Hi Craig,

i hope you are doing well and enjoy the beautiful Bavarian weather right now.

I (1,83/70kg, using mast AL82 with AL68 fuselage) recently bought a non-duotone (shame) narrow board (1,83x47, 90lts) and this is a real game changer for light wind. The basic speed @ light wind and therefore the ability to rise on the foil is incredible! Especially if only about 50% of all jibes and >10% of all tacks are successful this is a real advantage. Much less wind and also less pumping required! I see this as the future of wingfoiling for light winds, even without swell or waves. The only disadvantage: if the wind drops completely below 3 or 4 kn the static roll stability is of course very poor. On the other hand the speed when lying on the board and paddling with the hands is incredibly fast, much faster than sailing without foiling.

To complement this new material I just bought a duotone glide 1305, tested once now.
I had doubts because the 1085 glide I tested in Tenerife with carbon mast SLS felt unstable at lower speeds rolling from one side to the other, and I did not feel real improvements in direct comparison with the HA 1500 (my lightwind foil at home). I thought about the carve 2.0, but availability was poor and I did not find the right size , 1100 felt too small for light wind (with my capabilities) and 1430 much too big for my weight.

Glide 1305 does not show this unstable behavior as the 1085 AND it foils MUCH lighter than my HA 1500. Even stall speed seems lower? So excellent choice and my new combination for lightwind!!! Maybe this helps?

After a lot of testruns changing position of mast and shims I found different setups for my wings (1000free, 1500HA, 1305glide) also depending of windforce. But for all one thing is common: If the boardspeed increases, the board has a tendency to lower the nose (most glide 1305 , least HA 1500). If I shim the stabilizer of HA1500 +0,5° the tendency is reduced and pumping and jibing seem to improve? Top speed seems not to suffer! Do you feel this as well?

When instead bringing the mast slightly forward (1500HA with 0° shims) stability at high speeds is as well improved, jibing and pumping (due to the longer tail behind the foil?) does significantly suffer. And when the foil finally rises the load on the front foot is very high and (for me) it is difficult to bring the nose down again to accelerate to a levelled flight.

Do you have any proposal for a different approach to these topics?

All the best
Jörg