Efoils fun or boring

Fliteboard Ultra - Flow 900 wing / 245 stab - Sport Flitecell - Pro Tail Cover

8kn wind riding downwind on level 1 - 19kph average speed

Back-to-back riding my Series 1 Pro the thing handles like a truck compared to this new board! Pretty much everything I could criticise has been addressed, except the battery tech and weight being the same

The high aspect flow wings are awesome and in a few weeks I'll have the true glide propeller to test too!

I had a lesson on an E Flite with a friend a few weeks ago. This E foil is the only one I have any familiarity with. When I saw the ads for this at $250 a lesson for around one and a half hours I thought no way am I going to pay that much to try this. I have no foiling experience. A friend of mine said come, we are going foiling together. For two it was $195 each. ( By the way they have just had some specials for $149 per person) I was still reluctant but then I changed my mind and we booked. I was apprehensive, nervous, as I did not want to blow the chance of getting up on the foil. I did a J.O.B. (Jamie O'Brien ) before the 9:00 am lesson, drank a can of Red Bull to psyche me out for this. I never drank the stuff, it is disgustingly sweet. I weigh less than 70 kg and my friend is 100 kg. He had the Air board, the semi inflatable model and I had the standard board. I got to say this is the most fun PWT (personal water toy) I have ever had the pleasure of using. I had so much fun on this E foil the hour went much too quick. All I could say when I had to come back was, ("I want one"!)
What surprised me how powerful this board is. I asked the instructor how high the power goes, he said something like 20 or 22 but I would never get that high. I read somewhere that once up on the foil with the right wings, speeds approaching 60km ph.is possible on the higher power settings. On power setting three I was on my knees skurfing actually planning along and enjoying just that for a while getting the feel of steering, like being behind a boat but there is no boat. Power setting 4 getting up on the foil . What a thrilling feeling! After that I got to stand up mode. Yes the price tag is high at the moment. I do feel that the new model with the free spinning prop is a very important improvement in order to ride swells without the motor running. I did not like the fact that if you let go of the trigger it full stops so if you are scarfing along and accidentally let the trigger go, over the handlebars is not a good situation to be in with an axe behind you. I also like the fact that this is an Australian design in Byron Bay. A local company to deal with I feel is more practical than overseas.

Hopefully we can arrange some waves for you to try out your new prop!!

Friend at Swansea Heads yesterday, Flightboard pro.

You're on the right track with lessons. I'm over in CA, USA, couple guys here ride them "in the surf" meaning about 100 yards outside the breaking waves and surfers, but on legitimate swell lines. They make it look real fun. Then you have a lot of guys who just go out and cruise around. Within 2 hours you should know if you like it or not, and if you can do it or not. Efoil should be one of the better ways to learn how to foil. Very steep learning curve at first that ramps way up quickly.

I've never efoiled. I prone surf foil, but I've heard it compared to riding a dirt bike. You are always on the throttle and you can use that to torque through carves. At least one guy gave up on surfing and only efoils in the surf now.

Fliteboard seems like a good option. Lift is the main one I see. There's also cheaper options like waydoo (debate over the build quality of this one) Or the DIY option. Foil.zone has all the info you need to build one yourself. Could be a fun project.

Cheers fellas for all your input, food for thought.

I've been in touch with Marcus so hopefully I'll be getting a lesson in the next week or two.

Paularity, You hit the nail on the head, I want access to a new surf experience that doesn't have another 100 guys on the peak and I want to do it as often as I can. I've got 5 years to make up for! Your drone footage is amazing and just the flat water cruising looks epic in itself. Thanks for the tip on the FB group.

Murdy

Flite True Glide Propellor - Initial Impressions

So 16 weeks after the arrival of my Ultra and me constantly pestering Flite about it, I finally received the True Glide propellor a few days ago

Now with Perth / WA arguably being the wind sports capital of the country my primary use case is open ocean windswell, but as my Ultra arrived at the tail end of the Summer season late March, I haven't had too many days above 20kn to test some decent downwinders

I've been obsessed with Flite for about 15 months now, have 200+ hours of board time and have even practically retired kiteboarding as my primary activity. Just hunting to find the limit of eFoiling amongst all the naysayers while getting cool drone shots!

Winter here has been particularly rainy, but an angry cold front presented itself this morning so I went out for a survival session to 'test' out the free-spinning prop and here are my thoughts. Unfortunately it was a touch nasty for the Skydio, so no drone footage yet

The set-up today as is my usual go-to was - Ultra / Footstraps / Sport FliteCell / Flow 1100/245 wings

I'm 173cm / 5'8" and 75kg / 165lb wet

The conditions were intense to put it mildly. Absolute washing machine shorebreak to get through initially with a solid 25KN onshore wind and some big head height troughs to deal with finding the right AoA without punching out the top of the wave and being ejected at speed!

I've had a bit of a chat to Keahi about stance and technique for the True Glide so I was mindful of his tips, but generally for the most part I ride my Ultra in cruise control on L1, letting the wing glide and bumping up to 2/3 when you need to punch back upwind. I find it's just one less thing to think about feathering the throttle while you're dealing with holding on by your toes to a 25kg carbon fibre axe as a big bomb spits you out down the troughs!

This is usually averaging about 0.5kw of power and the prop spinning at 2k rpm. One thing I didn't do was check out the info in the remote as I was riding to see the efficiency. Next time!

And after much experimentation, my footstraps are set up in the narrowest stance possible
Well True Glide is kinda different.

I'm back feathering the throttle, but in L1. Initially I would back off incrementally and connect the dots to find lines amongst the chaos, but quickly realised I needed to get this thing dialed in before attempting turns so just went for straight-lining it and hanging on!

The session was 20km / 10 laps - 1km upwind and then 1km downwind run back in to shore. I think my most successful lap netted about 300ish metres of gliding without power before I either ate **** or stalled

Now there was a LOT of water movement so quite often on the 1100 I'd accelerate way too quickly and overtake the lump I was on and end up stalling out and this was mainly because you have to shift your weight distribution mid-ride

Normally the pitch sensitivity of a 25+kg board is quite front foot heavy also due to the thrust coming from the underneath and to the rear, when you power off you need to compensate for this lack of thrust and lean back which changes the dynamic of the ride and the handling of the wing. Not ideal in the washing machine and I came off many times more than usual today. Pretty spectacularly a few times! Shark bait haha!

Also I found you couldn't really just crank back down on the trigger if you were losing lift and stalling as that would buck your balance even in L1, it's more of an incremental feathering to reengage too

And I didn't even attempt to pump the board, I'm not confident you'll be able to keep it going anyway, but will have a go next session

It's bizarre having that comfortable whining background noise of the motor disappear which I guess is what all the 'purists' are very much used to haha!

But for the TLDR crowd, yes, with practice and the right conditions / wings (1100/1300 not S) you will be able to foil without power

I'm excited to nail this new skill and push some records into distance downwinder runs come Summer!

More specifics will come when I get some hours under my belt

DM on IG @paularityfromabove for more details

Yes still fun, not kite , efoil. My watch thinks I only kite, I am not sure how to tell it I have another battery toy.

Nice. So when you are dropping into those lumps, are you turning the power off so you are just surfing the wave energy? Or down, to lessen it? Or just powering through? From years of kite foiling, I see a distinction between surfing waves and riding amongst waves. But either way, looks super fun.

I got my first go at a buddy's Lift, only a brief try, but I can understand the appeal better now. All the good feelings that come from foiling, without paddles or wings or boat drivers. Power and speed on demand. I could for sure fit one of these into my lifestyle. I still have my doubts about it as a vehicle for e assisted surf foil, given how heavy and clunky it is ... but it's partway there and going to get better. Anyways, not a chance I am spending $13k, so it's all theoretical anyway.