Actually the foils in the pic on the first page of the thread were really simple to make. I just used regular cutting board material that I bought at Walmart, (it’s white plastic, like $4 bucks). The stuff cuts very easy, and can be cut with a hacksaw to the right shape. The slot that fits around the mirage fin I just cut the shape out with a dremel till it fit over the fin. The fins are Santoprene, (same material tennis shoes are made from), so most glues like goop or tennis shoe repair glue can be used to glue them in place. Basically when pedaling they don’t do anything at all, ( they don’t effect how the mirage drive works), however make sure they are small enough that you can still get the mirage drive into the slot, (oops, my first set was too big and I couldn’t get the mirage drives in or out, had to redo). This was all done like 8 yrs ago, I have no idea if the same design would work on the new mirage 180 drives. All of our boats we always had rigged with giant sail sets, (like 250 sq ft plus). And the boat was our only family boat so we typically had 3-4 adults on board, ( I got a big family). The mainsail on the TI is mounted way to forward on the hull, and there is very little flotation on the bow. Because I had so many sails, ( all on roto-furlers) with a lot of controls, (the boat was always quite a handful to sail, keeps you really busy). But you have to realize the keys are fricken huge and I flat refuse to sail at 3mph, (lol you can’t get anywhere).
We only used the foils on downwind, and normally with the big 135sq ft spinnaker deployed, ( FYI Hobies spinnaker is 79 sqft). The bow also dived when using the main ( with a barbor hauler) and the jib, ( with one on each side, what they call wing on wing). What would occur is the downward force of the sails would push the bow completely underwater, and it would just stay underwater until we let up on the sails, ( something I would never do, I’m always ball to the wall max). We called it nautilus mode, sailing with the entire bow underwater doesn’t seem to slow the boat down much but boy do you get really wet, ( lol kind of like a submarine). The way they worked was if the bow dove, we would lock one pedal all the way forward with my foot. The fins go against the bottom of the hull and bends the rubber fins about ten degrees, (so they point down about ten degrees), which creates lift. That was usually enough to lift the bow back out of the water. I’m not talking about hydrofoils like on those crazy moth boats. I have no clue if these kind of foils would help on a stock TI, ( without big sailsets), I only sailed a stock TI twice back in 2010 with dismal results, ( never again, lol). A short time later we added a 2ft bowsprit to the boat, tilting all the foresails so they also created quite a bit of lift. After installing the bowsprit were no longer needed the foils. A little later on we designed and built real hydrofoils for the boat, yea everything worked, but boy oh boy it got really dangerous, ( I don’t recommend doin that). 99.9% of the owners out there just love the boat as it comes from the factory, your wasting your time tryin to change anything. FE Edit: keep in mind our needs were always different from anyone elses. We are mostly divers, snorkelers, free diving, and spear fishing is what we like to do, mostly offshore, so we needed an offshore capable hardened boat with a 100 mile per day range, very fast even in very light conditions, ( you can’t dive at all when it’s windy and wavy, ( no underwater visability)). So we rigged our boat specifically for that purpose, ( all custom), I don’t recommend anyone attempt the same unless you really know your stuff, just sayin offshore, especially down in the keys is really dangerous.
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