I'm on my second board, a 4'6 Freedom Techno and it's a great board, but the boxes have cracked and I opted to have them repaired. The repair is solid, full carbon replacement. Just from experience with fin box repairs in the past, repairs are never as strong as the original construction and with how much force is applied with a foil, I don't think it will last.
What is everyone riding and what are you considering for the future?
That's disappointing from a dedicated foilboard maker...not uncommon though.
I think the problem is often the prefabricated box cassettes most guys use.
They only sit 2" or so below the lam and aren't very large in area. They are usually gooped in with hard epoxy/qcell and there is no give to help translate force between the very rigid cassetthe and very soft foam (sometimes 1lb marshmallow).
I've been using 8lb pour foam like grg, either anchored to the deck or undercut (although 2lb blanks don't really need anchoring) with futures one shot boxes. The advantage is the foam exerts serious pressure as it expands locking it in, and it sticks like sh!t to a blanket. The foam around the install is slightly denser too as it has been compressed.
Carbon fibre, which is sexy and expensive....isn't magic and doesn't do sh!t if you don't play to it's strengths. It is way better to bag it, especially in the box region as you cannot see if it is wet at all, or perhaps too wet... there is always a degree of bridging on the sides of the box too.. Its better to slice the fabric covering the box as you laminate to ensure it holds tight to the sides of the box. Blobs of resin (which carbon floats on) or dry spots or voids will help the flanges to delam and crack. I also cap the whole box area after i've sanded the boxes open with 45bias carbon
Basically you want to stabilise the box area as much as possible. You need to run big laps in that aren and I run the capping layer of carbon all the way around to the deck, and forward of the boxes to add stiffness and stop the "hinging" action along the front of the foilplate or box install.
