great articles chip!
but it looks like the quad’s front two fins are about the same as the twinnies, did it ever give dimensions on any of the boards somewhere else?
how do you think the results would come out if we did the same test today with swaylocks equiptment and testers?
I find it interesting what MR has to say in the last of the b/w sequence photos; it would seem that he is bagging on the modern tail slide it favor of a solid rail-based carve. “No good,” he says. I couldn’t agree more. Mahalos for the article. M
did it ever give dimensions on any of the boards somewhere else?
not in this issue …
over the page however ,
part 2 of the design testing article …Cheyne Horan and ben lexcen …the winged keel …
ben
funny M.R. mentioning the tailslide , because , if you watch “Storm Riders” and various other movies from around 79-85 , he did more than his share of …shall we say …tail drifting twin fin turns …
Interesting…today’s quads are still different. The front fins toed, canted, and single foiled, the rear fins often more upright, double foiled, often further inboard, and often less canted. Sort of a hybrid between the old quads in which the fins were doubled out (same foil, toe, cant on each fin), and a thruster.
I bring this up b/c a few local designers are hard-core quad enthusiasts and excellent surfers. And they ride the new quads, well, and don’t know why they would want a thruster instead. My impression is that going vert into the lip it makes a difference (riding hard on the tail fin), but that’s a pretty minor concern in the grand scheme…
today went out in clean overhead waves, rode a quad from a friend…the board has perimeter stringers and a concave deck, loved both of those…
But I came up into the lip hard and threw spray…in the transition at the top, the board has no fins. I’m transitioning from backside fin to frontside to make the turn off the top, and the board has 11" swallow tail, and all four fins pop out…probably something I could get used to with some practice, but I really like using the rear fin for control off the top…
I’m pretty sure for me the bottom turn diff is no big deal…the quad likes to turn a little higher than the thruster, but generates speed pretty well. Just not as good going vert off the lip for me…
Concave decks and perimeter stringers…yummy. The concave deck really lets you torque the rail harder…like a concave deck skateboard. Like, given the choice, who would choose a flat or convex skateboard deck for a longskate? The concave offers obvious advantages, and the board can still be made quite thin if you use perimeter stringers…
Definitely a better design.
BTW, the board was a 5’11" wood canard quad fish that weighs 8 pounds or so. The rail stringers works of art…its designer rode my rotating rail fin board…bottom turn surprised him and he immediately started trying to go vert into the lip 
…maybe add some length to the fins so they don’t pop out???
I"ve always advocated really big fins for twins, something no one else understands at all.
Not saying I can surf or anything, but that’s exactly the scenario why bigger fins would help…that and sketched out bottom turn in waves bigger than the board was designed for…
Quote:
…maybe add some length to the fins so they don’t pop out???
I"ve always advocated really big fins for twins, something no one else understands at all.
Your not alone here Lee. I have always thought the same. Forstall of Coda feels the same way. His fins on his twinnies are big. I used to have a 7’ twinner and the fins looked like two single fins and the thing worked great.
I always liked four fins slightly better than twinnies, but probably because few shapers understood how to make a good twin fin. Those boards took some shaping talent. I always like the zap outline for four fins, but the traditional Mccoy/M.R. outline for twinnies.
I was never a big fan of old school fish. I always liked the pig fish better than the swallow tails on that design.
bigger fins [all four , perhaps ?] and double wings , to narrow the tail , as in the photo of M.R. with his four finner …
THAT would be FUN to ride , I reckon .
Great article Ben. But come on mate, you can’t just tease us with the following Cheyne Horan winged keel test. Cough it up!
Cheers and thanks.
Rohan
all right , my comment got a bite ! [I threw it out there , to see if anyone WANTED to see it]
later Rohan , on a separate thread …looking for waves now …
catchya mate !
ben
Right. Forestall’s twins are as big a production twin fin you will find. Big and thick.
Great find these old articles. So many people have either forgotten or are too young to know all the design testing that came before. And that makes them prime sucker candidates for shapers pusing the retro craze to it’s retro limits. Nothing worse than being stuck with a brand new $800 pos abandoned by groms 25 years ago just so a shaper can cash in. Shameless. I know one shaper with more 80’s templates than anyone and the integrity to keep them in the dusty rack, even though other of his shaper friends have encouraged him bust em out just to cash in. To date he has refused. Now that is integrity.
If you got any more articles floating around keep em coming. Good thinking Ben.
Don’t forget the past! Or you will be condemned to relive it. Didn’t someone famous once say that? Anywho, That’s pretty much what GL was saying in that R. thread, that got moved to industry.
mark,
I agree with pretty much everything you said. However some designs were never given their just do and today being modified are still valid. The worst retro on the market makes more sense to the average surfer than a modern thruster if the emphasis is on catching waves and having fun instead of trying to look like everyone else.
The old twin fins cleaned up a bit, but still with width and float is probably one of the best small waves boards on the planet. Wide tailed singles and wide tailed thick thrusters (as they originally were) work great also.
I totally have to agree on some of the junk that is popular though, for some reason they are gravitating to designs all of us tossed because of their limitations.
That is why we study history. Like Greg said why start the retro craze with the original Lis fish?
We study history in school so (hopefully) we can learn from our mistakes. Some cultures teach the mistakes (without criticism) as the way it should be done. That perpetuates the cycle of misery.
By teaching and being critical we can advance. That is what I’m saying. Sure there are great ideas from the past and they are incorporated into todays boards of all kinds. But why put the garbage back in too?
History lessons are to remind those of us who went through it and to inform those who didn’t.
Agreed. My issues are that old prejudice still is accepted as the norm. Today, because of magazines, many surfers think thin and narrow is better. This is not the case. It’s different and works for smaller surfers. (even though shorter and thicker would work better (IMO).
The old fish outline has been improved on and made lighter out of epoxy with some sucess. Put more curve in those straight rails.
I still think as twinnies go, the winger swallow and double flyer pin are hard to improve on.
How about those ugly, slow, wide point forward singles. If there was ever anything that needed to stay in the past it is those things. One thing you could always count on them for in a critical section was…spinning out.
Good surfers made them look better than they were.
Your issues are well founded and that fear is well documented. But it is still floating around. So we need to be vigilant and call foul when it reappears. I think Greg sounded the alarm quite adequately. But sadly his words may have fallen on deaf ears. The people who need to hear things often times are the exact same ones not paying attention.
Is it any wonder that that is one of the great tragedies of life?
In 1970 I went from a 6-0 wide square tailed Rick twin which I have posted a picture of and was a tracking front foot nightmare to a 6-2 single fin wide nosed narrow round tailed Sunset. Also needing lots of front foot because the tail would sink and the wide point needed extra effort to turn it. Those boards SUCKED. I keep them as a reminder.
Looking back it was a wonder I could surf at all. I must have done something right because it was a picture of me riding the 6-2 that got in SURFER while I was still in HS. But I don’t have any fond memories of turning that board or the one before it.I dont think turning like today was on th eradar screen yet. Long drawn out lines were still the norm. Just point and surf. Guess I didnt see any potential in surfing as a career either. Because I promptly forgot about that surfer article till recent years.
That mag must have been in a box that got left behind over the years. I have every other issues (Surfer mags not problems:-)) from back then though. Oh well. Live and learn right?
"I have every other issues (Surfer mags not problems:-)) from back then though "
I’d love to see some of them …particularly if you have any 1970s articles on Lis’s fish , and the bonzer …I don’t have either of those …
maybe I could pm you at some stage with a list of the issues I have ? and vice versa ? [did you get 'surfing mag’s as well ?]
cheers !
ben
Ben,
I only have SURFERS. The 70’s were all about school for me so I was basically living in poverty.
Anywho, yeah, there’s a Lis fish article in there somewhere. And the bonzer too. Ah the 70’s. Back when mags were interested in new technology. Now we can buy better technology off the rack, than we could ever dream of then. But were it not for the mags that technology would have taken longer to spread. Seems every mag had an article with some now legendary shaper doing something new. Not some retro re-hash. I don’t know exactly when the mags stopped printing technology articles, but I know Greg has said something here recently about an editor saying that technology has no place in Surfer mag. I’d rather not name names, but he has a pro surfer brother. So that is a clue.
Anyway, whenever this guy was editor…draw you own conclusions:-)
Now all they do is hold technology back. Well that is good for Swaylocks. And I’m sure one reason why Sways is so popular.
Been rather tied up lately with no time to spare. But the mags are right here in boxes so if I start thumbing through them and if I can remember how to work my camera…
I can PM you rather than post here as it’s still copyrighted material. Ben, I can talk more freely on PM also. m