TL/DR: New member from Utah, have an industrial 3D printer and excited to start my first build. Looking for what the community favorite design is.
Hi there, my name is Alex and I am writing to you all from the landlocked state of Utah.
We have lots of reservoirs but I don’t have the time or money to hassle with a boat. I grew up spending my summers wake-boarding with friends but as I got older we all moved all over the place. I want to get back out on the water and an eFoil looks like the best way to go about it.
Day job is a technician for an aerospace company and over the course of my life I have collected quite the set of tools. I figured I have most of what is needed to go about building my own setup and stumbled across this community.
I acquired a Fortus 250mc a little while back when a company I was working for went out of business. They couldn’t settle up payroll so I negotiated and got this beast of a 3D printer. It isn’t as fancy as the newer Stratasys systems, but I can run ASA through it to my hearts content. I love the UV stability and being able to print soluble support material makes my life so much easier.
I noticed there seems to be a few different designs that people have been basing their builds off of, but was looking for some advice as to what the main design is that people are starting with these days?
At any rate, looking forward to being a part of the community.
Hi Alex. Welcome aboard. I am on my second build. I have used Pacificmeisters shared files and material list. I mounted the batteries and controls in an external box for the learning experience. I have found keeping water out of the pod to be the biggest challenge. My second board is a work in progress. Built the board from scratch. Using my same Liquid Force foil set up. I bought and installed a boat hatch that was listed as waterproof. Not even close. I am reworking the hatch and using honeycomb aluminum. Made my own gaskets. I should know tomorrow if it is good. If I like the results, then I will post some pictures on making gaskets. It came out really nice. I welded an aluminum block to the bottom of the pod and tapped an 1/8" npt thread so that I can drain any water out and to pressure test for leaks. The one thing I found with a pressure test were the soap bubbles coming out of the PLA printed parts. I have settled with PETG. Been a lot of learning and mistakes. I will be upgrading the battery and might be changing to a direct drive when the gear box or motor die. There is plenty of reading to do and a lot of experienced wisdom on this site. Have fun. FYI, I am an old timer from Maine and will be wintering in Florida. Charlie
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Hello,
Thank you for the pointers, I will be sure to keep an eye out as I begin my journey.
I have been mulling it over and I think I will also make my own board since foam is easy to machine and I can easily fit a sufficiently large piece of stock on my CNC router.
I feel fairly confident in being able to keep my ASA parts watertight so hopefully I have at least that going for me. I am also considering rolling my own ESC as I feel like there are a lot of inefficiencies in the way most are currently setting up their board.
As for Maine, how late are you planning on being up there this year? Depending on how current events play out my wife and I are planning on spending some time in Portland this fall.
Stay in touch with your journey to Maine. I may be here