I have a Dick Van Straylan twin keel fish - with wooden keels. The board was a surprise wedding present from my wife.
I love the board but the fins are giving me a massive headache.....however wife is great.
First problem with the board was the fins humming as soon as you would tke off. The board went great down the line but once it hit is max speed the fins just would not hold, bottom turns would have to be drawn out angling for the shoulder instead of the lip and coming off the top the board wanted to stay stright and not come back down the face, every turned felt flat and skatey.
I hate to say but a china rocket fish pop out bought on ebay from $150 rides better. dont tell the better half....
I fixed the humming by sanding my trailing edges and now the board doesnt hum but generally goes like a dog.....on the odd wave it performs but it has nowhere near the pace it did when it was humming like a bee.
There is minimal toe in and the fin cant would be around 2 degrees if not parrallel.
Help!
At the risk of a bad marriage i would like to get some performance out of the board. im hearing grumblings that I should change the fin cant to around 6 degrees?
zero cant no toe keel fins, almost parallel rails into a wide fat swallow … sounds like it’s doing exactly what
it was probably designed for, going straight really fast. with that outline I doubt you’d get much more up & down performance from it by just increasing fin cant… if I were given that I’d try to enjoy it in waves and the type of surfing for what it what designed. .02 from a backyarder FWIW
I have a small keel fin board with zero toe, but 6deg cant ( probox, oh yeah!! ). Doesn't track at all, and even with 4deg inserts i dont have that problem. It is 5'8'' and im 5'8'' which i think helps. How tall are you compared to the board?? If its too big for you maybe that's it??
A wife that suprises you with a board like that is one in a million. Forget how it rides, and just cherish the love that came with it. That one board will be more valued by you twenty years from now than a quiver of any others. Save it for special times with the family and kids to come.
Can’t believe how soft I’ve gotten in my old age!
Now start another thread about what you should be riding, and we’ll get you ripping.
May have found the culprit. On real close inspection to the fins, there is an area on both fin tips on the outside that is bevelled and it breaks the curve (leading edge?) of the fin - there are nearly in an identical spot - fins scraped the reef, concrete, no leg rope or an elephant sat on them.....
how can i safely re-instate the original curve of the fin line ( blend it in) especially at the tip - my study of swaylocks leads me to belive that this is the most important area of the fin. probaly around 1.5 cm in lenght in deviation from the normal curve on the keels. can i lightly sand to blend them in?
would the damaged integrity of both keel fin tips greatly effect the boards dramatic drop in speed?
there is no cant in the fins and they are set 5 inches from the tail.
If your set on these fins then tape up one side and lay some glass down and re-sand the fin to it’s proper shape and see if that does it. Now if it was my board I would tell the wife how much I love it and then take it down to my local repair shop and have them knock those fins off and put in some kind of a fin system like Futures. There are so many option with fins now days like the Rastavich Keels ( http://www.tactics.com/future-fins/vf-rasta-keel-fin-set?src=gglb ) that future fins makes…I have these on my Mini Simmons and I love them. And there are many people that will make you fins just like the ones on the board now for whatever fin system you choose. Then you can have some options that will change the ride more than anything else. The next board I make I’m thinking of putting the 8.5" old school fin box’s in it so I can change fin types and move the fins up or back depending on the ride I want. A company like Rainbow fins can make any fin style you want for a fin box, even those old school keels.
She would love more for you to make that board into something your stoked on.
End result: Bit the bullet after weighing up everything, and with the notion of underlying love for my wife...............................I took to my board and ground out the fins (what an effort - more glass in them rovings than expected) and re-set them. I wanted to cherish the great wedding present as is but after riding a friends keel fish it was pretty clear mine was missing something.
Yes the board has its days but unless im surfing perfect 3 foot right hand sand point it aint going to cut it.
I maintained the same toe in but added a cant of 6 degrees. I also moved the fins forward to 6 inches from each swallow tail tip and in proportion moved each fin out towards the rail to maintain the same fin-rail distance as was set at 5inches from the tail.
Verdict: just have to hot coat it and blend it in with the bottom and get it out there for a trial - but for now - it looks better.......
