yes, wider contact surfaces of butt joints help reduce reaction loads from the short couple. This is why Cedrus Classic at 19mm thick is fine with butt joints at the adapter interface while a thinner mast like the Slingshot Hoverglide always suffered from loose (overloaded) hardware. But the statement ignores the importance of materials and the role, size, location of the fasteners. With Evolution, the 10mm dowel pins are primary loadpath and manage the bending loads. Steel is 3x stiffer than aluminum, and 4x stronger. Depending on the diameter, location, and quantity of screws, you can dramatically affect the stiffness and strength of the joint even beyond what you can do by playing with mast thickness. Our Evolution fuselages actually connect with 3 M8 screws (no dowels) and offer equivalent strength to adapters with pins while remaining cheaper and easier to manufacture/install.
Iāve really grown to dislike the mortise and tenon connection. Itās tight initially but the fuse sockets all loosen up or crack with time and arenāt easy to fix.
I think the Cedrus standard is probably ideal or something like AFS fuselink. Crazy that weāre not any closer to a standardā¦
AFS interface (F-one is pretty similar style) has got to be the best Iāve seen.
The Cedrus is even better if going into a metal fuselage - the fit of the dowel pins can be very very tight with no play. I donāt think the Cedrus would work very well with a carbon fuselage though.
The socket connections are bomber as long as the socket is metal and the mast carbon goes into the socket (instead of a piece of metal being glued into a little socket on the bottom of the mast). Even independent of the connection movement the stiffness of an aluminum fuse is much better than carbon.
Beautiful isnāt it? Designed in Anacortes WA 
Can you elaborate why ?
I am currently riding an AFS Fuselink (Enduro) andā¦ yes it works great.
But I canāt see any advantage of this connection type compared to an Axis or Code one where the mast is inserted into the fuselage.
Because the socket wears and stretches with time and eventually develops play regardless of how tight the bolts are.
The AFS style wonāt do that unless the flared section of the mast connection gets distorted but would likely take some serious damage.
Well, the Code/AFS probably also wear out in a similar way.
But they also wear out in a much worst way : the coil insert simply get ripped off your mast and you loose your whole plane.
This is reported every other week on various French users groups (yeah, two french brands).
Thatās inevitable when 100% of the load and force transmission is assured by two bolts.
Plus I would say that the wear is easy to workaround it: just undo your mast/fuse connection as few as possible.
Are there actually lots of reports of AFS masts sheering like that? I thought it was just F One
Iāve seen a few ones in less than a month since Iāve been in a whatsapp (french) user group.
Some are covered by warranty, it depends how it snaps, and when you bought your gears.
AFS is french and built in France.
Code is australian right?.
So mast to fuse connection is failing on AFS?.
Can you post the french user forums to dig a bit?
Thx!.
Yep AFS is French, so weāve got shitload of users here.
Look for Hadou BRUNNERās videos on Youtube, his videos have all communities linked.
But itās in French.
Yes Code is Australian.
Thereās been a 2 different sets of issues both of which have been addressed and appear to be resolved starting with production last fall.
Issue 1: some masts were produced incorrectly the inserts were placed too shallow per the design specs, this caused masts to split
Issue 2: the mast fuselage bolts were m8x35, another brand has m8x32 users appear to have been using too short of bolts and shearing the inserts (I think those were the numbers but could have 40 and 38 regardless it was incorrect hardware)
Resolution: the inserts are now deeper and the bolts m8x45
To my knowledge all were uhm masts that have a 3 year warranty and all were covered under warranty including foil/fuselage/stab. Not sure exact numbers but in Americas it has been single digit number of masts. PMs open with any specific questions or concerns.
These connection styles require to be tightened fully, as long as they are tight then the pressures/pulls of foiling are only exerted on the connection surfaces not the bolts.
I made a sketch to explain why I said AFS/Fone have the better mast to fuselage connection. For me it is about the stiffness of transferring the torsional loading of the fuselage between the front wing and into the mast.
ādo whatās Mikeās Lab doesā is probably a good rule to follow
Well the thing about code/axis is that it doesnāt rely on the screws. For example I was riding the 1300 on my 75+ mast and the guy who screwed it in didnāt do a good job. One screw was completely loose after the session. But the plane was still stuck tightly in the mast. I think my plus mast fits tighter than my old non plus mast tho
I think those sidewalls create a lot of force too.And if you add a crossbolt like Cabrinha fusion then even more.
Only if the fuse is aluminum. For a carbon fuse the AFS style is def better
I wonder if weāll start seeing metal for the whole mast foot section. Metal is as far as i know the standard for parts of the vertical in high performance sail boat foils now. Chubanga apparently made a prototype for kite racing
Obviously the afs system has advantages over the code system. I think the advantage of afs is that the fuse itself is alot smaller. I feel like the long fuses of code are more draggy and less efficient than the short fuses of code. Iām not an expert but this is the feeling im getting when testing various combos. I do like the medium fuse with the smallest wings, but i hate the longer fuses with the medium to larger wings.