Always something someone read in a book.
Was that meant to be cryptic and unhelpful or am I reading it wrong? Sounds like you’re pretty fed up. Maybe find a cat to take it out on rather than an innocent curious question from someone interested in learning. You do have the option of not posting if constructive advice isn’t your bag these days McDing, in case you weren’t aware.
Hard rails all around the board will give you lift , but I would make the tuck from the nose of the board about 3/8 to 1/2 back to in front of the fins and than fading to 0 at the tail , in my opinion that design will work better with a flat bottom .
By the way , what your son asked for is not new , back in the day they were called toilet seat rails .
Toilet seat rails, ha, I will make sure he knows that thanks!
I didn’t mention (in case it matters), the board has a single to double concave. The front 10-12 inches (nose) has a VERY thin but rounded (about 60/40) rail, then the rest is virtually 90 degrees, definitely 90 around the tail and maybe 100 degrees round the middle. At a glance it looks like a tail rail all the way round. This board has become very thin as he wanted a flat deck and, well long story short it ended up very thin compared to his nice boxy railed shortboard i made last time (he was still learning/beginnery then, much improved surfer now).
I will get back to it tomorrow and glass it. There is very little room (thin rails) to tuck much but I will definitely have a go. If i had the time and money to let this one stay as it is and take a gamble I sure would like to! But I had to save up for this blank and don’t have much spare change to go buying another if he doesn’t like it. Safer option sounds wise.
Just in terms of what effect this current rail style would have, you say more lift (still not entirely sure I understand what lift is really, just being honest!) but am i right in thinking those knife edges would make the board ultra (perhaps too) responsive, so any weight onto either rail and it will cut and carve fast? That’s what my logic suggests, but I know very little, in case that wasn’t obvious, which it was. 
thanks again. Toilet Seats R Us
You can still make the edge where the bottom of the board meets the tuck very hard but you should do it when glassing , if you have a very hard edge anywhere on the board before glassing , round it off by at least 3/16 or you will have a lot of trouble with air bubbles where you wrap the cloth around the hard edge , after you have glassed the board and put on the fill coat you can use tape to make a dam around the rails where you want the hard edge and sand the hard edge onto the board , the hard edge will be made out of resin not foam , by lift I mean it will get up on plane faster , toilet seat rails catch , bite too hard , you need the tuck , but talk to your son first , its his board its his decision. good luck .
Looking at your pics I cant tell how thick the board is but if you are nervous about it being too thin , save yourself some heartache and glass the board 4/4 top and bottom the added weight will be negligible and if poss use S cloth .
More great advice thanks. I am not sure what glass I have. I have volan (yuk for this!) and may have hexcel 6 and 4, or possibly only 6. not sure yet. I usually do 6+4 deck, 6 bottom (as a minimum). I have done 3 x 4oz on top and the damn things still get pressure dents so I am not doing that any more! 4+4 top and bottom I can do if i have 4. I could actually do 6+6 if all i have is 6, we don’t mind weighty boards and I have made a few with 6+6+4 deck and min 6 (or 6+4) bottom and they weren’t too heavy.
I will see what tuck I can get on it. There’s almost no rails left so I will talk him into letting me round the bottom edge off. I have a very adventurous glassing job to do (colour work i mean) and I hadn’t thought about the bubbles issue, good call thanks! I have built a hard edge with resin before so will see if i can somehow squeeze the edges into rounds if at all possible.
great tips thanks
A little late to the party here, but want to throw this out more for education for myself and OP.
Regarding rails “biting etc…” are hard rails not more maneuverable because they don’t “hold” water? Meaning water can only form around curved surfaces similar to airflow over an airfoil. That’s why 50/50 rails are more stable and found in classic shapes/nose riders. The water is able to cling/hold onto the rails offering stability to the board. Hence why the board is less maneuverable as you have to overcome that force. We typically harden rails towards the tail section as the stability is increased with the fin(s).
right… wrong? Thanks
I think all shortboards are made with hard rails at the tail and some longboards , but do you see any boards with the same hard rail all the way around like a toilet seat or do the rails have a tuck ? the transition from the tuck to the bottom of the board is the subject , in my opinion if that transition is hard it will add lift because it will release / shed water and get on plane quicker and if the board has a flat bottom it will be fast , I am only sharing my opinion but if you make surfboards it is very easy to take one of your boards and make a resin dam around the bottom of that board at the transition and sand a hard edge onto the board , if you don’t like it sand it off , once upon a time guys would experiment with rail shapes using bondo , fast , easy , if you don’t like it sand it off it’s only a surfboard .
Welcome to the party, although you need to get some dress shoes and a tie please. 
You’re spot on where my thinking was really. Whilst you don’t often see toilet seats (certainly not where I am, mushy smallish waves), I didn’t mind the challenge and I do like to experiment. I can’t really afford to be too adventurous though so some experimentation is fun but if it risks destroying a board and making it an ornament to go on the wall, I should probably pull back. I think this thread has convinced me to do that!
gbz makes a very good point, this thread IS (as he said) about the transition from the tuck around the rail (excluding tail rail) to the bottom flat surface. I have a sharp edge. I am going to round that off today. The board will still be VERY knifey all around, but I am doing away with that corner lip except on the tail.
Damn, why didn’t I think of that idea of adding the sharp edge with resin and could get rid of it later! I am sure I have read that idea before but totally forgot. This is one of the major difficulties of only making a board every now and then. I have forgotten everything I learned last time round! Seems like I am back to square one with this board, it’s been way too long since the last one. (kid grew up out of it, hence why I am making another as he’s bigger than me now!)
Time to make a list of notes and laminate the fecker on the all of the shaping bay! crib sheet, been meaning to do that for years but keep forgetting. I need a crib sheet to remind me to make crib sheets.
hey gbz - thanks again for input, very useful. A few times you have said “if you have a flat bottom” - Do you mean no concaves? I have single to double concave.
Hopefully these pictures show a better idea of what little I have to work with on rails…
https://i.postimg.cc/HnLT87Vy/signal-2020-08-13-103745-003.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/Rhb47VHb/signal-2020-08-13-103745-004.jpg
As you can see the tail is close to bare min thickness for fitting fin boxes. I can round off a touch just to try and prevent bubbles, which I will do today. As for the rest of the rails, I will tuck and turn those but as you can see we are talking about 1/32 to 1/16 max, just enough to avoid to many bubbles hopefully, that’s the plan anyway!
I have made some ultra thin boards before, thinner than this. So thin that you can shine a torch through the board after all glassing done with even dark colour work. They surf great, but I didn’t intend to put myself in that position again when it comes to making/glassing as it was a friggin nightmare! Bang goes that!
I have one other question in case anyone can help…
I have only ever used ISO10X resin from Seabase.eu. Got to know it quite well, but all this Covid madness means I can’t get it and had to get Silmar as that’s all they have at the moment. It seems runnier in the bottle. Are there any major differences I should be aware of for glassing, i.e. will it kick differently? The colour job I am doing is about twice as adventurous as I have ever been before, not looking forward to it at all! But it would be good to know if the resin is likely to give me more headaches if it works significantly differently to the ISO10X i am used to. If anyone has used either (ideally both) I would be grateful for any comments! thanks
I didn’t see if anyone mentioned this as the answer to the original question. If you’re shaping a board and taking rocker out, the likely culprit is the way you are holding your planer. If you run it lengthwise down the blank, you’ll straighten the rocker. If you want to keep the blank’s rocker, turn your planer more perpendicular to the stringer and make your passes that way.
First it looks like you have done a good job with the bottom contours , but yes , no concaves no channels , I have no experience with those resins you mentioned but remember whatever color hits the cloth first wins .
I am being constructive. Don’t go by everything you read in a book. Consider the source and out of curiosity; What book? And; Who wrote it? How many surfboards do you see with hard rails all the way around? I frequent surf shops and rarely see rails as you describe. There’s a reason for that. Anything can work on a surfboard, but not everything is practical, nor will it get the best result. If you only buy and shape 2nds, you’ll always be working against the grain. More often than not you’ll be trying to shape something out of a blank that just isn’t in It. If you are just learning, take sound advice and do a little research. Ortherwise you come off like someone who has built there first board and is now an expert. Which in your case is exactly what you sound like. I do get a little tired of hot air. But that’s alright. Have at it. I don’t have to read four pages of it.
Thanks. Yep the colourwork is going to test me (and my squeegee cleaning abilities in between colors!) - This is the kind of thing he wants - https://invidio.us/watch?v=rrSJrcV-ABg
Sorry I worded the title of the thread badly. I was trying to get more rocker FROM a blank, rather than take it out. Seems I managed it ok in the end but always had flattish boards before and struggled to get nice rockers. That’s great advice though about the planer. Interesting that you mention planer too… I realised finally (with this board after doing a good few with it) that it’s no good! It takes a deeper gouge one side, I always thought it wasn’t right but this board confirmed it. So I did virtually the whole thing by hand with surform and paper (and cheated with sanding disc a few times). It’s a bosch planer with good new blades so it’s not the blades. I have just cleaned it up to stick on fleabay. I need a replacement so I will have to read some threads for recommendations. I can’t afford the Clarke modified collectibles but that model of Hitachi would probably be a good bet, if I can find (and afford) one! Not sure what model it is but will have a read around on here. My planer also took awful chunks out (hence the new blades which made no difference), and it didn’t matter what the angle of attack or speed, it just did it constantly. Look forward to a decent planer, would sure speed up both my boards and my learning!