A comprehensive shaper's guide

General Discussion
1

Im a new shaper looking for a comprehensive guide about shaping. Up until now, ive been taking measurements and creating templates from other boards and i would like to begin designing my own. For instance with fin set ups. how do i know how far from the tail to set the center plug? and then how far each rail fin? and the angle?

can anyone point me in the direction of something online that can give me this. Ive watched shaping 101 and it helped alot, but id like a document that i can have in my shaping bay with me.

thanks

jz

2

hey there surf3184,

i suggest you do like i’m doing and spend a LOT of time

in the archives and take notes…

see near the top right of the screen where it says search?

type in what you want to learn more about and just cruise.

there’s a lot of info in there.

Swaylocks is a “comprehensive shaper’s guide” with input

from the best designers and shapers from around the world.

3

Somewhere in the resources archives is a kind of catalog of surfboard “types” by Dave Parmenter which gives a description of performance characteristics, dimensions, fin placements, bottom contours, etc. for anything from a standard shortboard thruster to big guns, traditional longboards and everything in between. It is a very helpful starting point.

ps. I did the search myself. The resource I’m talking about is- “A Surfboard Anatomy.” There is also a guide to shaping by Parmenter as well. Another good starting point.

pps- The link isn’t obvious. You have to hit the small link at the right. It’s actually a surfline.com link.

4

PM me with an address

I have a CD full of stuff and links to save you time.

but it’ll take time and allot of practice to become one

5

And once you have all the information together, you should write a book called: The Comprehensive Guide to Building Surfboards. I’m not kidding. There is a lot of information out there, and if someone put it all in one place, like in a book, there would be plenty of hacks like us who would buy it.

With the knowledge represented on Swaylock’s you could probably write 50 books.

Doug

6

Sways is the spot, and the archives are a treasure trove…but, you should also take a look at StickTheory. someone compiled a “best of the basics” guide from the Swaylocks archives, all indexed and organized and easy to follow. give it a browse.

7

Okay

I have 15 prestuffed and sealed mailers that have the Builders Compilation CD I’ve been working on ready to go.

Since I have to packup to move offices in 30 days I need to clean up my personal items around here.

So instead of having to take this bag of packaged CDs home I’ll make the offer to mail them out free to the first 15 folks who PM me with an mailing address and who don’t live in kukamunga somewhere where the postage isn’t worth mailing the contents. I’ll cover the postage for any US address even though it is going up to $0.41 come Monday.

A book project sounds interesting but the IP I have accumulated on the CD is not mine but stuff I have gleaned from anywhere I could find it including the generosity of some goods folks and some interesting posts here.

Amazing how what started as a backyard-build-your-own help forum has given rise to so many new sell-for-profit side businesses in the past couple of years. Its funny that if some poster here does it its okay but if some one offshore does it it horrible. All the same ongoing surf industry cannibalism in my book. Maybe that’s why the silence from the old timers has grown deafening. Today is either boast, bitch or argue some mundane point here where none of what’s posted really makes a difference at the beach or in the water where it counts.

So just buy-em or build-em ride-em and report back cause until then it’s all BS.

Pick up some rubbish while your there and let someone you don’t know try it out as well just make sure they report back here too… And if you’re here just to steal someone else’s IP to make a quick buck then say so up front.

oh yeah don’t forget to take pictures for chippy (hope your dad’s doing well Ben)…

8

When I first decided to try my luck at shaping my own boards I found the book “Essential Surfing” by George Orbelian to be a great reference. While it did’nt have instructions on how to actually build a board, it has chapters on the different components that make up surfboard design. It also has a section featuring different shapes by a vast array of shapers with intricate rocker, fin placements, thickness, etc. Since then there have been numerous other books, videos, etc. to refer to, but I guess this book is kind of special to me as it was there for me when I needed it.

9

I concur with Derek

I’ve bought them all and George’s book is one of the best if not the best

the rest are mostly located online which I’ve linked to via the CD

The GRAIN book and Paul’s CD are probably the best right now for hollows

10

This is what Sway’s is about for me. Thanks oneula.

11

My copy of George Orbelan is tattered from so much re-reading

BUT my designs really started to progress when an experienced shaper started to mentor me - I contribute computer designs and he spends time showing how my cut blanks vary from my vision and how he would achieve it with a planer. It scares the hell out of me learning how much I don’t know about design - never mind the handcraft. Board 7 and it’s coming good. Thanks Stumpy! www.stumpsurf.com

Find a mentor.

12

Update on the CD

First of all apologies to those getting the CD

I decided to sit down and click through the thing this morning and found that the following links are no longer valid…

so much for the internet I guess…

Anyway they are:

Anthony’s Board Building site

Fiberglast document on Vacumm Bagging

Starboard Discussion forum on Composites

All About Surf’s Article on Swaylock

For those of you that don’t know how it works…

Instead of “stealing” the IP and then using it for gain like some do all too frequently I decided to just provide a dynamic index that allows the user to access all the websites I have found interesting related to board building in particular composite board building over the past 2-3 years. Things I actually had to archive as a file I provided on via the CD.

You’ll need office, adobe and flash to get through the cd but 80%-90% of it still works.

I’ve already received enough requests to surpass the pre-packaged 15 but found another 25 or so I can still package and send out. The price to mail these “odd sized” packages just doubled today but I could send dozens of them for the cost of shipping to Australia or Europe. Total cost to me I figure is about $5 not including the labor to design and burn these things. If you’re feeling generous or just grateful then please Paypal some money to Mike. It’s the least I and you can do for what I’ve gain in knowledge and friends from his website.

For those of you not on US soil this is what I’ll do for you, I’ll re-up on my subscription to the development service I used to build this thing for another month and send you a link via email to the hosted version which doesn’t contain all the components that aren’t available vai a website. So if you want to remotely connect in see how it works and you don’t live in a USPS serviced zipcode then just PM me an email address. You can then save the links and download any info you deem neccesary just be respectful or pay the consequences in bad Karma and legal prosecution…

And as a side note an a word of caution…

But being on the investigative/criminal justice system side of tracking down and prosecutiing cyber-criminals down who steal others money and identity, don’t ever let yourself get suckered into such a social engineered scheme to siphon off personal information using the weakness of group associations such as Swaylocks. This is a classic modus operandi of the criminal syndicates who permeate the web at this point. I realized as the requests came in that this post was a classic example of the “artificial trust” the web can create so please take care.

As far as the integrity of this offer, hopefully those that have been a beneficiary of my other forms of aloha in the past can vouch for my post.

But when in doubt double check

Please feel free to do so if you’re wary of the offer as it’ll make me feel better anyway…

Mahalo

13

oneula…if i may offer a suggestion –

why not rip an image of the cd (*.iso) and upload it to a fileshare server like “yousendit” (it only stays valid for 30 days, but it’s free and easy). then post the the link here on sways. that way, anyone who wants a copy can just download the image file and burn it themselves.

14

I actually can download the components if someone wants to host it.

I’ll need more help about putting it out on a server like that. I try and stay away from anything involving file sharing for security but if you can show me how (PM)

I’ll do what it takes to to make it easier on for everyone.

15 
Howzit oneula, Received the disk yesterday and looked at it last night. Very nice work and very informative plus I want to thank you for including my name. I think all registered Swaylockians would love it. Onca again, thinks and Mahalo. Aloha,Kokua
16

thanks for your Aloha Oneula.

just sent Mike a payment.

for those who are wondering how,

check out the tiny link at the bottom

center of the page that says

“keep swaylocks alive”

quick and easy.

17

Thats nice of you Oneula. I sent you my adress .thanks

18

here is Oneula’s CD:

http://www.transferbigfiles.com/...9b-a7e5-51b7c994fe28

it is an executable file (.exe) that will give you all the files on the cd. it’s only about 10mb, and launches as a program from the start menu once installed.

the link is only available until May 23 @ 9:51am (Pacific Time).

i had a chance to go through the cd last night, and it’s got lots of really great stuff. check it out!

p.s. – some time in the next day or two, i will upload it to my personal webspace so anyone can download it from now until forever. in the meantime, back to ding repair.

19

oneula I got mail. Thank you! I will give her a look this afternoon.

20

I believe I still have a few copies of Oneula’s CD that he brought over for the lastest sway-gathering… for those who might be, er, technologically challenged…