So ive been seeing these (mostly midlengths I think?) rails that look like a chine rail on the deck side of the board…
Is there function mainly aesthetic?
Hows best to tackle shaping them?
Often used in conjunction with a beak and tend to run length of the board… obviously tapering slightly through the nose and tail.
Can anyone elaborate?
Cheers
i ve seen those too, but didnt ask the shaper what his intention is. My own interpretation was that its a way to taper a thicker board into an rail with a desired thickness. Basically a deck dome without blending it in.
I liked the look and tinkered how id make, so my aproach would be to look at the cross-sections of the rails and setup the bands of the rails bottom to top- and let the planer do the rest. But im doing eps cut from block only , so starting with a PU blank from the catalogue might require a diffrent approach.
I think it’s to have a thicker board with thin rails. Or a throwback to older shapes.
In the early 70s here on Oahu, I saw many flat or slightly concave decks and an obvious edge where the deck and rail meet. Rails were boxy but turned down then and they led to a thicker beak nose. My brother had a Lightning Bolt that was like that, and I really liked the slightly concave deck.
Sam Hawk says in his Surfer’s Journal article that he told Brewer to make the decks flat because flat decks were faster.