I wish I had a couple of my old 70’s/80’s shortboards because I kind of remember those boards being thicker and definitely carrying more foam toward the rails than today’s shortboards at similar lengths and widths. I had a late 70’s 6.8 ‘Something Special’ that was probably 3+" thick. I also has a ‘CANYON’ by Rusty from the early 80’s that was also a 6.8 and pretty darn thick with a flat deck that carried almost all the way to the rail line. Similar boards these days seem to be thinner, less volume.
Oddly enough, I only ever rode that board in chest-head tubes, and it worked great. That board is 3" thick but the rails were fairly sharp, especially for an early 70s board. The thickness helped it catch and the rails/tail held in steeper sections. It’s sold now but it’s a shape I should remake.
70’s and early 80’s short boards were thicker, but typically narrower than what we see today. I think 19" to 19.75" was about as wide as they got here. I like my boards in the 21" to 22" width, but I’m a senior citizen now.
True. But by the 80’s Shapers we’re starting to figure that out. That is one of the first things I figured out in 70 or so. The beak wasn’t really so much a function of design as it was a result of a shaper’s ability. Once the majority of the shaping community figured out what it took to get rid of it; the “Beak Nose” was History. The thicker the board though, the harder it was to get rid of and maintain volume. Rusty’s Canyon boards from the 80’s were at the head of the class. Ron Cunningham and Hank Warner were pretty much done with the beak by 1970.