Glenn, Im afraid Lee is right…Ive been wanting to say the same thing…as is the norm, theres just too much subjectivity between all the responders and frankly, youre asking for a bit of majic…that can only be had thru a veteran pro designer/shaper… or something very unconventional like a McCoy or some other unusual beast. It could take three or more board attempts to get there…
but thats all part of the passionate pursuit…
just my opinion but i have a 6’10’’ that i cant say enough about…its really thick and something like 15x22x15…squash ,i have ridden it on headhigh,also seen noseriding kneehigh…paddles into anything…but.i dont really trust it in overhead…it wants to slide out but what can you expect from something that wide and short…
Thanks everyone. I appreciate all the input.
I’ve currently got a bunch boards; 6’4"x2, 6’6", 6’8", 6’10"x2, 7’, 7’2", 7’4", 7’10", 8’, 8’6", and a 9’ noserider. But really all of the boards over 6’8" are more gunny. And were made with Hawaii and Indo in mind.
When I was making most of my boards it was between 77’, I was 19yo, and about 83’, I surfed a single fin up to 83’, when I had Ole make me my first thruster. A board that did not really work all that good, I know now what much of the problem was, the fins did not have enough toe-in for sure and the rocker was not right. I spent twelve years living on Maui, 80’ to 92’, and it was not till my last five or so that I got really good boards from shapers like Minami mostly, I got about four also from Chuck Andrus and one Rawson that really surfed like a dream for me. It was an awakening riding these guys boards in good surf. The four biggest guns I have now are boards I brought back from Hawaii. I do beleive that certain shapers know their shit. Probably more these days since the thruster has been around for awhile.
I did make three thrusters in the late 80s and two were dogs that after a few times surfing I just gave them away. But one in 88’ was a copy of a 6’8” Minami that my friend Kenny Carter let me borrow. I spent an entire day and a half shaping it; making a rocker template and doing the rocker and bottom exact as I could, I took solder and bent it around the rails every foot or so and got them near exact minus about an 1/8” all around thinking of the glass thickness. I glassed the fins on as exact as I could. It actually worked really good, much better than most of the thrusters I got from other local Maui shapers in the early to mid 80s.
I’ll start looking for a board that is looking like what I have in mind and see if I can copy the rocker and foil or even the entire board. Since I’m gunna be making a EPS board cut from a solid block of EPS I’m gunna need a rocker and foil template so that I can cut the blank out. It is not like I can just adjust a premade blank. One aspect I am thinking that I’m gunna like about doing an EPS, if I can get the proper rocker and foil. It is gunna be fairly easy. Much of the shaping will be with a hotwire doing the rocker and foil in two cuts, or so I hope.
So I guess it is time to track down a board and take some measurements.