Contact   Imprint   Advertising   Guidelines

Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold

Here you can exchange your experience and datas about your home build boards
naishdude
Very Frequent Poster
Posts: 968
Joined: Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:14 am
Local Beach: Holland
Spain
Danemark
France
Favorite Beaches: everywhere at the seaside, where it is allowed to kite
Style: cruising& wave
Gear: Airush Sector 54 V5, Cypher5'8 active, compact 5'6, Compact5'5 active, Limit Waves custom 5'6
Ozone reo V5 12 9 7 5
Brand Affiliation: none
Location: outer space
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 6 times

Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold

Postby naishdude » Mon May 21, 2012 9:29 am

Hi there, the idea came out of the fact that I bought some old kite waveboard for cheap, but the trackerfins that were in there were too small and flexible, in the jibe you had no feeling and nice sprayed turns were not into it, so propably the board was drifting too much due to the too small and flexible fins.

Now I had a plate of aluminium and a 3 layers plywoodplate.
The idea that the trackerfins are without a profile on the inside, gave me the idea to put the aluminium plate on the inside and this would be great because you could screw the allen screws against it ( wood would not hold it)

Secondly the outside of the fins, would be wood, easy to profile and lightweight too.

I copied another trackerfin on the wood and the aluminium as well, cut them out, and glued them together with Tec7 a silicon based glue that glues everything together.
A night inbetween a benchpress and the next day we could start grinding and shaping , which turned out to be not that difficult.

6layer plywood would have been better to controle the profile and it would look nicer but these are just proto's, to see if they hold the pressure ( maybe 6layer plywood would be stronger, we will see)

If this holds, I will be going a good time this winter in makeing all kinds of fins, they turned out really light :now 70grams for one, and still need to work the epoxy that I pored over the wood.

Any ideas/remarks would be helpfull, have not been able to test them yet.
Cheers
Dude 8)

User avatar
ChristoffM
Medium Poster
Posts: 196
Joined: Tue Jul 19, 2011 5:26 pm
Local Beach: Langebaan and Cape Town.
Favorite Beaches: Anywhere in the Cape, South Africa.
Style: Hydrofoils! (And surf and old school)
Gear: Cape Town Foilboard and Spotz hydrofoils.
Any kite that can keep up with the hydrofoils.
Brand Affiliation: Cape Town Foilboards
Location: Langebaan (Cape Town)
Has thanked: 0
Been thanked: 0
Contact:

Re: Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold

Postby ChristoffM » Fri Jun 01, 2012 6:05 pm

Looks beautiful. Next time one of my fins break, I make my own as well.

Have you tested them?

naishdude
Very Frequent Poster
Posts: 968
Joined: Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:14 am
Local Beach: Holland
Spain
Danemark
France
Favorite Beaches: everywhere at the seaside, where it is allowed to kite
Style: cruising& wave
Gear: Airush Sector 54 V5, Cypher5'8 active, compact 5'6, Compact5'5 active, Limit Waves custom 5'6
Ozone reo V5 12 9 7 5
Brand Affiliation: none
Location: outer space
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 6 times

Re: Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold

Postby naishdude » Sun Jun 03, 2012 7:51 pm

ChristoffM wrote:Looks beautiful. Next time one of my fins break, I make my own as well.

Have you tested them?
I Christoff, I will test them one of these days, we get around 25 knots so it will be a good test..
I fear they will be too stiff.
The next bunch I will make in wintertime, I will polish down the aluminium from the tips towards the base...so the tips will get some flex.
Next time I want to use 6 layerd waterproof glued wood, this gives you a better controle to make your profile and you will have like 5 or 4 layers and nice surrounding lines...onto the wooden side of the fin...

I have made a middle fin too, 2mm of Aluminium and on each side a 1mm wood, I ket teh wooden forms wider that the aluminium core, I will now inbetween the two wooden plates I glued onto the alu, put in some epoxy putty, and let it dry, this way I can make a nice pointed profile all around the fin.
Then pinsel some epoxy glue over the whole and see how these work.

Keep you posted
Dude 8)

naishdude
Very Frequent Poster
Posts: 968
Joined: Tue Oct 14, 2008 9:14 am
Local Beach: Holland
Spain
Danemark
France
Favorite Beaches: everywhere at the seaside, where it is allowed to kite
Style: cruising& wave
Gear: Airush Sector 54 V5, Cypher5'8 active, compact 5'6, Compact5'5 active, Limit Waves custom 5'6
Ozone reo V5 12 9 7 5
Brand Affiliation: none
Location: outer space
Has thanked: 6 times
Been thanked: 6 times

Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold...forget about

Postby naishdude » Mon Jun 04, 2012 6:12 pm

Ok guys...

thjey do not hold, first attempt , heavy shorebreak, justtouched the beach to get started it was over...the aluminium plied and the wooden surface broke...fin stayed into the box without damage...

pity, it would have been an nice winterhobby to make several fins..

next time better

dude :cool2:

flyyboyy
Medium Poster
Posts: 64
Joined: Thu Aug 04, 2011 4:21 pm
Brand Affiliation: None
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Has thanked: 0
Been thanked: 0

Re: Selfmade trackerfins wonder if they will hold

Postby flyyboyy » Thu Sep 06, 2012 4:49 pm

Why not glass the outside? The aluminum leading edge is a great idea! To improve on that get aluminum that has a spine behind it that you could insert into the LE so it has more area to hold it.

I used to make skegs for my olddddddd Bic windsurfer out of just wood like yours. They always lasted and were a cinch to make. They always looked nice like yours. Nice pics.

I'm going to make some longer ones for a surf/kite board I'm making. Will probably use lexan but may look into some kind of wood/aluminum laminate.


Return to “Gear Builders”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 48 guests