Hey there! I’m a college student with no money, and got hooked on this efoil stuff a couple days ago.
I have a lot of experience with DIY projects and building, 3d printing, planes, and drones but no experience whatsoever with anything efoil related. So please, correct me on anything wrong!
I’m pretty sure I can get the electronics figured out with what I know and what I’ve read on here, on a really basic level it consists of a big brushless motor mounted to the mast with some 3d printed brackets, powered by a 150-200a 12s ESC and then using a waterproofed rc car controller to control it with.
From what I’ve read so far, is looks like it’s possible to print my own front and back wings, frame, and mast and then cover them in fiberglass. Is this realistic?
For the actual board itself, would it be possible to use a normal surfboard? I can get one on facebook marketplace for pretty cheap, and then just mod it and make it work.
As for price, I’ve taken a look at the motors (150-250) and ESC’s (200-300). I have batteries and the receiver/controller covered, but I have no idea what other costs such as fiberglassing would actually be.
I am coming into this from the other side, long-time foiler (kite, sup, surf, wing) now exploring adding the e. We are making e-assisted options (aka foil drive diy) and hope to progress to full efoil soon.
For a good enough option for a board, I think you could take regular foil board and then have the motor controller and batteries in a waterproof box on top, or built into the board. You could also get a surfboard or equivalent and add in tracks for a foil mount. Not a hard job, if you’re comfortable fibreglassing.
For a foil, after lots of DIY experimenting, I’d suggest not going there. You’ll spend lots of time and money to get something that is kinda half good. For the same $ or cheaper, you can buy a used gen1 sup/surf foil and it’ll be better – in contrast to 3-4 years ago, there’s quite a bit of used gear out there now. Or for a little more you can get the low-end foil gear new (eg Gong…not to say it’s low end quality, but it’s bottom quarter price wise). But if you remain keen to DIY your wings, definitely suggest not building your own mast/fuselage, you’re way further ahead to start your build with that done pro.