foil config.

Hence i have sold my 14m2 single skin after this experience, feeling that i will not save any knots in light wind (maybe a hope by perfectly combine palming upwind + get up "in a jump" and perfect body balance/anticipation during the loop , and with more than 40m lines and a "no rocker flat board" ? I am even not sure , i would say no...).

I have another idea to test , but not on a wingboard and also not with a single skin if not 18m2 at least ...

[Just Passing Through]

I see little or no wind in this video...

[Just Passing Through]

KD did the same a few weeks ago as well...