Windsurf board

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Windsurf board

A windsurf board has not been around for long. It is the surfing equivalent of a mountain bike. People have been trying to windsurf for a long time, but they were doing so with homemade adaptations to existing surfboards. Much like the first mountain bikers, who took leisure bikes and reinforced their frames, and put thicker wheels on them, the first windsurfers were using rigs that looked little like the sleek outfits we are familiar with today.

The boards themselves were little more than surf boards. To be fair, the differences between a windsurfing board and a surf board are minimal to this day. There aren’t long board style windsurfing boards today, but many are comparable in shape, volume, and style to surf boards. They are sometimes wider, and thus higher in volume than a comparable surf board, but overall the resemblance is still visible today.

The first windsurfing boards looked a lot like something that a garage inventor would make up. This is because the first windsurfers invented the equipment in just such a place. They struggled with issues such as getting a sail out of the water, attaching the sail to the board, and how best to trim a sail. The answers to these problems may seem self evident today, but we have 50 years of history to look back on.

Windsurf boards became commercially available for the first time as a product in their own right in the 1970’s. The invention process, or adaptation process if you prefer that term; began more than a decade prior to that, when a couple of men had the idea for a sail powered surfboard. Their first concept was kite boarding. They foresaw an issue with keeping a tensioned wire that close to a human’s body, because at that time there were not nylon ropes of sufficient strength to handle the stresses involved. That problem was eventually solved by others, and kite boarding is a successful sport in its own right today.

They also grappled with the mechanics of sailing, and how one person could handle all the forces in play while sailing. Sailing momentum is achieved by harnessing the difference between the water’s current (hull momentum) and the wind (sail momentum). It is usually at least a two person job, while one can trim the sails, the other can adjust the rudder. The issue is that both of those things are a fully engaging task, leaving no time or space for one person to do both.

The answer came, surprisingly enough, in looking back at the very first sailboats. They had weak, stationary keels and rudders; and they relied on moving the sails to adjust the direction of the boat. So, the first windsurf boards incorporated small fins onto the underside of the board to stabilize its course and allow it to harness the differential. That left the issue of a fully rotational sail to solve. The first attempts at this involved a removable mast that sat in a hole set into the board. While this provided sufficient freedom of movement, it was not strong enough to hold up to the forces that could be exerted on the sail. This was solved by the invention of the universal joint. The joint allowed a solid connection between board and sail that also gave a full range of movement to the sail.

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A windsurf board has not been around for long. It is the surfing equivalent of a mountain bike. People have been trying to windsurf for a long time, but they were doing so with homemade adaptations to existing surfboards. Much like the first mountain bikers, who took leisure bikes and reinforced their frames, and put thicker wheels on them, the first windsurfers were using rigs that looked little like the sleek outfits we are familiar with today.

The boards themselves were little more than surf boards. To be fair, the differences between a windsurfing board and a surf board are minimal to this day. There aren’t long board style windsurfing boards today, but many are comparable in shape, volume, and style to surf boards. They are sometimes wider, and thus higher in volume than a comparable surf board, but overall the resemblance is still visible today.

The first windsurfing boards looked a lot like something that a garage inventor would make up. This is because the first windsurfers invented the equipment in just such a place. They struggled with issues such as getting a sail out of the water, attaching the sail to the board, and how best to trim a sail. The answers to these problems may seem self evident today, but we have 50 years of history to look back on.

Windsurf boards became commercially available for the first time as a product in their own right in the 1970’s. The invention process, or adaptation process if you prefer that term; began more than a decade prior to that, when a couple of men had the idea for a sail powered surfboard. Their first concept was kite boarding. They foresaw an issue with keeping a tensioned wire that close to a human’s body, because at that time there were not nylon ropes of sufficient strength to handle the stresses involved. That problem was eventually solved by others, and kite boarding is a successful sport in its own right today.

They also grappled with the mechanics of sailing, and how one person could handle all the forces in play while sailing. Sailing momentum is achieved by harnessing the difference between the water’s current (hull momentum) and the wind (sail momentum). It is usually at least a two person job, while one can trim the sails, the other can adjust the rudder. The issue is that both of those things are a fully engaging task, leaving no time or space for one person to do both.

The answer came, surprisingly enough, in looking back at the very first sailboats. They had weak, stationary keels and rudders; and they relied on moving the sails to adjust the direction of the boat. So, the first windsurf boards incorporated small fins onto the underside of the board to stabilize its course and allow it to harness the differential. That left the issue of a fully rotational sail to solve. The first attempts at this involved a removable mast that sat in a hole set into the board. While this provided sufficient freedom of movement, it was not strong enough to hold up to the forces that could be exerted on the sail. This was solved by the invention of the universal joint. The joint allowed a solid connection between board and sail that also gave a full range of movement to the sail.

Windsurf Board

Equipment

Sails