A friend of mine who was going to buy a Costco board and then met the Spider Surfboard rep in the Costco parking lot. After recieving the Spider board list via email from the rep he forwarded it on to his fellow students in his graduate department at the University of Hawaii. Below is a copy of a response from one student/fellow surfer, a 3 year Hawaii “local”,
"Spider surfboards are computer shaped surfboards made in south
africa with australian blanks. they are probably slightly better in quality than costco made realm boards which are currently made in china, which are handshaped by workers who have never surfed (in china they just take the measuremnts of exisitng surfboards and copy them). basically, the quality continuum of surfboards going from high to low: Hawaiian handshapes, U.S. mainland handshapes, Hawaiian computer shapes, U.S. mainland computer shapes, Australian shapes, South African Shapes (SPIDER), and then Asia made boards. also, Australian blanks (core material of polyester fiber glass boards) are of lower quality as compared to say clark foam blanks. a majority of Hawaiian handshapers only use clark foam. some Hawaiian computer shapes are made using australian blanks, especailly those made as cookie
cutter ‘pop-outs’ for stores. anyways, my point is that a number of really good local handshapers, charge similar prices to the spider price list sent out for a custom shaped, quality surfboard. the choice is yours, but you can buy a better board custom made at a similar price made locally in hawaii. the only downside is it take 4 to 6 weeks.
aloha,
alex"
just thought i would post it to see what you all think…
IMHO a custom Hawaiian board would be best for Hawaiian waves - either handshaped or off a machine. A custom Australian board either handshaped or off a machine would be best for Australian waves, a custom US board either handshaped or off a machine would be best for US waves etc. I’d say the jugdements about quality are parochial.
Surfboards are always a gamble…ive had crap boards from alot of name brand manufacturers and some magic boards from some relativly unknown shapers. Its up to you to decide…of course you could always do it yourself…which is why this message board is here.
Does anyone have any non-subjective proof/evidence that Aussie blanks are of a lower quality than say Clark Foam? As someone who uses Aussie blanks I’d be curious to know if there is any substance to this claim.
I’m also curious to know what the author defines as quality (quality of materials, or workmanship, or suitability of board to local waves etc. etc.)? It sounds very much like “my backyard is better than yours” sort of crap.
Does anyone have any non-subjective proof/evidence that Aussie blanks are of a lower quality than say Clark Foam? As someone who uses Aussie blanks I’d be curious to know if there is any substance to this claim.
I’m also curious to know what the author defines as quality (quality of materials, or workmanship, or suitability of board to local waves etc. etc.)? It sounds very much like “my backyard is better than yours” sort of crap.
Kind Regards,
Matt.
I have never used aussie blanks but ive heard…if i remember correctly something like the densities are different…memory could be wrong though.
Ive always thought no matter how pretty your board looks if it doesnt work nothing else matters…
my back yard has to be better or I have to move to Your Backyard and we all know that entails some kinda bring down effected by the regional establishment .The objective tests were never made public but as I remember the comparison of clark and walker , trade offs of porosity for reduced weight offset by greater absorbtion of resin surfaced and the walker guys remained walker guys and the clark foam guys remained clark foam guys but in hawall the switch to aussie blanks included a reactionary move to accomodate the unreasonable request for replacement blanks because of blow through a demand that was backed up with the big switch to aussie blanks and the continuance of the lightweight performance design quest ,in our hawaiian back yard …ambrose…never had an aussie blank … T&c has plenny.no warranties implied or given on the Tand C’s
Comming from South Africa. I must say that the poster of that mail has it wrong. The top 2 brands in South Africa are Spider and T&C and for South Africans these brands are not cheap and few SA’s can afford to replace boards at regular intervals. The Spider boards that I have seen been sold over the world are no different in quality that Ci or the Rusty’s that I have seen. The boards are shaped by machine but not finnished by non surfers. They are not made in sweat shops. The salaries are realative to South Africa’s economy.
They are good beach break and point break boards. Spider Murphy has sponsered people like Shaun Tompson etc.
Those are just a bunch of sweeping statements made by someone who doesn’t really know.
Like one of the previouse posters said I would look to a local shaper to guide me if I was to surf extreme places like Hawaii etc
just thought that i would let you all know that the guy who was looking at the costco board and then the spider has decided to let me make him one in my garage. he came over to go windsurfing on saturday and was checking out a balsa board that i am just about to finish, a clark foam/epoxy short board that i am working on and my good ol’ Home Depot foam fish and was stoked on the idea of owning a swaylocks inspired/guided misfit…
oh yah, about 9 years ago i was in my buddies shop in Cal. and he had two aus. blanks with wood, not ply wood, stringers (don’t remember any more then that as to the brand or where he got them etc.) but when he was shaping the first one the nose, about 9" down from the tip, just fell off… i was watching him shape it through the window that looked into his room and he was over in the corner doing something with a hand plane and the nose just fell off… you should have seen the look on his face when he turned around… just a funny story, don’t mean to imply that is a common thing or anything bad about the current aus. blanks…
IMHO a custom Hawaiian board would be best for Hawaiian waves - either handshaped or off a machine. A custom Australian board either handshaped or off a machine would be best for Australian waves, a custom US board either handshaped or off a machine would be best for US waves etc. I’d say the jugdements about quality are parochial.
When JR came over to oz a couple of years ago he said he couldn’t believe the quality of our blanks and how hard the foam was.He said our 2nds were better than the clark 1sts and that blanks regarded as rejects here were better than the clark 2nds eg a 9’8" reject(fine for home built boards)costs around$65-80 aus dollars depending on suppliers. I think that rounds out to around $50 us.
is that JR Ewing,Jack Recfotigue or Jim Restorlini I am in the dark is there an american authority I am not aware of.If so I must immediatly cancel my order of inferior blanks or perhaps just continue making and riding inferior boards made from inferior materials , in a degraded environment and enjoy the company of the birds who think that its a nice sunny day…ambrose…who is the man behind the curtain.and is this Oz
A - you have one of the best back yards so… Waves are waves, good and bad, heavy and mush, it seems - all over the place and people seem to ride boards from all over and do well or not. To be sure some boards fit some waves better but… to say one place over another, board/wave/other wise seems to be in error.