I’m such a bonehead kook. I’m used to having smaller fins on my board, I chipped the tip off an almost new 11" Nuuhiwa tempate fin – that I got to try to improve my noseriding. The board was on my roof (fins up/forward) and I forget about that extra clearence needed to get into the parkeing garage. Now I’m missing about 3/4" - the tip is gone and split.
Should I:
Just sand it down, blend it in to the existing foil and surf it. If I do this the tip will be squared off/flattened out and the template will be comprimised.
try to reconstruct the tip shape with fiberglass+resin and foil it.
Any other ideas?
Just how critical is that tip? It’s a box fin, but, this fin wasn’t cheap. Thank God the board is OK.
Nice. I’ve almost done that 100 times. After a surf session about 8 years ago I witnessed a buddy pull into his garage and achieve the same result. Actually I was talking with his girl friend and hear the “F!!!” and turned around to see why he couldn’t pull all the way in. He was so pissed, actually enraged, with this move that in a fit he took the board off the car and beat the living snot out of it with a baseball bat. That was a fun 30 seconds wondering if I was next.
Maybe the next post will provide some help to your problem.
Don’t stress Nomad! you can repair like you stated in (2), in fact you can even color-match or do a different color (I figure every ding tells a story; friends will ask…).
You can even gloss the tip again and polish it. I’ve had great results.
(You may consider letting some of the air out of your tires to get the needed clearance next time!!
how long ago did you buy the fin? if you charged it to a credit card, all CC companies will replace it within 30 or 60 days (depending on the CC company) if it’s lost, damaged, or stolen. just call the 800# on the back of the card and let them know…and then you just go to the same store and buy the fin again, and they’ll credit you for the cost.
Sorry mate but you really made me laugh out aloud,
My very first solo drive, aged 17, in my Dad’s mini Honda was a disaster.
I went out and bought some metal racks and put them on, they stuck out both sides of the car about a foot, put the board on, listened to Dad’s rules for 30 seconds (he went on for 5 minutes), nodded as if I was listening, jumped into the car and reversed out wiping off the racks with the brickwork of the garage from the gutter on the left hand side of the car. The board was OK…
Dad was watching, he didn’t say a word, he just turned around and went inside…I think he was laughing at me…
The credit card idea is good but feels like scamming, but it’s trus so I may do it. I also may give a go at fixing it like you suggest. Any specific instructions – how much glass, what weight, and a procsess. Sorry to be anal anal about this – but I am.
i got one customer who did that twice , after getting a new car that had more ground clearance (less roof clearance ) both times came in with his tail fin smashed out , the second time he reckons he pulled the roller door out of its runner …
Offhand- sand it down and foil it pretty, give it a little gloss and polish and call it good. Who knows, it might work better.
Thing is, with a real long fin on a longboard, I see a lot come in that have been somewhat reshaped by dragging the tip through the sand on real small days. I’m not kidding, they get this odd gouge at the leading edge where apparently the fin is plowing a furrow. What that does for the noseriding, I have no idea whatsoever, but it prolly doesn’t do the speed a helluva lot of good.
Not only are you now ahead of the curve on that, you’re gonna wind up with a fin that will make it into the garage on top of your car. 'Cos if you try adding the end back on the fin, you know it’s just gonna happen again.
And don’t go calling yourself a bonehead. Hey, every invention was inspired by something like that.
Slickest thing I have seen in a while was today: the electrician on the job pulls out his after-lunch lollipop. Then takes his side cutting pliers and clips off all but about 3/4" of the lollipop stick. Think about how many times he banged the end of that full length stick into something ( though with Billy it may not have been that many, bright guy) working in confined spaces and jamming a lollipop back into his tonsils before he came up with that move.
It’s not about screwing up…everybody does that. It’s about how ya recover from it.
well, I know a fair number of bike riders who put bikes on the roof of their cars… Compared to pranging your fin on the carport, picture trying to drive into your garage – and forgetting that there are two bicycles attached to the roof of your car… Whoops… happens more often than people would like to admit.
If you rebuild your fin to the original length, it helps to tie some kind of reminder on the overhang/garage door - a tennis ball on a string – something like that - whenever you leave with a tall load on the car roof. That way when you return you see the thing hanging in front of your windshield and slam to a stop just BEFORE doing it again…
