duck diving an hws

thought this might be good for a new thread.

Any thoughts on changing dimensions for a hollow wooden board to allow for duckability? I’m copying a friend’s 6’2" fish that I’m able to get under medium sized waves, but wonder about my board. The comments here all seem to say that an hws has more float and I’m thinking that might be a problem.

Dimensions of the board I’m going with are:

6’2 x 2 3/4 x 17 1/2 (12" from nose), 21 1/2 center, 18 (12" from tail.)

Today was a big day for the work progress as it was sunny and flat. Built a box to soak the rail planks for water bending, built a template to bend them on, and ripped all the planks that need it to 1/4" thick.

thanks for the input.

Pat

G’day Pat

dimensions look sweet, to increase the “duckdiveability” I would consider cutting the thickness down to 2 1/4" or maybe even 2", if you’re worried that this will make the rails too thin just go for less of a crown on the deck so that the thickness at the rails would be the same as on a thicker, crowned deck board. just a thought.

or plan B …

A DAILY diet of 4 litres of icecream , three barbecues , 10 blocks of chocolate , no exercise , sit on the couch , for a coupla years …

THAT should give me the required …er…"dimensions’’ , to be able to push hicksy’s 10 ton 8’ wooden battering ram under at least a FEW waves [whether it , and I , ever resurface of course , may be another story altogether … “No great loss” , do I hear many swaylockians cry ? , “as long as Hicksy’s board resurfaces in one piece , it’s all good” ]

“super thin bin” [the new zealand pronunciation of my christian name ‘ben’]

Pat, a big issue with duck-divability is the nose thickness. Most fish have a lot of buoyancy in the nose. Even if you can just keep it pretty thin for the first six inches so you can get the duckdive started, it will help a lot. If the nose is too buoyant you cannot even get the board started.

I’ve duck-dove a 6 ft HWS fish, it is definitely not as easy as a shortboard, but not tooo tough.

I second the width of the template to be the issue for duck diving. A wide thin board may be just as hard to push under as the same board 1/2" thicker. Narrow the template to the degree you are worried about it…

I personally think the major factor in duck-diving is technique. If you push evenly on both rails, you’re displacing a large volume of water. Water is heavy, hence the board appears undivable (is that a real word?). However, if one sinks one of the rails first, the board is knifing through the surface orders of magnitude more efficiently. Once the first rail is sunk, now you can rock the board by placing the weight onto the other rail, shedding water off the bottom instead of merely displacing it. Now your deep and able to dive anything. I use this method to dive my longboard under just about anything that San Diego throws at me. That said, you can also try kicking with one leg on the way back up, and also using one of your arms while underwater to get some preliminary paddle strokes going too so you’re at full speed the instant you pop out the back.

I agree that it’s technique.

Heck, you can duckdive a longboard if you move it (& yourself) around right.

Keep practicing…

It’ll do it but slowly, early anticipation and timing is the key…

thanks for the feedback guys. I guess I’ll probably keep the dimensions about the same given what everyone had to say. I’m going to start practicing heavily with ducking my 7’ egg to get the hang of the one rail first technique, but I’m a slow learner so it’ will take a while. The nose dimensions are:

3/4" thick (top to bottom) right at the nose.

1 1/2" thick 4" from the nose, and 7" width

2" thick 14" from the nose and 16" width.

much wider than the semi-gun I started learning to duck, which had a very narrow thin nose profile. think I should go thinner blakestah? I don’t want to change the profile width if possible, since I’ve already cut my templates out. It’s not too late to change the thickness, since I haven’t cut my ribs out yet. Part I what I’m trying to get with this project is a comparison between the hws and my friends board of the same basic plan. (I know the final contours will probably be very different since two people worked on the boards… one a pro and the other myself.)

I guess the question I still have is that with two boards of the same dimensions, one in foam/glass (pu not eps) and the other a hws, will the wooden board be much more difficult to get under, or about the same?

As for sitting on the couch, gaining 60-70 lbs, and then forcing the beast under any wave that comes my way…I’ll let chip try it out. (don’t want to end up with my ironic name being literal here!)

pat

“As for sitting on the couch, gaining 60-70 lbs, and then forcing the beast under any wave that comes my way…I’ll let chip try it out. (don’t want to end up with my ironic name being literal here!)”

which BEGS the question , of course …

WHERE the heck is “fatbaslardass” lately ???

ben

Quote:
I guess the question I still have is that with two boards of the same dimensions, one in foam/glass (pu not eps) and the other a hws, will the wooden board be much more difficult to get under, or about the same?

Foam/glass boards are usually convex decks, thickest in the middle, somewhat thinner close to the rails.

A HWS, because it is perimeter stringered, typically carries a lot of volume pretty close to the rails, making it tougher to duck-dive.

I’d hate to advise on how to compromise appropriately, because thinner is also more prone to snappage. Somewhere in between there is a happy medium. Probably, using the same basic plan will work fine. A 16" wide nose (14 inches back) with 2 inches of thickness will be tough to get going, but certainly not impossible at your size.

Also know, that a HWS and a foam/glass board are very different mechanically, and made to the dimensions designed for the foam/glass board will be less than optimal for HWS construction. Its kinda like all those Surftechs, lighter sandwich boards made to the dimensions designed in foam/glass. It doesn’t work as well as it could.

Due to its increased weight, the HWS will be easier to duck dive than a foam core “conventional” surfboard of the same dimensions. Refer to Archimedes Principal.(I like how this issue raises its head every month or so and people just cant get their minds around the concept that a heavier object of the same volume is less buoyant).

Quote:
Due to its increased weight, the HWS will be easier to duck dive than a foam core "conventional" surfboard of the same dimensions. Refer to Archimedes Principal.(I like how this issue raises its head every month or so and people just cant get their minds around the concept that a heavier object of the same volume is less buoyant).

You’ve never ridden a HWS, have you?

Quote:

Also know, that a HWS and a foam/glass board are very different mechanically, and made to the dimensions designed for the foam/glass board will be less than optimal for HWS construction. Its kinda like all those Surftechs, lighter sandwich boards made to the dimensions designed in foam/glass. It doesn’t work as well as it could.

and here appears to be the crux of the matter. Having absolutely no reference to go on except all the excelent feedback on this site, I’m just guessing here. I personally have never ridden an hws before, that’s part of the fun of this whole project. Have no idea what I’ll end up with. I hope the end result is better than the surftechs I’ve ridden, but if not at least I tried. I’m going to play with my stringer profile to see if I can thin this baby out a bit, but keep enough girth to avoid snappage.

pat

Quote:

Due to its increased weight, the HWS will be easier to duck dive than a foam core “conventional” surfboard of the same dimensions. Refer to Archimedes Principal.(I like how this issue raises its head every month or so and people just cant get their minds around the concept that a heavier object of the same volume is less buoyant).

My HWS is shaped almost Identicly to my foam board. When compared to my HWS,The foam board is lighter, Much easier to duck dive, and sinks way lower in the water when I sit on it. Archimedes Principal is a bit of a paradox…

Bouancy is bouancy right? You guys sure your HWS doesn’t have more volume? It wouldn’t take much air to counteract 10 pounds.

Or maybe it has to do with the placement of the bouancy.

Being a bit heavier than a foam board, but only 6’ish long, it shouldn’t be a problem, it just takes a little practice I think.

It will sink but slower than usual, the inertia of it going down will keep it under.

I rode a friend’s (Danny Hess) HWS fish. It weighs about 8 pounds. I also rode another friend’s Pavel fish, pretty close to the same outline.

The width of the nose on a fish makes it tougher to duckdive. But the HWS carries more volume closer to the rails, so it is tougher to duckdive, by Archimedes’ principle, because to start a duckdive you have to sink the nose, and there is more buoyancy in the nose of a HWS than in a foam/glass board.

You also need to remember that glass is very dense, and rails have a lot of glass, whereas wood will still float, and rails on an HWS will typically use less glass.

That being said, I could duckdive either board, and whereas the difference was noticeable, it wasn’t THAT big a change. But nose volume is a huge factor in making a board easier to duckdive, and at Ocean Beach SF that is often a significant factor in board design.