Zeeko Spitfire Hydrofoil

[bragnouff]

Hi Mike, I'd say the XLW wings are also a very good start for what you want to do. I'm also close to 90kg, and not so much into going in straight lines. I'm yet to be convinced of benefits of SUP sized wings for kiting.
From what I understand, wings are interchangeable

[Mikey]

Hi Nicolas,

Any news of the XXLW release?


@ Bragnouff, thanks for the advice . I’m still leaning towards the xxlw setup. I kind of like the idea of having something for both for sup and kite. I could later get xlw’s for driving a bit harder on the kite!

[Zeeko]

Hi Mike

we have a few wings XXLW ready, contact us at: contact@zeeko-kites.com

here is another video about the XXLW wings riding

ride easy
Nicolas

[Mikey]

Thanks for the video Nicolas,
(couple of other questions below)

I understand for kiting, XXLW means no jumps, which is OK as i'm not interested in jumping and want to ride strapless

Maria, told me the XXLW foils sets you have at the moment are for 70 cm mast. Other guys have said 70 cm work well for then in a cruiser / surf style. I'm good with that too.

Later, can I get a longer mast, if needed? can I get XLW wings later, if needed? They are all compatible, right (mounting plates, bolt spacing wings / fuse etc)?

Thanks for your patience, this will be a big investment for me, and i want to get it right

Final question, on the video, i notice that when the front wing breaches the nose of the board dives pretty radically. When kiting and leaning over to go upwind, wing tip breach seems likely, especially with 70cm mast. What happens when the wing tips breach? Can you recover? Will I be constrained on lean angle?

many thanks for your patience,

Mike

[Peter_Frank]

Hi Mike

Yes, you will be restricted a lot on lean (heel) angle with a shorter mast, as you will ventilate otherwise, especially if chop.

Sometimes you can recover when a wing tip breaks free, but you might crash.

This is the very reason why racers dont use "short" masts like 90 or 100 cm, but 110-115 mostly.

BUT, having said that, it does not mean anything if freeriding, where you dont ride very powered, not heeled over much - so I would not worry about that.

Of course you will ventilate more with the shorter mast, especially when still learning, but there are advantages too when new, with the shorter masts.
And for SUP it is almost standard and needed with 60-70 cm masts.

Peter

[ronnie]

Hi Mike

we have a few wings XXLW ready, contact us at: contact@zeeko-kites.com

here is another video about the XXLW wings riding

ride easy
Nicolas

The foil does crash a couple of times, but at 43/44 seconds, the foil breaches but he is able to continue flying.

[Mikey]

Thanks Ronnie,

I had a good look, and yes I see the breach, it looks quite minimal. certainly not like the ones where he crashes.

That said, i've never foiled so I have no idea how breach friendly foils can be

Ciao

Mike

[BWD]

Re: foil breach recovery, I don't have a spitfre, but have been impressed how well my zeeko carver wing resists crashing when it breaches slightly. I often ride it pretty high over light chop (20-40cm) with rather frequent momentary wingtip or tail breaches - all I notice is a slight drop in lift for a second, most times. It is definitely possible to have a lot of partial breaching, without full ventilation and crashing, on many foils. Intuitively it seems like ones that do not have downturned wingtips would be less likely to scoop air onto the underside/intrados in breaching. A little air over the exrados/top seems tolerable for most, but only a little, definitely the case with my zero anhedral carver wing at least. Air that gets under the intrados and sticks, with air also on top, seems to be terminal.
Nico preciously said they aimed to apply the avs surface from blaster and windfoil to spitfire in future as well, but I wonder how long it will take to do this. It’s the kind of thing that must take careful tuning and scaling to the wing, it seems.
The current spitfire wings mainly seem to address the ventilation issue by having the main wing farther back and deeper than the front wing.

[juandesooka]

The current spitfire wings mainly seem to address the ventilation issue by having the main wing farther back and deeper than the front wing.

As I understand it, one of the main advantages of a canard is that the rear wing is providing the majority of the lift. So a front wing breach is not necessarily a catastrophic failure: you lose some small % of lift, and sink down a little but have increased chance of recovering and carrying on. Versus regular foils where the front wing provides 100% of lift, so if it breaches, it's nearly always a wipeout.

I've only experimented with canard a little, I noticed some small improvement, but didn't really rigorously test it with intentional breaches.

I remain intrigued by the concept, would be even more welcomed on a sup/surf foil if it works as proposed, as wing breaches will be even more likely in a dynamic wave environment. I still wonder why so few other designers are experimenting with canard -- either due to not knowing the capabilities or if it's performance isn't as effective as desired? Once I have my regular sup foil mastered, I intend to do some experimenting with canard set up, see how it does in comparison.

[Rojbrown]

A little help here please. I just did my first day on a brand spanking new zeeko spitfire. For background I'm 190lbs and can ride a directional strapless jibing both directions. I have experience on a borrowed SS HG over the last year able to foil both directions but no transitions. After research I went with the spitfire and OMG. I'm learning all over again. I couldn't get it to foil consistently and when I was up I went down almost immediately. I get on the water a few times each month. Is it worth sticking with or change to a more traditional foil?