In this interview I was mostly talking about the position of the weight, not the weight itself. This reinforces the importance of adjustability because a change like this would require an entire new board using a Tuttle or I would have to add weights to my Tuttle board to fix the balance.
I’d rather ride a regular board with a 3kg battery in the perfect spot than my foil 1” off in the boxes on a 2kg board.
Any chance there will be some way to swap the Cedrus baseplate with a tuttle-friendly connection? One mast, any fuse, tuttle or tracks…
I’ve asked. Maybe more people asking will make it commercially viable for them.
This is exactly what Nils has done. FYI.
Disclaimer this is a us centric comment:
This is an awesome thread to follow and learn from but what will ultimately slow down or prevent mass Tuttle adoption is wake foiling… i’d wager there are more wake foils on the water each and every day, May 1 through August 31 in the US (include Hawaii and Puerto Rico), than all other foiling disciplines combined.
There’s a chance the market bifurcates between wake and wind but it could be to the detriment of new users learning how to sail. Foiling could be sport that gets America sailing, anecdotally I see it regularly people wake surf get bored, wake foil, wind blows out the lake they see guys ripping on kite foil/wing foil and now parawing and they want to get in on the fun.
And maybe the answer is just a Tuttle to us box adapter but that starts getting long… don’t get me wrong this is super interesting and makes sense in certain scenarios but for mass market maybe not
Tuttle to plate is pretty elegant and inexpensive … (~$125 from MikesLab for an Alu plate?).
Kyle at Cedrus has made some pretty good arguments for why even on a carbon mast, a transition to an Alloy (or maybe even Ti?) foot handles that change in load directions well.
I was just about to say exactly this, wake foil will never use Tuttle as the boards are just too thin. And without total adoption brands won’t be interested in making two different systems.
Wake is a huge market, larger than many of the other foil sports.
I recently took a look at a simple model of a downwind board (a 10kg 8ft by 5” rectangle). I was surprised by how insensitive the moment of inertia is to modest changes in the pivot position. Being off by 2” only makes about a 1% change in the MOI.
Are people just that sensitive to it? Or is there something else in play than just the moment of inertia?
I have also asked. Sounds like cedrus will make them for a group that wants them. Question is how many are needed to make this happen?
Tarifa Kite Foil board making their own Tuttle box with adjustable options that looks super cool , for sure that can be the right direction
Another thing to consider is the max mast thickness, as the DT is 15mm , so can limit some design…
Regarding the wake market.. how thick is a Tuttle though?, and with a slightly thicker board comes board stiffness. Maybe this combined with better touchdown would be more attractive than an ultra thin board.
one issue is that there are lots of different versions of “tuttle” depending who you talk to. Seems like we’ve settled on 50mm deep (just over 2”) works well for foil masts. Soa bit too deep for the thinnest wake and tow setups
This is a valid point.
Even in tow foiling in the surf, the boards are smaller/thinner than would allow for a tuttle.
I don’t see how a tuttle could be reasonably incorporated into wake/tow or even foil drive boards at this point, without the boards becoming so thick it would negate the benefit.
Maybe a tow board could have an extruded/shaped area around the tuttle, similar in shape to a mast foot on current masts. Easier to shape that into a board than build into a mast, no? Maybe hard to make it structural however.
I don’t really see the win for tuttle in a wake foil or tow setup. Those thin boards are plenty stiff deck to track and getting towed up nobody cares about plate drag. Plate masts are here to stay for the vast majority or all of foildrive, wake, and towing applications.
Personally I’m happy to leave the foil drive crew with their thick, heavy, draggy and expensive setups.
The foiling industry has already dedicated a tonne of time and resources making an inherently low performance design more performant.
I don’t think it’s a reason enough to stop progression for the rest of us especially where those gains are likely to be more beneficial and noticeable.
Time for the rest of us push forward with lighter, stiffer, higher performance options.
I suppose the battery could be built to receive a tutttle but the better option is probably just the waist/backpack style battery
By the way, a tuttle mast should be significantly easier to make. Can be done in a two-piece mold rather than three-piece, doesn’t require carbon to turn the corner to the baseplate so the layup is much simpler, and it uses less carbon in the first place. All this should make it CHEAPER, who knows if the foil brands will pass on the savings…
I couldn’t have timed this push any worse (have 2 new track based boards on the way and fairly recently upgraded to a UHM mast)
But I’ve read/heard enough to feel this is an avenue worth looking into knowing it will take a while for it to filter through to the market.
The fact it’s adjustable both forward and back as well as allowing for rake (may have got that terminology incorrect but I presume it’s a bit like baseplate shimming) get’s it over the line for me (along with the other more obvious advantages)
I think the real make or break moment will be if the industry can for once pick one standard and stick to it 
There is absolutely NO WAY the “industry” will leave behind the plate mast. Tuttle is a nice thought, but it’s limited to custom boards and limited runs of masts.