The most futuristic surfing I’ve ever seen was Laird on his foil board, but unfortunately I have not seen anyone take that ball and run with it.
The yachties are always way ahead of surfers on the evolutionary wave. They were way ahead as far as composite construction and now they’re doing stuff like this, even on the small scale, low budget stuff.
Time for surfboard makers to step up.
I know, I know… I’ve thought about this for ages.
I think the biggest problem to overcome in a surfing application is the increased drag from a full set of foils which could support a surfer’s weight. Getting over the initial drag to get the board lifted out of the water would be a challenge, paddling out with a board fitted with foils would probably really suck.
Then there’s the question of re-engineering the foils to function on a dynamic surface like a human-sized wave. Laird’s foil was deep, so it wasn’t really interacting so much with the very surface of the wave. Also, I never saw any video where he was working a particularly steep face with his hydrofoil. Everything I saw was fairly soft surf, even if it was big. It also looked very unstable, and a lot of work to ride. I don’t think that kind of single-foil is a practical solution for paddle-in surfing.
You also gotta think, hydrofoil boats are designed with flat water in mind. Even if designed to deal with waves, they are for cutting through and across waves, not for engaging directly in the face of the wave and harnessing the energy there. So foils for riding breaking waves the way we’re used to riding them on normal boards might have to be significantly different in design in order to be functional. That calls for a lot of R&D, and there just isn’t the kind of development cash in surfing that there is in yachting.
All that said, I think whomever comes up with the magic formula for a hydrofoil paddle-in surfboard will have the world beating a path to their doorstep.
I think the concept is great. The first time I saw a sailboat with foils I was definitely impressed. But when I saw Laird on his foil board I was absolutely amazed, that footage is pretty awesome.
I have no clue how you could ever make a foiled board that would paddle at a practical speed though. Unless the foils were retractable or something…
The first type of hydrofoil I saw was on a sailboat. This is a pretty impressive video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geTExu9EGts&feature=PlayList&p=EA1D8BE06317D985&index=0
Retractable might actually work.The foil would have to be somewhat embeded on the bottom of the board seating almost flush,as you paddle in and start to slide down the wave face and popup,the area where your hands are placed to pop could be a large button of sorts and the spring loaded foil fin would release and lock into position.
I still think it’ll end up being something that will do bi-directional and not add weight, complication and compromise down-the-line maneuvering like foils.
Blakestah didnt think it would ever work out because of the seeming “necessity” of our higher aspect fins and tips, and I know surfers are inherently conservative about design and lots of them don’t care about being able to maneuver in both directions, but I still think ultimately surfing will join the other board sports…
And theyre doing good work with bottoms and fins apparently in the wakeboardin’ field
Hell, I dunno.
more design variagbles = more fun, right?
A few summers back I saw a kiteboarder riding a foil board, looked very similar to what Laird publicized. All the other guys out were gettin a good leg workout negotiating the wind chop and this guy was just crusing twice as fast and 10x as smooth as everybody else.
I’m usually all in favour of all things progressive, but…
Will this stop me attacking the lip?
Busting the fins out is one of the best feelings ever… Ripping the top of one like the pull tab of a cold one (could be a magazine caption eh!)
I don’t wanna lose that!
I know that these things could open up a whole lot of new manouevres, but I don’t wanna let go of the old ones!
[quote="$1"]
The most futuristic surfing I've ever seen was Laird on his foil board, but unfortunately I have not seen anyone take that ball and run with it.
The yachties are always way ahead of surfers on the evolutionary wave. They were way ahead as far as composite construction and now they're doing stuff like this, even on the small scale, low budget stuff.
Time for surfboard makers to step up.
[/quote]
Excuse me.........a bunch of us stepped up about 30 years ago. Okay, give or take a year. In 1980 when windsurfing finally starting taking hold, there were two major camps of designers that surfaced: boat designers & surfboard shapers. A number of us shapers were on the forefront by spending the time to learn how to windsurf so that we could fully understand how a sailboard works.
There were different disciplines that developed as the sport began thriving in the United States: big board & slalom course racing, speed sailing, and surf sailing. I was deeply involved in the surf, slalom and speed disciplines. By the early 80's I had team rider Brett Lickle on leading edge equipment riding 60 ft. waves with best buddy Laird. They and a few others pioneered Jaws and assorted cloudbreaks on surf sailboards that led the way to tow in surfing. I made all of Brett's equipment during the decade, and he trusted his life on my equipment.
The boat designers were creating windsurfing equipment that were sound in principle, but what I considered aesthetically to be abortions. Brands like Meritex Seaquest, some of the early O'brien Equipment, and too many others that fell along the wayside come to mind, but aren't worth mentioning. Two of the higher grade companies had me shape polyurethane customs for their riders that evolved into molded boards within their lineup. One most notable, was a racing board for Olympic athlete Rob Hawley. One of my race boards also clocked the 2nd fastest record at the San Luis Reservoir being beaten out only by Fred Haywood on a Jimmy Lewis speed board. The speeds were clocked by radar and there were over 300 international competitors present. We effectively became the fastest hull in the world powered by natural forces.
During that period of the early 80's, competitions were on the rise, and I had the distinction of being Assistant Head Judge for a multi discipline "World Cup". The course racing was held in San Francisco, while the surf discipline (where I was) was held at Waddell Creek, north of Santa Cruz. The events were viewed by thousands of spectators. Unfortunately the wind dropped for the wave event, and to keep the spectators entertained, they decided to hold a surf contest with the competitors required to ride a sailboard with its footstraps still on. I was allowed to compete in this as it was only a fun event and voluntary. I ended up getting 2nd in the finals behind Maui Meyer. My tube ride scored high, but he beat me out with a headstand!
Anyway, as far as us stepping up.......keep in mind that it was the surfboard designers that created eye pleasing equipment due to shaping surfboards all along. As one of the leading edge custom manufacturers of the era, my research & development comitted thousands of dollars in testing new materials and countless designs that eventually would crossover into surfboard design. Nearly every 'new' technology you see incorporated into today's molded surfboards directly descended from what we were doing with sailboards throughout the 80's.
The yachties actually looked to us, or at least that is what was stated to me by Dennis Connor, winner of The America's Cup when we met in San Francisco during the World Cup. I was telling him how the members of the Santa Barbara Yacht Club looked down their noses at us as poor lowly sailors of some sort. Dennis responded by telling me that he looked to us with for leading edge developments in sailing at that time.
The windsurfing sailmakers like Geoffrey & Borne (Neil Pryde sail designers), fellow windsurfer buddy Danny North (North Sails), and a bunch of surfing sail designers at Gaastra were coming up with incredible new concepts like Rotating Assymetrical Foils (RAF's), Camber Induced Sails, different flex patterns for battens & masts, improved downhaul systems........and as board builders we were building ulltralite EPS carbon, E, K, & S2 reinforced epoxy boards that were the Ferrari's of all sailboards. Fins were exploding in deisgn as well with slotted fins, canards, and new foil chords and high aspect ratios for the new dynamics windsurfing presented to us.
This was the richest period of time for me as a surfboarrd/sailboard/watercraft designer. By comparison, the 80's decade for surfboards was reatively stagnant after the intoduction of Simon Anderson's thruster. Although my business "The Surfing Underground" continued to produce hundreds of surfboard each year, the difference was a surfer hedging at surfboard prices approaching $400 while my windsurfing clientele paid $1,000 upfrot for their hulls (I sold boards with footstraps mounted and high grade fins, not any other equipment such as sails, booms masts and universals. Still, surfers benefitted greatl from all my R&D on sailboards........for instance, I was shaping single double tri and quad concaves on a daily basis and began to crossover those concepts to surfboards. The vertical square tail rails, sanded bottoms, and hard basted edges were just a few other design elements that came to fruition. Fins were improved dramatcially during the 80's as well.
As far as surfboard manufacturers lagging behind the yachties, this isn't really true of the leading edge surfboard designer builders. The evolution of Surftech was once a young struggling sailboard company called "Seatrends" started by Santa Cruz surfer Randy French. "Boardworks" is another supplier of alternative technology surfboard production, and there is quite a bit of PVC, wood, and high density foam vacuum bagging going on by many on Swaylocks.
For me personally, I think there was a time that I fell in love with the notion that in order to be a 'real' professional company producing a product, that I had to look like something stamped out of a machine. I don't feel that way now. I love the fact that much of surfboard making is a craft, that no two are exactly alike. Instead of trying to reinvent the wheel and mimic some other product that has no soul, I feel that handcrafted surfboards are a thing of beauty that offer surfers and shapers the experience of interacting in a quest for perfection.........or whatever magic may mean to that one particular surfer.
[IMG]http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r31/llilibel03/49erruder.jpg[/IMG]
Thats the hard part , surfers want something new but arent keen to lose all the benefits they have now.
Sailing has an infinite history steeped in tradition that goes well beyond “Rum, Sodomy and The Lash” and yet a section of sailors have keenly jumped on the new foil technology and,… well… sailed away on it. I dont think that will happen with surfing, why? dunno.
As for surfing foils, Laird has shown that the foil arrangement he used ( that came directly from the Airchair / tow behind a boat ) works on waves. Looking at the vids Laird has good lateral stability but constantly monitors pitch control, as does the Bladerider system that has pitch control through a tiller mechanism. Both systems are good for long fast swooping turns but Foils dont do Snaps because they lose speed and drop instantly. Theres even a foiled kayak too, “Flyak”.
Terry Hendricks, Gaylord Miller and a few others have proved that foils can be used on surfcraft, but even at 10 knots / 5 metres/yards a sec to plane, they will require long waves to be functional fun.
It’d be great to see a rider paddle into a beachbreak wave, lift off as he bottom turns and then rise higher up from the wave to glide faster out onto the shoulder, and speed off into the sunset but foils are reliant on a minimum speed to lift a certain weight, the bigger the foil the lower the lift speed and a bigger foil is slow to turn / adjust, not to mention paddle.
I found my own foil boards to be a most absorbing ride, smooth, fast, almost silent, the only thing I return to thinking about, when I think about making them again, is to use a single foil or a submerged ‘ring’ instead of a fore /aft 2 foil arrangement that is the popular setup.
Theres certainly scope for improvement when even something this basic is as fast as any board.
Yeah Roy, I remember you saying you did this when we went through a Hydrofoiled Surfcraft thread a few years ago here.
Pity you havent got any pics, what happened to the boards or at least the foils ? Did you save any ?
And how would you approach the hydrofoil question now ?
Some U.S. guy started all this with fixed hydrofoils on his 2 water skis back in the 60’s and now Lairds slicing up giants on foils.
Whats next…
And before I go too far I should mention that Roy Stewart was doing foils on surfboards in 1997.
Its the first application of a foiled standup board, that I know of, so a bit of kudos to Roy.
Heres a few more pics of the struts as they progress.
I think I’ll try something on a rigid prone board, aluminium post with 2 carbon foils.Foil area 200 sq in.
2 thin foils are better than one, and they are at different levels so the front one doesnt affect the rear one.
Something like this.
If theres any suggestions I’ll go with them, if not I’ll start on Wed.
EDIT: for those late to the conversation, unfortuneately some comments have been culled so the thread is hard to follow…
Aluminium struts are under construction so just a few figures and theory and a bit of conjecture…
The style of foil setup that Laird used is from an Airchair , or similar. It has a combined foil planing area of approx 220 square inches.
Terry Hendricks had a hydrofoil paipo with a main submerged ( rear ) foil with an area of 240 sq in and a front canard ( surface piercing ) foil, area 147 sq in. Total approx area 387 sq in.
So the easy guess is that a surfcraft that uses 2 submerged foils would have a combined area of more than 200 and less than 400.
Using FOILSIM ( google “foilsim” and then download the applet ) to get an approximation of foil sizes and angles…
using a foil 6 inches by 18 inches & at 7 degrees AOA ( angle of attack)
at 5 mph ( 8 kph) gives 38 ibs of lift
at 10 mph ( 16 kph) gives 154 lbs of lift
at 15 mph ( 24 kph) gives 360 lbs of lift
Even a flat plate gives good lift figures.
at 5mph - 35 lbs (15 kgs)
at 10 mph - 143lbs (64 kgs)
The above figures are for a single foil and I will be putting 2 foils onto the board.
I may have made grave errors with the inputs so if someone could be kind enough to check my figures please.
The foils are ply with a single carbon / epoxy skin but all dimensions will change as construction progresses.
Pics of the struts tomorrow.
Is anyone reading this or am I being boring ?
Nope, not boring.
Keeping my tech geek hat on…
If you are going to use two foils, look seriously at the AOA of the foils.
I did a hydrofoil sailboat study for an engineering project eons ago,
and all of the research I did seemed to indicate that the forward foil
should be around 2 to 4 degrees and the after foil have a slightly
negative AOA. The theory being the higher front foil lifts the bow
(nose, in this case) allowing the after foil to then go to a positive AOA,
this also allowed for a fatter (lower aspect, higher lift)after foil,
with less tendancy to stall.
The idea being that the forward foil controls the AOA of the after foil.
You could go with a “sensor” out front, and a single “T” foil, or
maybe a hoop, as banking turns would allow the tips of the “T”
to approach the surface and ventilate, this would/could cause
some interesting things to happen.
Will be following with interest.
Pete
**If you break it down in the simplest manner, you have to throw a lot of money at it. After that its time and finding the waves. It made me think of how many airplane designs that were scrapped over costs. Designers can design, builders build, and riders ride. Somebody’s got to pay. Ten I guess, they must sell.**
no, I don’t think it has to cost a lot of money. Time, maybe, to think it up, suss out the “right” or most do-able way to construct, and then bring it off. You only need one good run (World’s Fastest Indian) to prove your concept.
But look at most foilborne craft: they have relatively huge power available to them. Not even Laird could paddle into anything on his foil board, he uses a jet ski. Boats sails produce power that makes our handn over hand paddling motions look utterly futile, less than nothing. That Terry Hendricks was getting waves on his hydro 30 years ago, well, he has fins on his feet, right? And he doesn’t have to stand up, either.
I think the power requirements for paddle-in stand-up surfboards will only be provided by sails or engines except in some rather limited areas. See event though Terry can do it, where has he taken it?
Here are the struts, ( Part 1).
With the 2 struts I’m going with a side by side connection to the board similar to the ones Ive done before.
More on the struts tomorrow.
One thing I’ve thought about is how my father and my father’s friends were all engineers. All of them worked at Convair here in San Diego or for the Navy. My father, uncle, grandfather and father-in-law all worked on the Atlas missle, for example. They know how stuff works.
All my friends, on the other hand, are artists and firefighters and (non-engineer) small business owners and so on. And the thing is, surfboards are really fun as they are. I can’t imagine having more fun. It’s pathetic.
C
I too saw this pic and accompanying article in Riptide Magazine in Australia about 12 months ago and in a meyerhoffer way they didnt ackowledge prior art or history and said it was a “**revolutionary” ** moment to put foils onto a bodyboard.
They did what Laird did and adapted a foil from an Airchair/ Skyski (tow behind a boat) setup and it shows that in essence, the fixed foil itself is the only essential part of the vehicle.
This also means that whatever is above the foil doesnt need to be overtly hydrodynamic in shape. Just as long as it floats and provides a sturdy platform for the rider whether they lie down, sit or stand.
Its already been proved that a rider can be fully supported by a set or single foil on a wave but I havent seen it adapted for use in standard waves.
Where a rider could paddle in to a beachbreak wave and then cruise way out onto the face, carving wide arcs back and forth, without the need to stay close to the curl of a breaking wave.
Here are the finished struts (in their basic shape) and with large polycarbonate foils. I’ll bolt the whole thing to a ‘board’ and then start changing the size and angles of the foils to refine the performance.
