Saturday, December 6, 2008

Longboard Windsurfing article

http://www.lbwindsurfing.com/ just published an article I wrote about the Expedition Windsurfer. Pretty cool stuff. Check it out.

3 comments:

Morley said...

Found my way here from LBWS. Great project, nice to see it under sail (your son did fine, "cheeesh"!). It looks like it doesn't use much of its waterline length to get the speed, the front half or more is out of the water, so it must be planing to some degree?? Maybe it will only go so fast (12 knot) without extreme pushing? My old Bic Astro Rock was like that, it could get up to about 18 knots then refused to go any faster. Probably an overall weight thing (it had a LOT of water inside). Or it could be rocker? Your board looks very clean in terms of little wake. Nice job!

Trey said...

Thanks Morley,
The project has been fun. I hope that with footstraps I can get better speeds. We have a coldfront approching this week and I hope to get some more numbers.

Trey

Matt said...

Hi Trey, was good to read about your project. A couple of years ago i did a similar thing but used a std Mistral one design race board and added a kevlar capsule to the front. I sailed down part of the Aust east coast for a few days in mostly downwind conditions which was tough going but all the training i did was in the Port Phillip Bay in Melbourne (Vic). I found the board planed well and with the 15 - 20kg of weight in the front was quite stable even at 20+ knots. I used a NP 8.5m 4wd sail but have just got hold of a 9.0m Gaastra Nitro which i hope to test in a week or so.
send me an email so i can email you a pic of the board with the capsule. i would be interested to hear more of your thoughts on the ideal board design.
Matt