Aloha, All . . . Some years ago, I saw a posting of photos from a shaper wth incredible talent, whose boards could only be described as master studies in the art of surfcraft. Their decks and bottoms had been carved into incredibly beautiful and intricate three dimensional radial and wave patterns. I cannot comment on the ridability of these creations, but they were visually arresting and testament to the creator’s shaping and glassing talent. Does any of this ring a bell with anyone? I know I’m going back quite a few years, and am hoping to track down the name of this person and/or photos of his/her work. Hoping this resonates this someone out there . . .
Jet Bottoms?
Ben Chipper (fins) know heaps.
As I recall it was a finless design. Looked like it belonged on the roof of the Batmobile! A real Tour de Force of shaping skill. I don’t recall the name of the thread.
Bill
Crazy. Are those even legal?
Computer generated sculpture? I see a lot of things carved out of foam here at the local art school.
BINGO! You found it, and in fact I remember the second photo as one among the original set that I’d seen all those years ago. Many thanks, @Huck. Absolutely stunning.
First it was crop circles and now this! Damn those UFOs are at it again.
I thought they were called Jit ? bottoms , by some guy in aussieland and I think I saw one on the north shore many years ago , also I seem to remember a long article on Sways about the ideas behind the bottom designs , as I recall they were shaped and glassed by hand , most likely thats why there arnt too many of them .
jick lives on the big island
he no longer makes boards (I asked)
you can find him selling stuff at the farmers market in kona
there’s string of posts on here
he worked with Earle P
his design is a little different than earle’s jet bottoms
glen collins makes those outrageous designs with earle
just saw a post on surfer of some new of those tom curren boards from tommy
here is the one I think Bill is referring to…
are you looking at the bottom in this pic?
Its called a Jick Bottom.
the surfboard I mean, LOL
the one WITH ripples
You found it! That IS the one. Quite an impressive shaping exercise. I don’t recall the result of the ride report.
Bill
http://www.swaylocks.com/forums/enterprise?page=1
Batboard was really hard to surf for ingleby cause so slippery… but ben loved the board and his only question was “Please could i surf it again before i leave ?” and harley was “and me could i try the white one ?” Ben had good sensations but we arrived to the same conclusion : plenty of speed and drive…maybe just only hard to make some tight turns…(same than other test pilots before) My idea was may i could fix that cutting the tail… After a lot thinking and hesitations i’ve been proceeding to the surgery with almost just what you can find there… i’ve been stocked, he really surfed it, not just only the usual finless bottom turns, 360 or trimmin’. But really pumpin’ (not sure that’s the right word for increasing your speed by going up and down and up…in the wave.), top turns, cut back. Ben has been practicing a lot in flow rider and that really helped him in really using the rails cause there’s no fins… He told me that what i shaped was acting like a fin.
Don’t they both have ripples? All lovely and seductive . . . and functional!
Judging from the pics, it’d be only a few streps to the point where the bottom channels are deep enough to create a set of fins - canted of not - to provde the needed hold for serious wave carving. Might require starting with a thicker-than usual blank . . .
Please excuse my “Senior Moment,” is this a shot of Terry Martin, or Alex Lorentz? In either case, these shots embody an idea I’ve had for a long time, to build a complete board - fins and all - from a sinlge block of foam, a bona fide sculpture from the ground up.
Gman- that is axel lorentz. And Bill, he was at the last boardroom trade show doing the aipa shape off. Did you get to see any of it?
@wideAWAKE and @Huck - Thanks for clarifying. Feels good to get back in the loop . . . got a LOT of catching up to do, and it’s well nigh about time.
I am really so much lucky for finding exotic plan shape (SPAM LINK REMOVED) and thanks for all your instructions.