I’ve been riding my latest build in clean 1-4’ NJ summer waves, the 7’1 shown below in white. I put the wide point at center hoping it turns well, and it does. I foiled it out for thin rails, nose and tail, and it floats my 5’9" 155 pounds just right. But I’d like to make some changes for my next iteration: (1) I want to turn it faster, but it feels too long for that (2) it paddles slow because I made the rocker too high. Options A-D below are the result of my work this week. My first plan of attack was to go shorter, a bit wider, but with low rocker, and add foam to tail and nose so I don’t lose volume. I found that as I moved lines around, added volume in nose moves the wide point forward. If I went with one of these it’d paddle better but have to move front foot forward to deal with the extra float up front. Another idea was to add volume in tail and elongate the wide point so it spans center, aft, and foward of center. I was afraid these desings were too wide, so I made the last one today, bringing width in an inch, moving wide point back behind center, thinning the nose out. I like the looks of this, but figure it has the least amount of foam overall. I suppose I could fix that by increasing overall thickness a bit and drawing it out so the rails, especially up front are full. Either way, if I go with a wide option I plan to run the bottom with a bit of belly to get it to roll over easier. If I go with the last option that has less volume and thin nose, probably run the bottom flat and vee under rear foot, then flat out the back. I know other variables will come into play as I move forward but I thought I should run these ideas by you first. Thanks for reading.
What fin setup do you plan to use, and what’s your stance like? How do you want to make your turns? For small conditions paddle speed isn’t usually as important as wave judgement and positioning and timing.
I’ve been riding single when it’s weak, 2+1 when it gets bigger. I’m ok with quad if it makes sense. Im at the lower end of intermediate. Earlier this year I went from 8’2 to 7’6 where I was standing towards the middle. When I moved down to the the 7’1", I found myself standing further back on my bottom turn so I can turn faster, so Im looking for more of that. I understand what you’re saying about positioning, etc… but the 7’1 really is a dog. My 7’6 paddles much faster so I’m catching about 80% of the waves I paddle for with it. With the 7’1 I catch about 50%.
I should add that one reason Im going shorter is because someone recently told me that Im riding way too much volume for my weight. Not even sure if thats true though. so Im not even convinced I should go down from 7’1
You specifically mentioned 1-4ft conditions. That 7-1 looks like it can handle anything that’s bigger that you would go on. Keep the 7-1 for bigger and do a small-wave specific board.
So for 1-4ft you need a flat rocker and you need “enough” float to paddle in. Anything more than that is just getting in your way. Beyond that it becomes a matter of positioning, not top end paddle speed. You need to develop a better eye for where that wave is breaking and develop a quicker transition from paddle to surfing. (Given yourt stature) once you develop your eye and your technique you should be able to get just as many waves in those conditions on a 6-10 as a 7-6. It’s your position where you end up that counts, not your ability to run the wave down from 50ft away.
You only need a dedicated singlefin for small conditions. In a 6-10 or 7-0 length a 3.5" nose rocker and 2" or less in the tail will work, and you can compensate for the flat rocker by adding more curve to the template; loosen that tail up by rounding the tail. Put a big ass flex fin in the box, mounted forward to where you stand with your rear foot and you’re styling in the small stuff. Go eggy. Something like this:
It will be a long time before you can do more than a board like this can do.
Thanks for the feedback. With that shape a 6’10" length makes for 20" wide. Think 2.7" is thick enough?
The 7’1 is 2.85"
At your weight the thickness shouldn’t even be an issue. Once you get to an adequate amount of float the rocker and widths are what make most of the difference in paddling. Personally, I’d point you toward a slightly wider width if you’re going to use a rounded tail, but 21" would probably work okay, too. If you can get your rear foot over your fin you can turn a pretty wide tail. It’s when your rear foot is too far forward that you start coming up short on the leverage.
I’ll put it this way: We kept a couple 6-10 singlefin eggs around for almost 20 years as my kids were growing up. And depending on their skill levels, those worked in small and weak for pretty much everyone at weights ranging from 130# and 210+#. Even the girls could handle those boards. Only a couple of noob longboarders ever had any problems getting their waves on those boards.
Plus, you can readily duckdive a 6-10 if you have even a little technique going with it. That’s a lot harder to do with a 7-6. A 6-10 or 7-0 length has just enough rail line to compensate for the lack of side fins at the rail. Set a rail and they will keep up with the wave just fine.
I’m old now but I still keep a midlength singlefin around as a daily driver in lieu of using a longboard. For small conditions, that is. I switch it up when the conditions get bigger/faster.
I don’t want you to just haul off and proceed with the first suggestion anyone throws at you. I was just adding some ideas and reasoning for you to throw into the mix. This is Swaylocks and the whole point of this forum is for you to do you. For you to do for yourself that which you might have trouble finding off the rack or ordering as a custom.
Pics sometimes get distorted, particularly if you don’t know what the length is of the subject of the pic. As it happens, if you follow the link I included you’ll see they have posted a size chart for their different sizes. Make sure to check out some of the other designs while your there because something might grab your eye or catch your imagination.
Thanks for thinking this through for me, super helpful.
I’ll draw up formal plans tomorrow and post them in this thread
Got it, thanks
Just to reiterate, on their size chart for a 6-10 they’re using a 21.5" width, with 16.75" in the nose and 15.5" in the tail. Bump by 1/8th in the middle for the 7-0. These types of widths are common for this type of design. I actually went 22" on the ones I was building (with tails and noses to suit) and those turned just fine. A little vee is all you need on that type of shape.
I also think you should look around at what other shapers are doing. Don’t be in a hurry to commit to any one design or style. Mollusk sells various types of midlengths by lots of different shapers, so scope those out and see if perhaps something else catches your eye.
It’s interesting to see that the profile you suggested is quite similiar to the 7’1. That could mean you’re saying to keep it simple and not make to many changes between iterations.
That wasn’t my intention as such. I’m just trying to give a little you “more” of what you’ve already been doing. Let’s rewind a little here. You are apparently trying to come down in size after learning how to surf on a longboard and are gravitating toward a single or 2+1 for small wave conditions because you enjoy that longboard-style stance and turning and such. That’s distinctly different than if you had already been surfing high performance shortboards and were looking to move up in size so you could cruise on small days without having to work so hard at paddling. If you were doing that I’d be pointing you to a more agressive design with a fin cluster you could pump.
You’re saying your 7-1 has too much rocker and doesn’t paddle as well as you’d like. So I’m just offering up a few suggestions:
- flatten the rocker, especially in the tail
- Go slightly wider and maybe move your wide point forward slightly (like maybe 1" or so)
- Round the tail
- stick with a dedicated singlefin design because in small conditions and at your skill level you're not going to be using the side fins anyway
- Use a deep flex fin to get some twang going in your turns. Like a Greenough A4. Those wash out in big conditions but they're excellent in small conditions.
Flattening the tail rocker will make the board more stiff (as well as making the board faster) but adding curve to your tail block will loosen it up again. If you also widen the board and flatten the nose rocker the board will paddle faster than compared to a narrower and more rockered board. You’re working in small conditions so you don’t need much rocker to handle those drops, but nonetheless once you get used to this combo you’ll be able to handle larger conditions so long as they’re also slow. This board won’t work on head high and dumping conditions but it will work on head high and softball conditions.
We’re trying to get away from “the perfect board” that can do it all, and break it down into a combination of boards in your quiver, each making fewer compromises relative to what you’re trying to do with it. You already have the 7-1 which should work well on larger conditions, especially if you run sidebites with it and work on getting your rear foot back on your turns. This design is aimed directly at smaller and weaker conditions. If you take both these boards with you when you go surf you’ll be covered for a somewhat wide range of conditions. By the time you run into conditions that are too fast or big for your 7-1 you’ll already be past your personal surfing ability anyway. For now. Next year you’ll probably be in a different place and you’ll have different needs.
P.S. for a 6-10 or 7-0 length of this type I favor the 7-4 SP blank. Maybe flatten it a little for a 7-0 length. I personally don’t care for the rockers on the A-series blanks.
I’m sure some of the other posters will have different suggestions for you if you ask them.
Wow, this is very specific advice, thanks for taking the time to think about it. It feels like a good progression to me, as a way to step down in size slowly. With this, I’ll have one board for small clean days, one for small pitching days, and then my 7’6 for when it’s really mushy. I have a 74SP blank here actually. Are you saying that rocker is good as is for a 6’10, but could use flattening if I went with 7’1? For reference, this is a pic of the 7’1" rocker, nose on left side. The 7’6 was quite flat and I think I went too far in the other direction with this one, and I suspect I also went too far thinning nose and tail.
My intention is to provide the reasoning behind these suggestions, as opposed to a “trust me, do this” vibe. You’re already doing to do some trial and error to see what you like; I’m just trying to provide some input so you can skip some of the less productive trials. Check it out and see what makes sense to you and ignore the rest.
None of this stuff is a secret. If you look around you can find similar content in a couple of the books on surfboard building, like this one:
Essential Surfing, George Orbelian
Those designs are 1980s oriented but the parts covering specific design elements are instructive. Aside from that, you can go look at the boards in the retail shops to see what the pros are building and how they do their bottoms and rails and rockers and such. Even for designs you have no interest in you might still see certain elements like how a shaper tucked a rail in the tail or how they foiled from a 2.5" thickness in the middle to a 3/8" thickness in the nose. Look at the rocker curves on the bottom AND the deck to see how smoothly they run and how effeciently they combine to foil the thicknesses.
Speaking of which, on the board above it looks like what you did was thin the nose and tail out separately. You basically added rocker on both ends. It’s been a while, but I’ve done that back when I was starting out, so you’re not the first or last builder to do that.
FOR NOW and until you get more control of your planer, I suggest you order the blank rocker you want and basically leave it alone; and do your nose and tail foils from the deck side. After all, you surf the bottom, not the deck so the bottom rocker is the more important of the two. Just adding bottom contours and rails will slightly tweak your end points.
Then when you’ve built your planing skills up to the point where you can take 1/4" or 1/2" of thickness off the entire bottom without losing your rocker curve you can shape the entire bottom rocker at the same time and thin your boards down from the bottom instead of the deck. But that’s going to be a ways down the road for you. .
That’s exactly what i did, adjusted tail and nose separetly, and I did it because my planner skills are rough. So I’ll take your advice and just skin the bottom, working the rest from the deck. I have been lurking the local board shops and it’s been an eye opener. I’ll get that book, thanks again!
Two more questions if I might:
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I usually use a 10" fin box placed 6" from tail end. This time I got an 8", think the same position works here?
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How do these thickness numbers look?
By the way, the 21.6" is actually 2" in front of center
Those thicknesses look okay. What you want to keep in mind is the point that the lines and the curves are what you surf, not the actual numbers themselves. That includes the curve along the deck. Some combinations of numbers will produce a nicer curve than others. So don’t be a slave to the numbers; they’re just a general guide. Go for the curves.
As for fins…
The conventional wisdom on singlefin sizing is you need the fin to be 30% longer than the distance of the fin to the outer rail. That way there’s still enough of the fin that’s engaged that it won’t let go when you’re laying the board over during a turn.
So if you lay your fin flat where you would mount it at the finbox then you need 30% of it to overhang past the rail. Less than that and the fin might let go when you’re on rail. Assuming you can get the board on rail to begin with. If you surf relatively flat you can get away with a bit less fin.
Obviously all that changes when you have fins out at the rail like with a quad or 2+1. At your weight the standard fin templates should all work well so long as you’re getting them big enough for your tail sizing.
I’d go with the shape that Gdaddy posted but maybe squash it down to 6’-8" or even 6’-6" (attatched pic), 21+" wide and 2.75" thick, that’s plenty of float for your weight and make it a 2+1 or a quad. With those other mid lengths you’re kinda in no mans land here in beach break NJ, too short for small longboard waves and too long and clunky to fit into those fun punchy clean days we get.
I’m glad you got a hold of an SP blank, it has a nice rocker that paddles great. Don’t worry too much about hitting all those thicknesses you posted, just get the center thickness you want and concentrate on getting a nice flowing foil out to the nose and tail.
Johnny, did you ever pipe in at the right moment…i just finished mowing the botom and cutting thickness of the blank, and was just about to start cutting a 7’0 profile when i saw this. i appreciate your supplement to gdaddys ideas, the “local” tweaks. thanks. i’ll go for a 6’8" 2+1. will post pics after i glass