I just tried to visit the Probox site for the first time in quite a while, and it comes up “Domain Not Valid.”
Some Google searching shows Robin Mair and Larry Allison on their new Gearbox project, and I don’t see anything about Probox on the Hanalei fins site.
Is Probox now past history?
If yes, I wonder if anybody has backstock they want to unload…
I am not sure, I think shapingshack has the boxes available. If you are in Europe I can send you some boxes and inserts.
Cheers
My browser ( chrome) says the probox site is ‘temporarily unavailable’
Fiberglass supply out of Washington state still has them on their website:
http://www.fiberglasssupply.com/Product_Catalog/SurfSailcom/surfsailcom.html
I’ve used both Pro-Box and Gearbox and in my opinion Gearbox is definitely the better box unless you actually need to change cants. It’s lighter, it installs under glass, and you get a longer threaded area for the screws - more material over the top of the screw. It’s a very simple 1-pass rout for the install if you use the high density collars (which I would). The install kit is cheap, too.
I use Probox because of the cant inserts. This allows for a lot of changes and it allows me to use fins with built in cant, but not use the cant they have. I have a couple of short wide boards that I can use keel fins in and have no cant, then change back to other fins and have cant. I also like to change cant in the rear fins in a quad setup to go from zero to 4 degrees.
Otherwise, I use FCS fusion or the older FCS plugs for boards I don’t plan on changing the cant.
Be careful when you buy older Probox, they used a different jig thickness. An older jig with newer boxes or older boxes with new jigs will be a problem to get the depth right.
The way things seem to work is that someone comes up with a system and then markets it pretty hard in the right circles. Once someone is attracted to the idea it is sold. Then it is up to the buyer to take the product to the next level. In this case it didn’t progress to the next level. Fair product, but it was not a product that the industry seemed to embrace. Seemed to be a product that backyarders and those who tend to experiment were interested in. Rarely does some OC kook care what fin system is in a board.
Too true. I think the main reason to use any fin system other than one of the FCS configurations or Futures (especially) is if somebody is getting custom fins or is making custom fins. And hardly any board builders are doing that, let alone the mainstay industry types.
First: thanks for all the feedback. I meant to revisit this sooner but hadn’t gotten around to trying to order yet.
Finally tried yesterday and turns out fiberglasssuply is sold out. They said they had two boxes left - meaning 2 individual boxes.
**** Can anybody sell or trade me 4 rail boxes? ****
Open to buying/trading more, but need 4 boxes with or without inserts for the holes I already routed in current board.
Fiberglass Supply did tell me supposedly the production isn’t kaput. I dunno if I believe it (seems like the Probox Hawaii website has vanished from the web). But the news that FS is next to sold out just came by phone this morning.
This news from FS has me holding on tighter to the 3 rail boxes I still have left, since I have had to route out one box after this occurred, when I ran someone down who had the temerity to drop in on me, and I will keep this board until I can no longer surf.
I am considering making a jig to precisely drill and tap the existing proboxes and inserts for more grub screws to spread their load across more of the fin and finbox. Not sure if i would have gone with this system had I been aware of this potential weakness beforehand.
I do like the adjustability, but honestly I am sticking most fins in the 8 degree inserts, and fins all the way back, and now modifying fins to overhang the back of the box further and extending the tab thus using the full receptacle for the fin base.
Best of luck getting your proboxes, but I am hoarding the ones I still have.
Damn, wrcsixeight. In a wood board that’s a tougher-than-foam project.
I’ll miss Probox if they’re done. I do a lot of one-offs and basically started shaping to make things I can’t get off the shelf, and to not have to deal with established shapers telling me things like “that will never work as a quad,” when they’re wrong (or to find out they’re right or wrong for myself). The first time I make a board, whether original or a tweaked copy, the best fin layout/positions/cant are almost never what I expected them to be or the same as the board copied in the case of a tweaked copy.
I think the main reason this fin system never became a third big name on the level of FCS or Futures is the installation process (pretty demanding to get a consistent watertight result, in my experience), and the lack of a capped or cap-friendly construction like FCS (or FCS leash plugs) or Futures where you can just insert the boxes as manufactured, cap the grubs and tabs/slots, glass over and sand down. When I install Probox I put them on after the lam and before the hotcoat, and have to babysit the hotcoat to pull the tape at the right time. This is the only way I get a consistent, dependable, watertight box, and even then there is all the added time of the fin roving, “football” patches, etc. etc… Any time I’ve done them the way others have (e.g. after hotcoat), I ended up with leaky box seams.
I also have never met a board builder in Santa Cruz that had a good experience with them. Mainly, those that discussed them with me found them too time consuming to install. When I had a board glassed by a big name here, and wanted Probox (I shaped the board in an empty bay at the factory), they made me come in to install the boxes. That time I did it the way I’ve seen recommended here, and the boxes leaked. I still have the board, and have repaired the boxes 3 or 4 times. They still leak. I no longer bother to repair them. The board is still great, and it wouldn’t be if I couldn’t put the fins in a different place than I thought they would belong, and with a different set of cants than I thought would be best.
I think the installation sucks, but it’s just the price of having that adjustability. I love and depend on them for the adjustability. If I could buy up 100 boxes, I would. In fact, that’s about what I tried to order, before finding out the cupboard at FS is empty.
Anyhow, I need 4 boxes, and would have, for example, happily made you a jig to get 4 boxes. But then you wouldn’t have the boxes to replace that one after routing it out…
Good luck – I’m sure you’ll figure it out and all will be well.
I wonder how many members here started making their own boards as they got sick of off the rack options, or being steered towards something their available shaper was more comfortable shaping. Weighing ~220Lbs and being anti pointy nose in the early 90’s left me few options I liked, and the shaper I turned to later taught me much about the shaping laminating processes, and made many boards with an outline and volume and glass schedule I wanted, and only once did I succumb to the potato chip disposable mentality of the mid 90’s, and thoroughly despised that board…
Well before I actually started building my latest and likely last hollow wood wood, or any board, several years ago, I came here and learned of Probox’s adjustability, as I had intended using fcs original plugs as I never had issues with those when they were installed properly. Knowing the huge amounts of time and effort I was going to expend on this board, I wanted lots of fin adjustability for fine tuning, and I love tinkering and experimenting.
I really like the long fin base of Probox. Much stronger and easier to make than two tab fcs, and would accept all those FCS fins I made/bought in the previous ~20 years, even though the flex at the tabs is not desirable to me. I dont like future’s canted tabs, and I prefer the post glass installation of Probox, and the fcs1 plugs for that matter. I dont much care what is production friendliest. I essentially bought the installation kit for use on just one board, and likely could just have freehanded the holes and saved $$…
I’ve had zero issues with water seepage around the Proboxes, They are recessed into multilayered cedar of many different grain directions with some cloth between those layers, each box has its own stringer, glassed and sealed / reinforced inside the board and capped all 5 of my boxes with one piece of 1.43oz cloth. The cedar receptacles inside the board are basically the size of the router jig/resin dam, and heavily reinforced to other stringers and nearby boxes, and rails. So the box install is basically bullett proof in my board, but the grub screw weakness is a worry, Especially with the high aspect ratio fins I have been keen on riding lately.
I had tried to rebuild the broken probox but had some issues with being frugal by using old epoxy dregs in some nearly empty bottles not curing properly, and busted out the router and took many shallow slow passes after super 77’ing the probox jig back to the board in the right spot. The replacement process went smoothly, I capped the box with 1.43oz again and have surfed many dozens of sessions with the replacement box, whose cap I have not really properly sanded flat and made to look pretty, yet.
I was going to design and build something like the Kreg pocket screw jig for drilling new grub screw holes through the probox and inserts, and then precisely tapping these holes for grub screws, perhaps of smaller diameter than the standard. I have sucesfully cast threads around fine thread small metric SS screws in epoxy, but there is no wiggle room and cross threading the screws is too easy and stripping the fine threads using too much torque was also too easy. But the 10-24 grub screw threads are coarse and much further apart in comparison to m4.
The probox center fin box grub screws are weirdly angled, pressing into the middle of the fin tab at more of a 45 degree angle. It could have been designed so there would be more material between tab recess and grub screw for greater strength, but was not. Custom fins for center probox need the grub screw Receptacle flat be up higher on the fin tab.
I guess if Probox is defunct, these little details are of little consquence.
I though Lary Allison was still selling probox and probox fins for SUPs.
Probox Larry has not ben on sway’s for ages but has a facebook page, if anyone does FB maybe they can get a response as to whether Probox is indeed out of production or get a line on some new old stock sitting in the rafters somewhere.
https://www.facebook.com/fibre.fin
Here’s the permanent solution to your problem. I’ve used both and these are literally better in every way, except that you have to commit to your cant.
https://forum.surfer.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2959171#Post2959171
wrc - many parallels here. Am 208-220 depending on time of year, and 50 yrs old, and what is available off the rack for me is generally not what I’ve discovered I’d do for me. Example: rented a Tomo Sci-Fi, 6-5 and marked 45.??L, and took it for a spin. Immediately hated its flat water paddle – my boards in the same volume range for the same waves paddle much, much better for me (was very stoked about that) – but liked its performance. I copied it with beefed up numbers (adding a bit of width, and a bit of thickness) and it still isn’t what I’d want to ride every day – the eggs I make for myself (I notice many older shapers ride hybrid eggs as their daily) are a better balance between paddle and performance for me in average to crappy waves – but the result was closer and the Sci Fi copy is probably what I’ll ride most of the time when waves are higher quality. But you can’t find my dims for it on the rack, or my foil (thicker foiled forward and toward the nose for my top-heavy body type). And I basically quit surfing in my late teens in large part because I went from a beefy 6’ Croteau quad that I couldn’t duckdive – awesome board – to a 6-2 Schroedel that I couldn’t catch waves on in the chippy 80s period. I thought it must be me, or the waves, because, “A 6-2 should catch waves better than and be a ‘step-up’ from 6-0, right?”
The best everyday board I ever made for myself has rails that are just a visual obscenity to nearly any accomplished shaper or surfer. It’s called “The Hamburglar” because it looks like a Big Mac and has rails like a grossly misshapen hamburger.
I haven’t broken a grub corner like that, but I don’t have heavy feet. 165 lbers riding my boards divot them up much worse than I do.
gdaddy - thank you! If anybody is in contact with ChrisP – seems like probably the same ChrisP from this board? – I will want that kit. I’ll see if I can find him on the forum in a sec…
I was always nervous about the amount of material left over the grub screws after sanding. I never had one fail but I was always paranoid that it would because the walls of the box are thinner and have less threaded area in support of the grub screw - due to the use of the inserts. As it turns out, I almost never took advantage of the cant adjustments except when I was swapping fin setups entirely to go from a quad to a twinzer.
So with Fusions or Gearbox I just have to commit to my fin setup from the outset and it’s all good.
Sanding/routing Probox flat, if installed correctly with tabs resting on lam and not a thick hot coat, will not sand any of the box by the grub screws though. The inserts fit flush to the box before installation, and they ‘should’ sit flush with the box after sanding the insertless boxes flush with the hull.
There is just not enough material between grub screw and insert to begin with.
One can actually submerge proboxes slightly if they razor the tabs a bit so the box sits deeper in the board as resin cures. Then capping them less cloth need be sanded off to get it flush, then the inserts sit a bit recessed. Hard to get the cloth over the area between grub screw hole and insert though for adding strength to that area.
I think if one is sanding probox by the grub screws, and then the inserts sit proud, then the probox floated up during the install or was not pushed all the way to the lam with tabs resting upon it. I was using my extra proboxes upside down with 3 or 4 Lb lead fishing weights atop to prevent them floating up as Epoxy cured. Glad I read every Sway’s thread on probox installs before I did my first one as this trick laid within. The 6 oz football patch under the box might swell and push the box up without weight atop it.
My Quad boxes which I either did not route deep enough or sanded the bottoms of the probox a smidge or both, got not only the lead weights, but a wood bar across both and then bricks for even more weight, as I could see more resin bulge out the sides with more downward pressure. Dry, I could not see if the box tabs were flush on the lam, but the resin bulging out the sides with more downward pressure indicated I needed to compress the 6 oz or 7.5 oz football patches I used in the routed hole under the Probox.
Does Gearbox allow for the fore/aft adjustment?
If I ever make another board with multifins, I Would go probably go for gearbox, over futures or fcs, assuming I could not get probox anymore and keep having issues with the grub screw getting ripped out.
I think Gearbox is a neat design due to the oval shape that’s just the right length and width to support most fins, because it can be installed under glass just as easily as a Future box, because if you use the high density collars you’re not only supporting the box better but you can also do a single-rout cavity, and because the top plate is trussed 1/8" below the top of the top-plate so you get a nice thick sandwiched top plate under the glassed cap. You can use FCS twin tab fins and have enough room to move them ~1/4" forward or back. Or if you’re making your own fins you can build them with a full length tab that will never break.
And, it doesn’t look like Gearbox sponsors any pro surfers or models so you’re not paying for that BS. Robin Main is a legit shaper, fin maker and hellman, not a suit; so that’s another plus in my book.
I should send flowers.
I have a bunch of ProBox boxes and inserts. Not sure of the inventory. I’d be glad to pass them along to someone who will use them. PM me.
all the best
GregTate - PM sent! 
A quick update: I got my shipment from FS, and it turned out they did have some white rail boxes in, but only with blue 0 degree inserts. I went through my entire probox related stuff and found that I have an overabundance of blue inserts, and a shortage of black.
If anybody wants blue inserts, I can spare 10. Happy to donate or trade em. If anybody has a backlog of black inserts, I can use em. And am still prepared to take any white or black rail boxes (center, too, but less need for centers as I usually do 5 box layout, and that’s 4 rails + 1 center) and happy to pay both for the boxes and for the shipping.
One update to the thread: I gave FS a call and they say they expect to get a shipment in the future. They said the hang-up/stock situation is due to the Probox factory moving. Maybe they’re still going to be made? FS was very low on stock. No black, white, or red inserts, only an abundance of blue. Anyway, that was what I gathered from the phone convo.
Thanks for the update. I’m glad to hear that the stock backlog might just be due to the factory moving.
The blue 0 degree inserts are the first ones I would give up, if I had to. I wouldn’t mind some of the box caps until I decide to start playing with my board as a quad again.