Howdy. Feeling very inspired by the 4/5 fin stuff you guys have put up and went to work on a longboard version for myself. Plus, my knees are in bad shape and I might kinda like something that comes around quicker than my normal 10’1-With-A-Pivot-Fin type boards.
Put in Probox, so I can change cant angles. As a quad, I expect to run 6* fronts and 4* backs. As a longboard style 2+1, I’d put the 4* inserts in the front. But what about a 5 fin? I have 4 great single-foiled Hanalei Fins in 4" and one bitchin’ old Fins Unlimited “Template #93” from about 1986, also in 4’ and with a longboard center box style base. It has the exact same leading edge & foil as the 4" HF’s and has just a little more surface area on the trailing edge & the tip:
The boxes are set at 5.5" from the tail to the back of the slot for the center, 6" for the rear sides, and 11.75" for the front sides. Rears toed 3/32" and fronts toed 5/32", as with a 10 foot board a wider arc is just fine.
So what about inserts for 5 fins? 6* fronts & 4* rears like a quad? 4* fronts and 0* rears like the 2+1? 8* everywhere?
I’m getting really excited to ride this thing (the boxes photo is after glassing & hotcoating a “cap” patch over all the finboxes for strength, so all I have to do is sand & polish & its getting wet…) and I want a strong recommendation on how to ride it first. Especially after reading the threads by Chip & Jar and Muggsie, I know that some combination is going to be magic in this thing, and I can’t wait to find it.
And its ok - if the best idea is to put ProBox plugs in all 4 ‘extra’ boxes and ride it as a single like I usually do, I can handle that too. But I made these beauty little pinched soft rails, and took down the tail rocker, and had my heart set on something different…so I’d love a little help.
Don’t worry Chip, I’ll send you photos of all kinds of different fins mounted in the thing.
my vote would be to try that as a twinzer setup, little fins front, bigger twin type fins back… but then again i like your quad setup too. you probably won’t have the same difficulty bringing it back around after blasting it off the lip as i did!
but i don’t know about that magic 5th fin. the trailing box you have keeps the 5th fin rather more forward like a GG five fin, so maybe one of his fin setups? then again maybe you or chipfish can make something that hangs past the back of that last box, nice and small, but just big enough for that extra drive. beautiful board!
look for the chipjar 5-fin-buster fin set coming to stores near you
(in dayglow orange, chum-bait red, and minty fresh lime!)
coming soon, the fish scale underwater board traction pad for finless fun for everyone!
The photo is oddly foreshortened. The end of the box is only 5.5" from the tail, 5" to the back of the plastic. And the board is 10’ long, so fins too far back simply won’t do a thing, if they’re small. Plus, I don’t own a single FCS-tabbed fin, let alone any plugs!
What would be a ‘normal’ placement from, say, trailing edge of a fin to tip of the tail on a thruster longboard, anyone know?
Chip, I’ve noticed that the big concaves in B5’s seem to be more & more subtle every month around here. This board has a rolled vee (very slight, like just over 1/16") through the center. Do you think that 4 appropriately-shaped side fins, heavily canted over, would create the bonzer feel, even without the concaves?
I thought that 2+1’s were just single fins with training wheels? ;). Haaahahahahaaaaa.
You and I both know it’ll go regardless if the combo is initially perfect. Not from any LB experience, but with my quad I found I liked ALOT of fin area; more jump out of the gate. Again, maybe a moot point when you’ve got a board with that much volume and glide. I was doing fine (before Rincon ate the boxes for breakfast) with the Rainbow RSCs up front @ 8* (BIG fin; 5.25"x5.37") and the Stretch Quad FCS trailers (symmetrical foil) in the back @ 4*, similar placement to your plugs, wit the fins as close together as possible in the spread. Found the Stretch fronts a little small and lacking “jump”. What’s your tail width on that monster?
I’d be careful though…you may end up wanting to “pump” that kind of set-up and we both know that’s a big “no-no” on a board like yours… ;).
Thanks, G, that’s the kind of info on the angles I really need. Not much risk of me pumping this thing, but I have been known to speed-wobble a longboard through a high line to take some drag off each rail in sequence You can really pick up speed that way, if you need to.
Tail width is only 14.5", nose is only 16.5". Its a lot like the one you made for S, just 2 feet longer.
Ahh, hell. I know I’m going to mess with it for a while & end up riding it as a single anyway, right?
Lousy phone camera grumble grumble In real life, the board is symmetrical and even sorta shiny.
I’m laminating a 9’4" x 22 3/4" quad these days and plan on my usual mad fin experiments with it. I’ll attempt posting some photos when it’s done.
It’s been my experience that the rail line of the longboard needs to be facilitated by the fins along it rather than be overcome by them. Large full based rail fins in the lead fin boxes will interfere with proper rail engagement and trim speed on a longboard. I prefer more high aspect fins up front that are, if you will, more speed sensitive that standard templated full based rail fins a little washy at real slow speed as they seem to meld with rail better while swinging the board about. I have settled on a moderately cutaway base fin. A sort of compromise in imitation of the pectoral on a bottlenose dolphin or a mako shark. These seabeasts are the masters of aquatic maneuvering at all speeds. I think 5 to 7 degrees of cant is the call for the fins up front.
For the trailers fin depth is a very critical issue if you’re going without a center fin, which will be my course. The trailing boxes on your board are well toward the rail so you make be able to go with a fin a little over 4.0" with good success but if the board is sticky it’s almost always because of the trailers. I’m going to experiment with some very flexible trailers on my board and some rather fast recoil lead fins. Two to four degrees of cant would be my call on the trailers depending on how engaged you want them to be.
Your board is a grand way to get a true sense of how different fin combinations will effect performance on a longboard. We’re moving into some new territory that screams to be discovered. Kudos!
I just did a five fin setup and used the 6 degree insert in the front with the 4 degree in the back, as the standard configuration. But on a fun day on a smaller beachbreak type wave I would change the angles to 8 and 6 degree to loosen things up even more.
I agre with you that for the 2+1 setup the 4 degree is the way to go, especially if there is any V in the tail of the board. All of my longboards are setup this way but I tend to put close to 2 degrees of V in the tail so the cant ends up closer to 6 degrees with this setup. I think the big difference that you might notice with the 2+1 setup is that the side fins are not going to be as far forward as would be optimal if this were strictly a 2+1. For my 2+1 lonboards this length the front fins would be close to 3" further forward than where you have these, so that is a big difference. To me this indicates that if I was riding this as a 2+1 I would lean towards using larger side fins and a smaller center fin moved back in the box, giving more of a thruster type setup.
The person I made the five fin for is mainly going to ride it as a quad with a tiny 2.5" trailing fin!
Looking at the placement of the boxes it seems to me that the most viable combinations are going to be the quad and the 2+1. I have a hard time seeing how you would set it up with five fins as the center fin would end up being adjacent to the back side fins. But I guess it would all depend on the combination of fin sizes.
I recently made myself a quad longboard and the thing is pure butter, just love it. It uses those 4" fins you show at the back and a set of 4.5" elliptical cutaway fins in the front. Really is one of the nicest turning boards I have ridden in a long time, pure magic. It is setup with the same 6 and 4 degree combination. The front fins are positioned almost exactly the same as your but my back fins are close to 1" further forward than yours, so the fins form a tighter cluster.
At the end of the day I guess the beauty of having all these options is that you can go out and try all the combinations and figure out what the best configurations are for various conditions. Having the choices sure beats being stuck with a single option, but it does make it harder to imagine all of the possiblities, but that is why we do this isn’t it!
Thanks so much, Robin & Rich. Since I have 2 quad sets from Robin, I can actually use all 4 of those 4" fins if I want to. And I also have 2 sets of the 4.25" Hanaleis:
Which might be good for the thruster type setup.
Was even thinking that a widowmaker-type with 3 in line might go ok, 3" on the outsides and maybe 5 or 6" in the middle.
Sounds like I’ll try it first as a quad, 6* front, 4* back, the 4" fins front, the 4.25" fins rear.
I’m so stoked you guys are also both making yourselves longboard quads right now, I just had a feeling this was worth exploring. A guy said to me in the water a couple weeks ago, “10 years from now, every board’s gonna be a quad.” He was being sarcastic, 2 of us old single-fin guys sitting in the lineup & watching the shortboards du jour keep trickling in, so I originally started this board to poke fun at him
Keep us updated on what your setups are & how they go, if you would… and thanks again.
It is pretty sweet. Its reversed from what I would have started with, but maybe the larger front fins help engage the long rails of the longboard better?
Anyone have a suggestion on cant angles for a Griff-5 setup? I started dropping fins in boxes last night and that one looks pretty solid too, but since I can change the angles with the ProBoxes, I might as well get it right…
I switch them around in bigger surf, but for small surf or if you want the board to be loose this setup is awesome. You can really reel off some amazing turns with this setup, especially for a longboard.
"Plus, I don’t own a single FCS-tabbed fin, let alone any plugs! "
be afraid …
…very very scared even !
… I can change all that , via a simple package , if you like , Benny ?
yes , i have ridden my flat bottomed ‘b5’ setup , HEAPS of times ! [ On my ‘fishes’ , though …]
A ‘b5’ setup would be interesting to try on a mal …hey , ‘popeye’ ? … you there , pascal ? hehehahahhhh [‘here we go again’ , li’l buddy screams into the air , frightening his 15 month old lilly ]
I enjoyed meeting you last summer at San Onofre. If you make it down here again please look me up. Please keep this thread alive…
I’m currently riding board #10. EPS/Epoxy. I got the rocker template from Surf4fins and I am using a ProBox fin set up. I built this board as a base line board so that I could make future personal boards with minor adjustments. My board is a 7’10" speed egg. From here I can fine tune from personal expirence and I have a rocker that Surf4fins is using and a board that has a few things in common with some of the boards that ResinHead is riding…
So…
Right now all the fins are forward. I’m happy with the board but it’s interesting how my thought process has changed while surfing…Should I learn to surf better or move the fins ,change the angle ,ajust the cluster…
One question…My board has a double concave ,the fin insert is 8 degrees but I think the final fin angle is closer to 6 degrees. If I keep everything the same but change the insert to 6 degrees what can I expect from the board???
on the proboxes I’d say go with 6 which I believe are the white inserts.
you’d be surprised what 6, 8 and even 10 degress of cant(like the H2s) can do for your tankering (sorry refuse to convert to the post modern slang).
The problem with 5-finning is that to engage the 5fin turbo your foot has to be right on top of the alignment of the three rear fins probably the same as in a thruster configuration. so that’s pretty far back on a tanker. I think if you want to ride a bit more foward I’d ride it as a quad or a “cluster” (small(4") center large(4.5"-5") sides). If you ride it as a thruster or a 5 fin drop all the back fins way down in size with little rake.
The three fins should be equivalent in total volume as a single rear just make sure to push the sides far out to the rail to tap into the face energy. Kind of hard to do it with probox versus FCS plugs though. My brother found these weird t-shaped plugs from fiberglass hawaii that I guess are for sail boards which are as small as FCS but have better and much more forward and backward movement. Griff says 1/8" should be the max though…
I’d put two of the bigger hanalei paddles up front and three of the sidebite sized semi raked ones in the rear. Even a pair of CRVs up front with the semi raked sidebites in the rear for hotdogging.
The thruster and 5 fin configurations work best when ridden hard zig zagging off the tail like a shortboard and you need to keep them moving all the time. But that how most ride them here in hawaii, just like potato chip for the 300lb guys. Might be something to think about depending on your style preference.
Thanks so much Bernie! Yours were the pieces still missing from the puzzle.
Zig-zagging like a chip for a 3-bill guy? Guess I got no choice but to start gaining weight
Sorry - its Friday night & I can’t resist.
I like what you’re saying about the 3 rears being the same as a single. Fortunately, I prefer singles with a lot of surface area, like big pivots (think Heritage, Nuuhiwa, Takayama, etc…) so I know that feel. With those, It’s looking like I need about 4" in all 5 spots with small tip areas.
For a quad, I think Robin had the right call with the Hanalei paddles up front for looseness & rail engagement and smaller trailers behind.
I’m actually toying (based on ePac’s posts about thruster longboards) with putting in a couple more ProBoxes for LB thrusters / 2+1 sidebites, up at about 15.5". I actually have room between the front of the (for now) front boxes and the rail. Thank goodness for wide tails and good routers.
Ahhh, crap. Its going to look like one of Chip’s boards. :
Well, we’ll blow up that bridge when we come to it.
Oh, and by the way, Ray…you can bet I’ll keep updating this - photos & ride reviews are pretty much required with combinations like these. I will, however, draw a somewhat stouter line than our photo- and fin-addicted friend downunda.
Board done… I may have forgotten to mention, its a stepdeck, as if it didn’t have enough else going on. Its also an inverted Firewire (“IceBlob”) with balsa skins & PVC rails.
I like the perimeter rail look so much, that I named it Werd Gnat, after checking with Drew Tang, of course (thanks, Drew!)
So normally on my 10’1’s, I’d set 'um up with something like this, for noseriding (10" Takayama Pivot):
Or something like this, for bigger waves or lotsa turns (10" Velzy Classic)…
But I’m sure the presence of this thread’s first 19 posts, as well as all those boxes, is a tipoff that something else is going on here…
