3D Printed Hydrofoil Surfboard - Will it Work? 

I assume that the wings bend and a lot of lifiting power gets lost. Try to Analyse the under water situation by using a GoPro or such. Great video. Love to see part 2

The presenting and editing makes it such a joy to watch! Nice job Simon!

I just want to say that I love the humor laced throughout your builds as you run through the trial and error process.

Great project ! Your main wing looks quite small, I do kitefoiling and the typical front wings are around 800cm2. Then the wingfoilers use bigger wings like 1000 to 1800cm2. I think you should try at least a 1000cm2 front wing with a 300cm2 rear wing for it to lift you over ;)

I hydrofoil a lot and if you were to stand back a little more that would of definitely flew in the water. It’s a huge balance game.

You probably could have gotten it to work but you have the battery components blocking you from standing over the foils. My suggestion, for simplicity, is to add a footstop behind the battery and controller compartment. That way you can balance your weight over the foil. I don't think you have quite enough power to stand in front of the foil at this point. Maybe not even standing over it but worth a shot. Good luck. Can't wait to see your next steps and future projects.

The foil sticking into the bottom of the board was hilarious! I think you need much much bigger wings. Also wings with a lower aspect ratio will make them stronger and more stable at lower speeds. Look at winging boards for inspiration.

Love how persistent you are at design changes that will help you reach your goals.

I always look forward to your videos. You're not afraid to show the development process and the failures along the way. Keep up the great work and you'll hit a million subs before you know it!

I really like your video style and how you show your mistakes and your trial and error, and you have great dedication. Edit: Is it possible to put jets on and have water cooling run trough the foil in to the board?

What I like about this video is you present even the fails as a fabricator and designer myself I have come up with all kinds of ideas that in theory should work but it takes me forever to perfect and get them working the way they are intended so kudos to you for providing the video footage because people need to understand the amount of work it takes to get a CustomDesign working correctly

great progress on this, looking forward to the next iterations 😎

Love the creative ways of putting on the wetsuit. I've been following all the jet-boards with great interest. Hopefully I can make one of my own one day. As an old guy who is 65, I can relate to issues getting it up. You're young and will definitely get it up the next time. The idea of using 3-d printed parts as a shape to fiberglass over is brilliant and should be real useful.

I love how you just iterate past things that don't work the first time. The little editing cuts are hilarious. Since I have no skills I can only suggest some Velcro in the electronics enclosure to keep things from sliding around. Oh and maybe a gasket for the lid. Keep creating!

A couple other comments point to the biggest issue with your wing and not generating enough lift. In layman's terms, with a higher aspect wing (wider in width and narrower in height), more speed is required to generate equal lift, than that of a stubbier style wing. When you pick up speed you can clearly see the board trying hard, but there is just not enough surface area to make it for the max speed you can get up to. When you go to a higher aspect wing, you will increase your drag significantly, but the trade off is you will able to be get the board up an foiling! Foiling SUP downwind setups which are popular would be a solid place to start given the length and weight of your board, or some of the larger efoils, like getfoil! Great video as always my man!

Your delivery of lines and editing is the best. Always makes me smile.

I tried basically the same project last year except I thought the board building from xps would be too time consuming so I just bought a cheap board from my local decathlon. Also did some research and found Ray Velinga' s videos explaining the hydrofoil calculations. he also has a book its a great read, it would help you a lot. One other difference between your design and mine is that I used two aluminium box section to strengthen the 1 m long spar, İt works great. now Im building a much stronger v2 cause the first one broke on the board-spar joint while testing.(on sea with me on it while my dad was pulling me with a boat. which was terrifying to say the least)

I'm a windsurfer from Germany. I'm pretty shure, that you need a bigger front wing. (maybe out of carbon)? You are really fast, so fast enough to get up. Also your Board is really long. The Foil Boards in Windsurfing are a lot shorter and wider. Then the board ist also pushing more water down. And maybe you need to shape your nose a little more like a windsurfboard. But so far, great job. Be careful, if you're getting it and the Board ist lifting it will be very unstable. And if its lifting to much, the foil will get out of the water und dann you will crash very hard.

As a foiler myself all you need to do is move the mast forward which will create more lift. And only a small movement which be very effective. You'll also want to adjust this setting quite a bit so make it adjustable. Great effort by the way, love it 👍

The amount of patience you have its amazing . very inspirational

Your speed is fast enough to go up, but your wing is too small. Really impressive to see that the 3D printed mast resists with your second prototype 👌

I'm amazed that the larger hydrofoil mast survived without being glassed. Great job on those new print settings! 👍

Honestly like your videos because you never back down if things go wrong or stuff breaks. Looking forward to the next part!

Your editing is fantastic. So much fun to watch and learn.

the lift coefficient of a profile change if the angle of attack change, but also the drag coefficient increase if you move the center of gravity in the back of the board. a good way to find the best shape of the profile can be to use standard iso profile ,size the bigger wing to create such a lift taht should bee more or less equal to your body force plus the one of the surfboard itself and then computing the rear wing applying a momentum equilibrium. in other words in order to deesign easly the wings the procedure can be: 1 choose a standard profile for water application (you can find on internet) 2 consider that the angle of attack is 0 3 size the main profile to counterbalance the structure and your weight 4 size the rear profile looking ate the momentum conservation equation (if there is an offset between the center of gravity and the main profile lift force you have to consider it)

Amazing project. You probably need a bigger wing with a stronger material like carbon or even glassfiber to decrease the flex...

The 3D printed foils n Mask didn’t break is amazing and your patience is exceptional. Good work.

That’s awesome. I’m always waiting for another video of yours. Truly an inspiration to keep myself of the bed and start working on a project. Keep it coming💪🏽🙏🏽

check the flexibility of the wings, i suspect that they are bending giving you a different lift capacity than what it has been modelled for. Also a taller mast will give you easier lift, så perhaps the wing you have is modelled for no flex and tall mast, so you will need more power through speed to get equivalent lift. you can also make some cutouts at the back of the board reducing the trailing edge and thereby drag. Last thing, you might be able to get it to lift with some "pumping" but then you might just break parts. Great build though! and great storytelling of the challenges!

you can check out actual foils for windsurfing boards to see how they do it(shape and size). i'd recommend windsurfing ones because those carry the most amount of weight(bigger board and a heavy rigg so a lot of weight)

Respect on the determination and execution, hope to see more

So many of these kind of projects on youtube are flexing by making it look easy and like ti worked first time. It's so great to see the iterative process. As for what I'd recommend: A bigger front wing will mean more lift, at the cost of a lower top speed. Looks like you're right on the edge of breaking free.

I built my own hydrofoil through Clearwater foils and things I noticed with that is once you make it out of the water you lose all you surface tension/drag meaning you can go slower once you break free. Also make the wing thicker for more lift…

Impressive. An inspiration to continue with our projects...)) Thanks

My suggestions: Place your center of gravity above your front wing. Cover all of your printed part with thick layers of carbon fiber, especially in mast connections . With glass you are way too flex. Seal better your battery box. Keep your speed controller as cool as you can. I'm really impressed that you get that fast with this setup. Looking forward for your follow-on video. Keep it up.good luck

Foiler here. You need a larger wing. Like 2x the size. The larger the wing the less speed you need to get flying. Double it and try again, also need the surfaces to be baby smooth. Nice work so far!

Great work mate! A couple of thoughts: 1. The lift created by the hydrofoil is proportional to the size of the wing and the angle of attack of the wing. See if you can design a few different airfoil sizes and add a method to adjust the angle of attack and test them. 2. You may need to make the connection between the board and mast stronger. When the board is out of the water your entire weight will need to be supported by that joint. Consider doing a test on land where you attach the mast to something solid and then stand on the board. If it doesn't break, you're good.

Your an inspiration mate. Keep it up.

amazing project! Well done, tough endurance to make it working !!!

I agree with the comment's. A great deal of people try to make perfect video's. I like the humor and the failures as much as the success. Looking forward to the next video

Perhaps changing the incidence on the wings could help? Also I think you're right that lighter (and maybe stiffer) wings would be necessary.

Foils are cool, but Efoils are pretty damn sick too! Wish they weren't so top heavy thanks to electronics... someday I'm sure that won't be an issue. Really enjoyed watching you learn haha

Very entertaining video showing warts and all. Know you will keep trying till you get it. Thanks so much.

What a cliffhanger, DO BIGGER WINGS! Nice wet suit transitions!

I love your edits, makes the videos really fun! Can't wait for more!

Awesome idea and nice to see how far you already got with this. I did laugh a bit at that first design, still surprised the wing itself didnt break even in the second design. I think the wing is deforming from all the upward force it is receiving, you may need a slightly stiffer wing even. Edit: ah i’m not the first person who noticed. 😅

I was looking at 3D printed wings for a while and was worried about them breaking. Happy to see it works and now I know I can use a 3D printed one too.

Great build! Way to persevere. One thing which you might know, is that adding extra wall thickness when slicing has a much larger effect on strength and stiffness of 3D printed parts vs adding infill. It's why hollow structures can be very strong while reducing weight. Love what you are doing. I watch it with my kids. Best regards.

wings definitely need to be stronger, they are likely deforming too much under the water to provide the needed lift, but otherwise this looks great so far, i'm sure there's lots else to do before next video. lol

I am looking to to build 1 for myself for a scientific experiment soon - just curious, how much did all the material cost you? Thanks so much!

Seems like you're on the right path. Keep going, I'm sure you'll figure it out! Can't wait to see it.

Laughing out loud when the fuselage drove itself into the board! haha I find that when using a store bought e-foil sometimes you have to place your foot on top of the mast in order to make it lift. this is exactly where your electronics box is...

You build it, we love it. I continue to dream harder. Great job.

Nice work. Back foot should be placed directly above mast. So you need to be much further back. Maybe bigger foil. Stiffness of all parts it’s important too. Speed looks good.

PART 2 please and thank you!! Great work, man!

its cool to watch! Nice job Simon!!

Im hyped to see the new wings installed, nice project !

Awesone to watch this video Simon! Nice editing as always :)

Nice, nice. Good work AND presentation.

Great video! For your 3D printed foil, make it stronger by adding 2-3 layers of carbon fiber fabric/cloth or even fiberglass fabric/cloth (do not use fiberglass mat). Carbon fiber has way better mechanical properties (stiffness, rigidity, etc) . You can use an epoxy resin for that, the best resins for technical carbon parts are: epoxies and polyurethanes. Search online, you'll find a lot of details about this topic. Also, I am not an expert on hydrofoils but you probable need a bigger foil and more thrust on your motor/propeller. Good luck buddy!

Its such a joy to watch you and your great designs

Brilliant to watch , fantastic progress, it’s going to work keep going 🤙, thanks for posting

I've really got to admire your persistence and your dedication and getting the job done and how quickly you can change your wetsuit laughing good job good job great video it works need done on the design but you know that kudos

Интересные эксперементы. Спасибо за ваши работы

You can build anything! Love your vids!

Awesome man, you got some good speed up too! Can't wait to see the next iteration! :)

Keep it going man! We love your work

There's something so funny about you painting the board and idk why

really cool project, please continue that

Rear wing is upside down. Fantastic effort. Keep it up

Bigger wings will definitely help a lot and get more running time

Love this series and great video editing

Sick! really looking forward to seeing that thing lift in the next video!

Your videos are always enjoyable to watch

Very nice!👍😁 Great job and video!

Looking forward to seeing the working product.

I love the shed man that looks really cool

After watching your videos, I am always willing to buy a 3D printer and start creating, but watching your videos is just too relaxing!

Its fun to watch you grow bud. You have come such a long way.

Honestly great that you were able to go that fast. Bigger wing and I bet it will rise

Great video as always, Simon - you are a legend. As for those board, I guess maybe give it pitch control on the wings? I think that's what the sailing boat things have to account for different wind speeds. Good luck!

Awesome job, I love seeing the failurs and then success

Awesome. Persistent always pays off.

Sick! Great video. Looking forward to the next iteration.

Like this guy, no messing about. 1:06 into the video and the board is half built. Other channels will still be padding out the intro/greetings for 2 minutes. the missing satisfying moment tho

What an epic adventure! Honestly, I call this one a win

Several ppl pointed out two main possible issues: bending of the foils and the box impeding you to stand back enough. First I'd check foils bending and the effect of your body position on the board, I'd go for "static dry tests": block the front foil on a support and back foil under a support, get on the board to see how foils bent in order to keep you up. No need to go "full scale" like airplane wings' stress test yet you'll get an idea of what's going on and hot to adjust. For the foils you might use some Carbon Fiber PLA for higher rigidity + spars. You could make the mast thinner as well with spars inside and reduce drag.

I'm not smart enough for any helpful suggestions but I really do like this project. Good luck with the next iteration.

Could watch this all day.

You just earned another long over due sub. Good luck with your projects bro.

Looks like a fun project.

0:44 ha ! I REWATCHED that same sequence a few times just for fun!

Keep up the good work. The mast the wing is mounted to may be flexing forward from the thrust pressure. You may need a brace going from the front side of the motor mount diagonally (45 degrees) up to the bottom of the surf board further up towards the middle of the board (front to back).

I love this. I never thought of using Fiberglass on 3d prints.

That's badass, from that first video I saw of a Hawaiian guy riding an unpowered hydrofoil board-I instantly knew that eventually powered hydrofoil boards were going to be awesome. I even tried to get my friend who builds aftermarket high performance wave runners and jet skis to build a prototype. Awesome work on all that 3d printing and building, I look forward to the next one.

You make the best videos, thank you.

Great stuff. Couple of suggestions. It's all weight shift when controling the foil. So stand above the front wing. Do quick rocking from front pressure to rear pressure and back to front foot pressure to get flying. Much easier to do on a shorter board and with a flat deck. One foot either side of mast is essential.

Very nice project !!

i tuoi progetti sono incredibili. un saluto dall'Italia, ciao

YES! Been waiting for this video!