Dynocore Premium build

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 4:59am

I was up in Queensland a couple of weeks ago surfing some fine Gold Coast beachbreak and a young surfer said to me “have you joined the Dynocore premium club?”. I said yes I’ve joined the premium club. The surfer then said to me “then you will get a board that you really want”.

I had met that same surfer only a day before in the same stretch of beachbreak and he was an employee of Dave Verral aka feraldave of Diverse surfboards and paddled up to me when he recognised the board. A link to the Dynocore premium membership here:

edit–> fixed link premium membership

I’m very happy that I have joined premium membership, my explanation here:

4 computer shapes, with design tweaks every 3 months. We have known of the possibilities of the computer shape for some time - how it allows us to adjust individual paramaters keeping other things accurately constant, but how many board manufactures have offered a practical way of achieving that to the bloke on the street?

This is the story of my premium build purchase. A while ago Benjamin Thompson from the swaylocks flex thread http://www2.swaylocks.com/forums/hard-numbers-flex-demystify-flex-patterns emailed me with a question on microballoons and incidentally attached a Shape3D file of his flex test model for my interest. So I fired up BoardCAD to examine it. I was completely happy with my goto board, but I did like the look of the numbers of the Thompson design, plus he was raving about it and it seemed to be keeping his flex test riders happy.

Basically its a one size fits all board with high volume to suit a variety of test riders, but refined features. My plans for those numbers were that it would allow me a little bloke to go shorter, thicker and a fraction wider - sort of the complement to Makakilo’s big bloke wanting to go shorter, wider thicker http://www2.swaylocks.com/forums/big-guy-looking-to-go-shorter-wider-my-new-daily-driver-would-appreciate-any-advice-comments. So I asked him if I could use it - I knew feraldave had a machine so I checked his website. I was thinking of asking Dave for a superlight PU build which also implies super fragile and then I saw Dave’s latest epoxy offering. I knew he had been playing with epoxy for years from Swaylocks, but only now just starting to offer an epoxy product to the general public, so he must be happy with it.

Dave explained to me that the the Thompson design (which Benjamin calls the Butterball) was fairly unusual, notably the thickness but also some of the deck contours. Dave went on to say that the Dynocore club economics does depend on re-selling each build iteration and therefore something more commercial is desirable. So Dave produced a completely new S3D file - his interpretation of the Butterball, but with a more conventional thickness and foil. At 2 1/2" it is still thick - intended to make paddling my 50 yr old self the long distances to the points easier than a 5’ 11" board of more conventional thickness.

So instead of the Butterball we have the MJE II (that’s what Dave has called it on the spec decal on the hull).

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:02am

I live down south in Melbourne Victoria, Dave lives up in the sunny Queensland Gold Coast. However one of the reasons why I contacted Dave for the build is that I knew his online board store with delivery to anywhere in Oz operated efficiently due to a previous purchase of a second hand ex-team board. The first delivery presented me with a slight moral dilemna - I was planning a holiday at the Gold Coast a week or two after the delivery date, so should I tell Dave and save him the postage or should I just go ahead with the planned postage and ride it sooner? I told Dave of my holiday plans, but he told me that he would “rather have me riding it sooner” and wanted to post it anyway - I thought what a professional business he runs!

I was certainly thankful for getting it posted earlier - I’m a weekend warrior and it arrived on a fri with Saturday and Sunday producing quality waves at the lower end and upper end of the intended wave range of the MJE II respectively.

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:09am

before I get into detailed ride descriptions first some interesting technical stuff. From an email feedback report I sent to Dave “I also think it feels stiffer flex than my TL2’s although I haven’t given it the Benjamin Thompson flex test yet - I will…”

I should say why I got that impression - I’ve owned and borrowed a number of construction types - TL2, Tufflite, home made sandwich, SLX (lightweight EPS epoxy with stringer by GSI), Josh Dowling sandwich and of course PU/PE. I’ve learned to associate responsiveness with stiffness and the Dynocore felt very responsive - I love this feel. I know I’m not the only one who makes this correlations I remember reading a post by Matt Biolos who posts under the name mayhemb3 on the surfermag design forum describing the hydroflex pump up technology and he said that pump it up to increase stiffness means more responsiveness and less dampening or something like that. I should mention that weight matters too - light means responsive.

from some email feedback to Benjamin
> > flex test vids here:
> > the second one is a PU Diverse Sprint model 5’ 11" x 2
> 1/4" I did the
> > tests several times and its definately a bit flexier,
> but feels quite
> > dead in comparison to the dyncore, however they are
> different designs
> > and the dynocore is lighter. {edit - the Sprint is a second hand board with nose snap repair so that would detract from its performance and is therefore not a completely fair performance comparison, but even so it did come in flexier and is useful for that comparison }
> >
> > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Eu4kajbBjM
> >
> > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqkgG4mnwjE
embedded for convenience here.

So no surprises there Dynocore came in at 3.7 - 4 bpm and the PU/PE Sprint at 3.7 bpm. I expected it stiffer although its not a big difference and considering that the Sprint is thinner then that increases its flex further - if they were similar thickness then I would guess flex would be even more similar.

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:14am

then getting TL2 tested - the 6’ 1" x 2 3/8" Byrne Phil Macca “pro model”

well thats a surprise the TL2 is stiffer at a definate 4 bpm! So the Dynocore is flexier than the TL2 yet I thought it more responsive, I thought to myself that I’m now going to have to rethink my ideas of the simple less flex more responsiveness correlation - and then it dawned on me:

between my feet, the exotic fabric stiffening makes the board responsive, however up front the board is flexier - yet I didn’t note this up front flex - my theory is that the board between the feet is the part that determines responsiveness the most, but its just a theory and even if its true there might be other things going on that give it its responsive feel.

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:19am

Theoretically this tells me that we might have the best of both worlds - responsiveness where its needed and dampening where it is least likely to detract from performance? So the ultimate test is to try it in choppy conditions.
[img_assist|nid=1059274|title=MJE II - choppy test, poor overhead conditions on the outside, good gutsy and choppy to the left of pic|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480]

above pic was the choppy surf last wednesday - long paddle out to the point which is why I went for thickness to make paddling my 50yr old self into this sort of journey easier. The places I surf have a channel to paddle out in, but frequently the distance is long.
[img_assist|nid=1059275|title=MJE II - choppy test2, fast, lined up and bumpy - some great mid-week fun!|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480]

above pic was the second choppy test - premier Vicco point break, but the winds turned and its mid-week so thankfully not crowded - this actually was a really good test.

I would be imagining things if I said I could actually feel the responsiveness of the rear end act in harmony with the dampening effect of the front end, this might be happening, I don’t know - all I can say is that this board rides nice and thats what matters.

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:23am

I’ve only had it a few weeks - although given it a fair bit of use to due to some holidays. However Dave and I already have plans for tweaking the next build. Explanation ot follow, but in the meantime I’m just going to enjoy riding it.

In order to explain the design tweaks, I feel the need to give some detailed descriptions of its specs/performance here.

Over a year ago Mike Daniel had noted that I was gradually downsizing and suggested I go the full way coz he had done something similar at my age: http://www2.swaylocks.com/forums/constant-push-less-volume-where-does-it-end?page=3

it was a great suggestion (thanks Mike) and I followed it up fairly promptly with a purchase of a second hand Diverse Sprint model. This allowed me to find my limits of volume and size - The Diverse Sprint is 5’ 11" x 18" x 2 1/4" with a volume of 24.1 L. Its one of Dave’s team rider proven shapes and this one is actually an ex-team board with a nose snap repair. The nose snap repair won’t help its performance, but it was a good cheap speculative purchase for testing my limits. This board is just too much hard work paddling for me - it catches waves (at least at the smaller end of the scale) much the same as my higher volume HPSBs, but repeatedly paddling back out to the lineup is too tiring for me and I tended not to use it. However I did receive some unsolicited feedback on how it went for me from a mate who didn’t know I was on a different board than usual (in small rippable waves and I was told that it went well top to bottom for me). So from performance maybe there was something to be gained from downsizing, from wave catching nothing to be gained (or particularly lost) but notably paddling distances was harder.

For the last year I have surfed mainly the Byrne Phil Macca - 6’ 1" x 18 3/8 x 2 3/8 and that is a far more comfortable paddling spec for me (not sure of the volume, but it must be more than Sprints 24.1 L

Hence the decision to produce the MJE II, which has a wider nose and is thicker so should paddle at least as well as the Phil Macca if not better and actually it does paddle better than the Macca model.

knowaloha · May 29, 2011, 5:23am

did i miss something ?

what does standing in the center of your board making beats have to do with surfing ?

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:27am

it is a practical way of measuring flex at home with no special equipment - check the link to the flex thread at the top, but briefly the higher the number the stiffer the board.

Some people think the amount of flex in a board affects its performance.

knowaloha · May 29, 2011, 5:30am

ok

MrJ · May 29, 2011, 5:38am

no worries, it was a good question - I had assumed that everyone would have followed some of the flex thread, which of course not everyone has done.

claude · May 30, 2011, 6:29pm

Hi J, could you toggle Boardcad to ‘Over Curve’ measurements for the old skool that still sometimes use a measuring tape over the curve.

I'm guessing that will bring the entry up to around 1.38" and will also narrow the nose measurement at 1' from the tip.

When I did the natural frequency test for a few boards (quite a long time ago), it was from the tail to I think 4' forward. So I was standing approximately where I would surfing, but with my feet together (my boards are quite long). The biggest difference was caused by the varying thickness (foil of the tail).

MrJ · May 31, 2011, 1:45am

Claude, good guess! setting boardCAD to over the curve produced an entry rocker of 1.37 however the change to say nose width was very small ~ 1/4". The story behind why I choose this view is because I asked for a marginal length increase on Benjamin's butterball design up to 5' 11" and thats what Dave produced, I then promptly measured the other feraldave/Diverse design I had (the PU Sprint) and found it also was measured in a straight line and I then confirmed with Dave thats how he presents his design specs - straight line measurement. I also confirmed with him that boardCAD shows the same readings as Shape3D - it is good to establish the same language when communicating with the designer/shaper!

However I remember reading a thread on measuring over the curve Vs straight line and it appears there is no standardised way and I liked the summary comment from Bill Barnfield on that thread - he said something to the effect of that there is far more important things to consider when designing a board for a desired performance range

I standardise my tests at 51” span to suit my light weight and shortish boards – which isn’t very meaningful for comparing to other people recording their frequency, however it is meaningful for comparing my personal boards under my weight for my own use. As mentioned the notable thing is that it tells me that Dynocore has achieved a very responsive feel – more responsive feel than TL2 and considerably more responsive feel than PU which at least partly comes from something other than overall board stiffness due to being flexier than my TL2.

Feraldave · May 31, 2011, 10:40am

hi mate, looks like the link to the Premium Dynocore Club didnt work… maybe this will… here…

claude · May 31, 2011, 6:10pm

It was just that Aku defaults to over curve for those measurements. It isn't that important.

You lucked out having someone personally design your boards and then have all the measurements at the end. That first one looks like it will go good for you. I seem to remember you saying you’re more on the front foot and pretty light footed. From my little knowledge that rocker curve should work good for that.

I just begged, borrowed and stole (and gave back later) as many boards as possible and then measured the ones that worked best for me. Sort of the opposite, 190-200 lb and plant my back foot about 2" from the tail. So fairly straight curve through the tail seems to work best.

Looks like the Floridians are going to have some competition from down under!

MJE - Is that the MrJ Exec model. Ha ha

cuttlefish · June 1, 2011, 12:14am

Tweaked my interest though I’ve been watching this technology and just haven’t been travelling down to the Gold coast this year like I was last year.

I’ve had a super fast look at the Dynocore boards by flagging Dave down at the Noosa carpark a while back.

Just got off the phone to Dave and have tee’d up a demo WD model for Friday. This will be interesting as it’s a lower volume than Diverse boards I’ve had before so the paddleability/floatation/wave catching with this tech could prove enlightening.

It’s also a more conventional planshape than what I’ve been riding having been exploring the alternative realm in the last several years.

Looks like Snapper should be pumping by then.

Keen to become a premium member as well.

I do seem to fit the requirements of the program very well.

MrJ · June 1, 2011, 9:15am

yes I reckon, borrowing, buying, whatever and measuring is a good way of understanding what works for us.

Claude, I like your name interpretation - the Mr Jones Executive model II

I reckon you are on the money regarding rocker suitability for me and your own personal foot position and rocker preferences is another interesting point. I want to do your comments on these criteria justice, but will need to get some diagrams together for that so later.

So first I’ll talk about the feel of the Dynocore tech.

I am genuinely excited about this because of the responsive “feel” I am getting. I know feel isn’t quantifiable and I am comparing the responsive feel from two different HPSB shapes - my TL2 Phil Macca and the MJE II design which isn’t 100% objective due to shape difference, nevertheless I am familiar with the feel of a variety of epoxy build types and have noted how they feel different from each other and more strikingly different to PU.

I’ve got some more evidence to support Dynocore material responsiveness, so using another measurement that is quantifiable: weight. Benjamin and I both think that reducing weight is another way of making a board more responsive. Although it is a different form of responsiveness to increasing stiffness. Just as an interesting aside Mick Fanning’s build team reject anything that comes > 2.2 kg (presumably PU core).

As I mentioned the MJE II dynocore feels more responsive than the TL2 Macca and considerably more responsive than the PU sprint. If it was lighter than the TL2 then that would be part of the explanation, but its not! Its actually marginally heavier, so again this points to material properties of dyncore that is giving me the responsiveness not the weight.

What really surprised me though was the weight of the PU board, in feedback to feraldave I used to say that one of the reasons why I didn’t use the PU board much despite being a nice shape was because it felt heavy - but actually its not heavy after all, I only weighed it recently - subtract say 200g for wax and deck patch and its actually quite reasonable - its just that I’ve been spoiled by responsive epoxy builds so the PU “felt” heavy. So I really believe feraldave is onto something special with the Dynocore.

MrJ · June 1, 2011, 9:21am

$1:

Tweaked my interest though I’ve been watching this technology and just haven’t been travelling down to the Gold coast this year like I was last year.

I’ve had a super fast look at the Dynocore boards by flagging Dave down at the Noosa carpark a while back.

Just got off the phone to Dave and have tee’d up a demo WD model for Friday. This will be interesting as it’s a lower volume than Diverse boards I’ve had before so the paddleability/floatation/wave catching with this tech could prove enlightening.

It’s also a more conventional planshape than what I’ve been riding having been exploring the alternative realm in the last several years.

Looks like Snapper should be pumping by then.

Keen to become a premium member as well.

I do seem to fit the requirements of the program very well.

Cuttlefish, your Queensland location is an advantage for trying Dave’s demo boards. In my case the MJE II was planned, built and delivered without even speaking to Dave on phone, was based on correspondence and a trust from knowing each other on swaylocks for some time - the power of the internet! thanks Mike Paler.

from looking at pics of the Gold Coast, you have some fine point breaks up in Queensland, when I was there recently I used my Dynocore entirely in the beachbreak. I was on holiday with my wife so didn’t want to waste time chasing the points or getting frustrated with unfamiliar spots with heavy crowds. I was lucky and had good waves every day. Here is some of what I had - fast shorebreaking and tubey with tapering peaks, many closeouts, but the makeable ones were such good fun and the MJE II went great and felt perfect for it.
[img_assist|nid=1059272|title=Diverse's backyard|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480]

my last surf on it down here was a few days ago in this - our points don’t seem as tubey, but we do get heavy swells - this was a heavy swell and pushed my board well into the upper limits of its designed wave range. …and our skys are grey.

lemat · June 1, 2011, 10:37am

Hi MrJ,

I found that small weight difference on scale make a huge difference in water. Measure of dynamic flex as benjamin teach us is a well better thing than measure of static flex but is not really enough because feel of board depend of dynamic flex distribution too. What i understand of your measure is something i found too: stiff part (under foot) give responsive feel, and if tail is still flexible with a fast spring back it give a projection feeling.

sorry for my frenglish

MrJ · June 1, 2011, 3:00pm

[quote="$1"]

Hi MrJ,

I found that small weight difference on scale make a huge difference in water.

[/quote]

cheers Lemat, your observation reinforces my suggestion that the Dynocore gets its responsive feel from its flex properties rather than weight - as mentioned the Dynocore feels noticeably more responsive than TL2 (a type of epoxy sandwich build and which is to my senses a nice responsive feel) - the Dynocore came in at 125 g heavier than TL2 so if their flex properties were the same it should have felt less responsive, but it felt more responsive.

just to give an idea as to how much 125 g is - a fresh bar of Mrs Palmer's wax weighs 90 g.

the different feel in the PU is much more striking however the weight difference looks less if I estimate in the weight of traction pad and wax (it was weighed that way) and I have added traction pad in the past and found it doesn't make a difference to responsiveness (probably coz of its placement). My estimated difference was just 35 g, but thats just an estimate.

[quote="$1"]

....

Measure of dynamic flex as benjamin teach us is a well better thing than measure of static flex but is not really enough because feel of board depend of dynamic flex distribution too.

[/quote]

I agree, it was me who suggested to Benjamin that we need dynamic measurement (but at that time I thought it too technically difficult) and to my surprise he said that was within his technical capabilities!

http://www2.swaylocks.com/forums/hard-numbers-flex-demystify-flex-patterns?page=11

and that's what sparked off his flex project, which is turning out to be a bigger job than he originally estimated and he is still working on. I think there might be multiple sensors at different locations in the board which will measure the flex distribution which you say is important, but not sure of that - perhaps he will chime in if reading this.

[quote="$1"]

What i understand of your measure is something i found too: stiff part (under foot) give responsive feel, and if tail is still flexible with a fast spring back it give a projection feeling.

.. [/quote]

ok, good to have some correlation on my feeling/theory of the correlation of stiffness to responsiveness.

Personally I've never knowingly experienced the fast spring back giving a projection feeling, I've been sceptical of this claim, but just because I don't think I've experienced it doesn't mean it doesn't exist - different surfers can get different things out of the same board or maybe I've not had that sort of board or my senses aren't tuned enough to know that feeling.

MrJ · June 1, 2011, 3:17pm

alrighty, now a detailed description of how the MJE II design rides for me. This is the precursor to my in depth response to Claude’s observation which I am working on with diagrams. Yes I know diagrams lol, but where would Swaylocks be without our diagrams.

The initial feelings of how a board rides when we have just changed to a new board and comparisons with our old board can easily be made are some of the most poignant I think.

The detailed feedback I have given to Dave is probably a bit too much for general interest so more concisely:

I love it, the board just seems to keep getting better and I've had it about a month.
super responsive feel - what I would hope/expect from a good epoxy construction - actually feels like a light sandwich board, but I don't think its a sandwich - I haven't actually asked Dave, been focusing more on design in my correspondence with him.
It seems to zip all over the wave and goes where I want it to. One of the main reasons why I like it so much. When in heavy chop I can quickly find the fastest pockets of speed by manouvering my board into the steepness.
Its both fast when manouvering all over a wave and skating down the line small/fat waves (although I've only had one session in small waves).
This board can be readily surfed from the front foot when needed - I surf both ways but the ability to skate down the line front footed when speed in fat sections is needed and the ability to send a board into a full rail/front footed cutback does lift my surfing experience - not all boards allow me to use the front foot like this one.
makes effective use of my leg kick - I know this is an individual thing, but kicking the legs on shortboards is an important part of my ability to catch waves - preserves my weak arms LOL. A couple of swimming instructors has noted that my leg kick is a lot better than my arms when swimming in the pool, one actually said that my kick is above average for a male - if I consider my overall swim speed I think that means my arms are really bad LOL
Never spun out on me despite resorting to a favourite tactic of mine to use the high line in various situations

The performance criteria 2, 3, 4 and 5 and 6 above of the MJE II exceed those of the Macca board, however in optimal HPSB design (and I reckon the Byrne Macca pro model is close to optimal for me - goes well in all sorts of waves…) add something and something else will be taken away as part of the design compromise. Non optimal ie. bad designs have the ability to mess up everything! So what have we lost?..

Lost some ability to bury a rail - although I'm not a power surfer I do like to bury some rail and displace some water at times. I can still do it to a less extent, but this board is more of a sit on the surface type board. However I think its possible that the way it sits on the surface is part of what gives it such a zippy write my name all over the wave face type quality?
In very limited situations there is slightly less stability than the Macca board - possibly due to a deeper concave - both are single barrelled, deeper in the tail. Its never caused me to fall off though and really the only time I've experienced it is having to straighten out towards the beach on a very heavy section that was about to go fat/back off - I have only one memory of this and noted that I sort of had to hang on rather than control it.
the overall reduced rocker may reduce its ability to cutback in small surf, but there is a big question mark on this as I've only tried it in rippable small surf once - the very first time. In the fast shorebreaking Gold Coast beachbreak I surfed there was little opportunity to cutback. In bigger faces it does cutties just fine :)