Hello Swaylocks, after lurking these forums for the past year or so I finally built a board. I recently settled in SoCal after a year of moving around the country. Well, moving between Oregon, Colorado, and Florida. Before coming out here I left my boards with a friend in Cape Cod. Having nothing to surf on I picked up a 9’ single fin log for fifty bucks off of craigslist. It surfed like total shit so I chopped it up (wish I had the “before” pics). I wanted a small wave board so I figured the resultant blank would work. I sawed the tail off from the back foot, sawed off the nose around two feet back, and peeled the glass off. This left me with a pretty clean piece of PU foam with very little rocker. For a template I used Greenlight’s 6’5" single fin pin pushed out from the stringer about a quarter of an inch for more width. I shaped it out and thought the nose looked funny so I removed a few more inches and rounded it off. The bottom is flat with slight V out the tail. All of the shaping was done using a small surform, 60 grit paper, thumb plane, and a palm sander. The process was pretty haphazard, which I figured was ok for my first effort.
On design, I wanted a board that was thick throughout with very little rocker figuring it would go well in small mushy surf. The dimensions are 5’ 11 3/4" x 20.5" x 3". The tail is 14.75" and the nose is 17.5". With the rails, I did what I thought “looked” right. They are pretty thick, rounded down rails (60/40?). I was going for rails similar to the Santa Cruz Pumpkin Seed I used to own. I glassed it with RR epoxy. Two layers of 4oz e-cloth on the deck and 1 layer of 4oz e-cloth on the bottom freelapped. Being nervous about using a router and jigs, both the fins and the leash loop were done with glass. I went with the Channel Islands thruster glass-ons available from Foam-EZ. I used some numbers off of Swaylocks for fin placement. I don’t recall the measurements off-hand but I remember doing 4 degrees of cant for the side fins.
Performance: I took it out in waist-shoulder high (mostly closeouts) El Porto a few days ago. It wasn’t terribly mushy as the tide was pretty low, so I am gonna reserve most judgement for now. Moreover, I haven’t surfed regularly in 6 months so judging the board’s performance is kinda tough. The board paddled really, really, well. It took steep drops really, really poorly. Going down the line I noticed I was surfing with a lot of weight on my back foot; I suspect this is because the tail is so thick. This caused a sort see-saw effect that could have just been user-error. I don’t know yet. Pig-dogging on steep lefts was impossible. The board just kept going towards the beach. I think this is because the rails around the fins are pretty round, not allowing for them to grab the way I am used to. Because I was surfing close outs I never really got a chance to lay into any good turns. Seemed to come off the bottom pretty well though. I can’t wait to surf it in the kind of waves I had it in mind to ride.
Overall, I am really stoked on the result. I think I subconsciously wanted it to go a bit wonky so I would better understand why surfboards perform the way they do. I am really excited about doing another board. When I get around to the next one I’ll document it from start to finish for other beginners. I also wanted to say thanks to all of you on Swaylocks. There is no way I could have done this without this website as a teacher. I purposely ignored some tips so I could learn why some things aren’t typically done (round rails by the fins on shorter boards for instance). Alas, RR epoxy is amazing stuff for the novice.