Wing vs regular windsurfing sail

[ittiandro]

I am planning to try winGsurfing from windsurfing next summer,
I weigh 90 kg and I will use a 5.4 m. Slingwing V2 on a 220 l, 85cm wide Tahe board, with no foil,just a retractable central fin and a 38 cm rear fin.I
In these conditions, I am just curious to know what to expect. Things being equal, how does a wing compare, in terms of wind efficiency and, ultimately, speed, to a regular windsurfing sail of the same size, without a foil?
It will be on a lake, mostly in light winds (10-15 knts.). I'd think that just doing away with the weight of the rig, will be, in itself, a considerable advantage. In addition, I hear that the wing because of its design is inherently more efficient than a regular sail, but I am no engineer ..

Thanks

Ittiandro

[more force 4]

What do you mean by a 'retractable centre fin'? Is this anything like a sailboard centreboard? This isn't one of those little centre fins that things like Starboard Start boards have? I suspect they are not going to do well. The Kona boards have a long, high aspect/high performance centreboard and it its like that should perform reasonably well, but you won't be planing except maybe at the 15 knot end. And even slogging is going to be work to stay upwind at lower wind speeds. You might find it more tippy than having the mast for additional stability, though if you are stopped/going slow, the huge flotation of the wing tip can catch you long enough to regain your balance and then get the tip out of the water. A longboard is great to get to know the wing feel and jibes etc., but really you'll want a smaller board and foil to break free from all that drag and fly!

A grunty sail is probably going to pull better, but the wings work way better than they look like they should (not sure how yours is for bottom end).

[ittiandro]

What do you mean by a 'retractable centre fin'? Is this anything like a sailboard centreboard? This isn't one of those little centre fins that things like Starboard Start boards have? I suspect they are not going to do well. The Kona boards have a long, high aspect/high performance centreboard and it its like that should perform reasonably well, but you won't be planing except maybe at the 15 knot end. And even slogging is going to be work to stay upwind at lower wind speeds. You might find it more tippy than having the mast for additional stability, though if you are stopped/going slow, the huge flotation of the wing tip can catch you long enough to regain your balance and then get the tip out of the water. A longboard is great to get to know the wing feel and jibes etc., but really you'll want a smaller board and foil to break free from all that drag and fly!

A grunty sail is probably going to pull better, but the wings work way better than they look like they should (not sure how yours is for bottom end).

Thanks

fair enough. Your reply goes a long way to answer my question.

Mine is a full fledge centreboard that you can pull up or push down.
Anyway, not planing is not an issue because winds rarely go above 12-15 knt here , and also because of the size of the board. I am looking at subplaning.

With a sail and a centreboard I can go upwind, although laboriously at times. What I wouldn't want is to have a wing that performs worse than my current board with a sail.

I am getting mixed opinions on this: some say to forget about if I am not foiling..Without a foil, a sail is a lot more efficient than a wing...For some it is a cautious "OK", but with some reserve about the low speed..

The final Litmus test will be, of course, on the water, next summer, but before then, I'd like to know what can I reasonably expect.

Thanks

Ittiandro

[winddoctor]

IMHO replacing a windsurfing sail with a wing makes for a "like windsurfing but much worse" experience. A wing really needs the speed of an engaged foil to come alive, otherwise it feels like a big, inefficient pool toy. Slogging on a foil board is terrible for this reason. Slogging on a windsurfer with a wing is slightly less terrible . In 10-15 knots with a 5.4 sail you might get planing occasionally with that kit. A 5.4 wing on a foil board will be up and ripping (comparatively) in those winds with some experience. It'll be fun to ride the wing on the windsurfer for about 5 minutes and then it'll become obvious that there's no performance benefit of the wing over a sail in those conditions. But try it and decide for yourself!

[more force 4]

Probably right on all your comments Winddoc and ittiandro clarified he already had a windsurf sail. For people who just want to drift around at the cottage or campground without always paddling, and have never experienced fast planing or foiling, I think a wing would be OK. Its so much easier than uphauling (especially a big sail) smaller people could do it, and its a giant floatation device for safety. Naish initially featured SUPs and longboards at sub-planing speed with a wing in their early wing ads, but it isn't going to perform as well as a sail would. That probably doesn't matter to most.

Ittiandro we haven't mentioned yet that the wing is going to be inherently less efficient than a sail because you won't be able to get it to near vertical and perpendicular to the water without the height of foiling, so its always going to be at a considerable angle and capture less energy.

[Highrocker]

Great question! I concur with all the wisdom from winddr and MF4. With all things being equal (without foil), your wing will perform worse than your current board with sail. I used a SUP surfboard with a centreboard and a Naish 5.3m wing in order to learn how to wing. It was fun, easy to learn, but it never equaled the performance of an equivalent windsurfing set-up. Beyond the points already made, with the windsurfing mast connected to the board, it directly transmits the power from the wind to the board. With a wing, you act as the mast and boom. Power transfer to the board will never be as solid as the windsurfer. As your body moves on the board to control board and wing, power transfer to the board becomes less than perfect - unless you have world-class core musculature and body control. I found many positives with SUP winging, including learning wing control in preparation for learning wing foiling. Highly recommended fun, but don't expect a huge adrenaline rush.

[Highrocker]

[more force 4]

Highrocker, how strong is that wind? It looks like a good workout and all the speed most newbies would want that aren't looking to foil.

[Highrocker]

Hey MF4! Maybe 15kts. Ya, way tougher on the shoulders with the increased drag from the SUP. Stable fun regardless.

[ittiandro]

Great video, Highrocker! If you were able to cruise around at that brisky pace in those low low winds , at times as low as 8 km/hr, without a foil, it is beyond my wildest expectations ! Looks like the wing is more than a pool-side toy, as some have put it.
You were doing a lot of pumping, though. No wonder if your arms and shoulders were not too happy!
Good wind!
Ittiandro

[grantmac]

Great video, Highrocker! If you were able to cruise around at that brisky pace in those low low winds , at times as low as 8 km/hr, without a foil, it is beyond my wildest expectations ! Looks like the wing is more than a pool-side toy, as some have put it.
You were doing a lot of pumping, though. No wonder if your arms and shoulders were not too happy!
Good wind!
Ittiandro

The wind is 15kts/30km/h

The gauge on screen is his GPS speed, which is extremely slow compared to what a normal windsurfer would be doing in 15kts.

[ittiandro]

Thanks for clarifying Highrock's video, Grantmac.

So, the speed shown on the graph in the video was not the wind's speed, but Highrocker's GPS- recorded speed, right?. He seems to be moving quite steadily all along the video, though. Does it mean that the winds were always around 15 knts/hr as a minimum, or they were also lower and he was able to ride along at 10/12 knt/hr?

Ittiandro

[grantmac]

His speed was in Km/h, in Kts his max speed was briefly ~6kts. That is extremely slow for that wind speed. You could be foiling going 3x that fast.
You could probably even get a regular windsurfing board planing in that much wind and go even faster.

[Highrocker]

Concur with Grantmac's points.
WingSUP is harder on your hands/arms/shoulders due to the increased friction with water. It's fun, it teaches wing handling, but for excitement, it pales in comparison to wingfoiling.
Ask me anything about wingSUP. I spent enough time at it. Lol!

[ittiandro]

Concur with Grantmac's points.
WingSUP is harder on your hands/arms/shoulders due to the increased friction with water. It's fun, it teaches wing handling, but for excitement, it pales in comparison to wingfoiling.
Ask me anything about wingSUP. I spent enough time at it. Lol!

Highrocker
I agree with you

I tend to think, though, that wingsurfing without a foil shouldn't be harder on hands, arms or shoulders than it already is when subplaning with a sail because in both cases the friction with the water is there.

Also, even when windsurfing on a sail, my (old!) muscles are already put to hard work when uphauling the rig, especially larger sails fillled with water. Add to this that I rarely use a harness..Most of the time it is not a big deal, in light winds, but when winds pick up there is even more work on the upper body.

The only downside I expect and which would make a substantial hurdle, at least in the beginning, is instability. I don't know how you worked this out.

I had already tried a wing a couple of years ago and I desisted after a couple of sessions because I simply could't keep balance. Perhaps I was too impatient..I thought I'd give it a shot again, because I found I was making serious mistakes: I didn't do any preparatory work on land, my body and feet's position was wrong ( off the center-line)I and I was not paying attention to the wind direction. After watching a ton of videos, I learnt a lot and I am more confident that this time it will work.

Thanks for your input

Ittiandro