Unifoil Progression, Hyper, and Vyper Foil Sets Explained

Today on Foil Fridays, Tucker gives a general overview of uniFoil's system and their foil range. Get tips on what each wing does and how to choose the one that's right for you.

What Is uniFoil?

UniFoil is a brand we've had here at the shop for a long time, ever since they were producing their stuff in South Africa. They've changed factories a few times since then, and now they are relaunching the product with a higher quality, fresh designs, and an excellent total package. One thing you get with uniFoil is a no-compromise design. You can just look at the gear and the designs, and you can clearly see that Cliff and his team aren't building this to be the cheapest foil on the market. They aren't building this to be the best beginner foil on the market. With uniFoil, what you get is uncompromising performance, design, and quality, and you pay a little bit more for it, but that's the way it is in the world, I suppose.

The uniFoil Lineup

The Hyper

The Hyper is their high-ish aspect foil. It's not a super crazy, racy high aspect, but a surfy high aspect, I would call it. It's a very fast, glidey foil. It's very thin and efficient. It is an absolute beast of a glider, so if you're looking for that gliding performance and speed range, if you're winging in mellow, rolling swell, if you're downwind SUPing or prone foiling, and you really want to eke out the most from the waves, this foil is super efficient, and the usable range on it is just massive. It's got such great low speed lift and stallability, but you can get it on a wing and blast at race speeds, so the high end is really impressive as well. You can cover a lot of ground with one foil through multiple wind ranges and wave ranges, so you really make the most of this size.

I'm really stoked on this one for a lot of different purposes. I've been riding the 170 for performance wave stuff and riding the 210 for downwinding in small swell, as well as light wind winging. Light wind winging that 210 is an absolute beast. It's not a huge foil; it's about 1350 cm2, but it is so efficient, and when you get it up on foil, there's just no stopping it. Even if it goes to zero, it just glides so long. You can pump it so easily and it just keeps going. In a little knee swacker swell, you can just glide around without even pumping. I'm pretty impressed by the Hyper and its ability in that way.

If there's a downside to the Hyper, I would say it's its wingspan. It is a higher aspect foil, so you naturally get wider wingspans. If you're in a lot of breaking swell doing really hard in-the-pocket maneuvers, or in critical turns, this might start to feel a little cumbersome. Then you might have to size down to a smaller size than you really want to ride, and then your stall speed rises. Then you can't hook that turn the way you want to because you've got to keep your momentum, so there is some limiting in the turns on this foil.

The Vyper

Transitioning from that, the solution to that problem is the Vyper. This is their medium aspect surf performance wing, designed in collaboration with Adam Bennetts. You might know him as @misterbennetts on Instagram. He's the one blowing everybody's mind in the waves, showing us all what's possible, and making us all dream that we could ride that well. We're not all professional surfers in perfect waves, but if you want to ride the same thing Adam's riding, that's the Vyper.

You get a narrower wingspan because of the lower aspect ratio. It's a bit more blunted, so if you compare the Vyper 150 to the Hyper 170, the profiles are rather similar, and then it's like the ends of the Hyper are chopped off to make the Vyper. The Vyper is a little thicker in the foil section, so you get a bit more lift from that, a little lower stall speed, and a better ability to quickly react. It has a bit more aggressive lift, which can definitely help in those rolling, pitching turns to really tighten the turning radius. Transitioning from the Hyper to the Vyper, what you get is a foil that's much more at home in the pocket, in and out of white water, really riding high performance turns in the critical section of the wave. The Hyper is going to be more of a shoulder rider, cruiser, and downwinder, while the Vyper is your hardcore surf performance wing. If you want to go out there and shred like you're on a shortboard surfboard, that's the Vyper.

So what do you sacrifice with the Vyper? It sounds awesome. Why wouldn't everybody just go with the Vyper? Well, it's got a narrower speed range because of the aspect ratio. It's also got a little less glide. The pumpability is really phenomenal for a foil this size and shape, but still not quite as good as the Hyper.

The Progression

There is another foil in the range called the Progression Foil. I don't have one in hand right now because it's so popular that we're sold out, but hopefully we'll have more very soon because that has been a very popular wing. Is it because it's the best one? I'm not sure I'm ready to say that, but it has been very popular and it is their newest wing in the lineup, so that could definitely have something to do with that.

The Progression is the highest aspect wing in the lineup. It's designed for surf performance and ease-of-use. While the Hyper and Vyper might be a bit more high performance and intermediate to pro level, that's not to say that a beginner-intermediate rider couldn't grab a Hyper 210, because it's a very accessible foil. But the Progression is definitely aimed at accessible performance, so it helps you go from intermediate to advanced level or from beginner to intermediate level. The way they do that is by having a foil that's really easy and fluid to ride, similar to the Hyper, only it's a little thicker and a little higher aspect so you get some good stability and good glide. It's a very easy foil to ride, but they've mixed in some voodoo magic to make it still turn quite well, especially at those slow to medium speeds. Where the Vyper wants to go a little faster and the Hyper really wants to glide, the Progression is going to be more of that in-betweener.

If the Progression has a downside, when you get to the higher end of its range, it does get a little bit more locked in and not as agile on the turns. Like the Hyper at those high speeds, you're not going to be making critical turns, but that's why you have the Vyper.

So if you're into winging, prone foiling, or downwinding, these are some great choices for the Progression. If you're working on surf foiling and you want to learn to connect waves, it's a great choice for that. If you're riding smaller swell, it's a great choice for that. If you're a new winger, jump on a big Progression and you're going to love that. It's really going to be a good stepping stone to becoming a more advanced level rider. If you have already gone through all that and you're looking for top tier performance in either downwinding and swell gliding and connecting waves, or high end on-the-wave surf performance, you've got the Hyper and the Vyper for that.

The uniFoil System

Fuselages

UniFoil does have interchangeable fuselages, so they all use the same carbon fiber fuselage piece. It goes in the wing with two screws, and you can use the same one throughout the range.

Stabilizers

Their new stabilizers come in a pack of three. These aren't carbon, but rather G10 fiberglass, so they have a little bit of flex in them, which gives you a really interesting feel in the turn. They have a little bit of a "pump and bump" kind of a feel, almost like bushings on a skateboard where it gives you a little something to push off of and a dynamic turn that accelerates you in and out of turns and adds a little extra flair. So I've been really stoked on those. They come in a 13 and a 14 inch set of three.

When you buy it complete, it's going to come with three stabilizers, and those are primarily aimed at how you balance your feet over the foil and how you transfer your energy into the foil. If you're a surfer, you're familiar with this and you hear of back-footed and front-footed surfers. Snowboarding, for instance, would be a front-footed turn: you pivot off of your front foot and use your back foot to direct what's happening on the front foot. In surfing, especially short board surfing, a lot of people are a back-footed surfer where you're driving off your back foot, almost like a skateboard when you're using the kicktail, so that kind of a turn where you're using your back foot not only to direct, but to push through the turn, is a back-footed thing.

Then they have a neutral stabilizer that's balanced between the two. Personally, I've been really liking the neutral. I like to ride balanced 50/50 over the foil so I'm very agile over that balance point. Other riders coming from different backgrounds or with a different preference might be more back-footed or front-footed, depending on how they want to ride.

They give you all three so you get to play with them, and that's a lot of fun. If you damage one or you lose it, you have another to replace it, which is awesome. It doesn't kill your session; it just gives you another flavor to try out. The shape of these stabilizers are all very similar; they just have different foil sections that are going to change the way they balance over the foil, so experiment. I've ridden them all, but I haven't fleshed out all my ideas on that. I tend to prefer the neutral stance, but I can't wait to try it more with proning, downwinding, kiting, and winging. There are so many different aspects that maybe I'll like a different stabilizer for each one, but thus far with winging and prone foiling, I tend to really enjoy the neutral position, so that's a good starting point.

Other Parts

I'm really amped on the total package. They come with nice wing covers and a titanium Torx hardware set. They also come with a set of stabilizer shims for between 0 and 3 degrees. I should mention that the stock setting is 0. If you bolt it on with 0, it's not like you're already at 2 degrees and you're adding a 0; you're still at 2 degrees. If you put a 0 on 0, you're at zero, so that's going to be a pretty flat-flying, hard-to-turn setup. I find myself really liking something between 1 and 2; 1.25 to 1.5 is probably my sweet spot. How fast I'm going to be riding and the way I'm going to be riding is going to change what shim I put on there. If I want more nimble, pitchy turns, I'm going to put in a higher degree. If I want to ride a little bit more glidy and flat with a higher top speed and I don't really care to have real tight, snappy turns, then I'm going to go with a little lower shim, like a 1 degree. It gives you a lot of different flavors to adapt, and again, it's built as a high level foil. They're not trying to make things simple; they're just trying to make it the best possible foil they can and give you all of the nuts and bolts and bells and whistles and honey and jam and all the stuff. It's really a great value if you stand back and look at all the pieces. If you pieced and parted it all out for any other brand, you're going to pay a similar price.

Masts

They have a couple different mast options. They have an aluminum mast that's going to be the most affordable. It's a very stiff, tight aluminum mast, so it's really excellent without a lot of compromise other than weight and a little bit of extra drag since it is a bit thicker in the foil section than the carbon mast. Their traditional carbon mast is the sleekest, fastest, most efficient option if you want that, and then they have their new Katana carbon mast, which is their stiffest, strongest, most direct carbon mast.

I've been riding the aluminum and the Katana a lot. Obviously, the Katana gets the double thumbs up vote from me, but the aluminum is surprisingly great as well at a much more affordable price. As a heavier rider, the Katana is a must-have, especially if you're riding the bigger wings. I'm 200 lbs, probably 220 with my cold water wetsuit gear on, and the carbon series is just a bit too noodly and soft for me, as much as I love that efficiency and glide. It's just a bit too unstable and nervous-feeling at my weight. The Katana is one of the best carbon masts I've ridden. It's incredibly stiff, really sleek, and fast and fun. It is a bit thicker than the carbon series, but I'll take a little extra thickness in that mast for all that stability and responsiveness. It's just so direct and intuitive and fun to ride, so that Katana mast really is the cream of the crop if you ask me. The masts all fit into the same fuselage system so you can mix and match as you choose and build your quiver to all your needs.

If you have any questions, I'll be happy to help you. You can always pick up the phone and call us at the shop, send an email, or jump on our website live chat and we'll get you set up. If we don't have something in stock, like the Progression at this moment, we can give you an ETA and get you on a pre-order list so you can get one as soon as possible. This has been Tucker with MACkiteboarding.com, and we'll see you next time. 

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