I spotted this during a very rare visit to surfer design forum …
enjoy !! [brings back memories of my YOUNGER days ! I used to have a yellow plastic version ]
That’s wild Chip!!!
I really want to make one now!!!
What do you think the dimensions are?
I’ve got a 8’ single stringer blank sitting there that I could make 6 of these out of.
What do you reckon? 1 x 4 oz each side, 15" wide and 18" long.
Cheap fun and practice…
Hicksy
kickboards are great to bodysurf with but ive found a soft one that works the best. you can grab hold of it and just get worked with it and not worry about it hitting you or messing up your wrist trying to hold it in bigger surf. maybe it has some mat ike caracteristics cause the thing helps you hold such a high line, its soft and maliable so maybe water just wraps around it and it sticks to the face. like bodysurfing on steroids as you get in way earlier and glide alot easier then without one. the only way ive gone as fast bodysurfing is on a good wave with no fins.
its getting to be that time of year when i bodysruf more then i stand up too. BARRELS!!!
Bodysurfing is my first love. I have tried making a few foam handboards, using Mc D’s trays, kick boards, plywood cutouts (dangerous), speedo pull execisers you name it. I have been using this handboard for the past 3-4 years and STILL can’t find anything that works better. The funny thing is, it is not even meant to be a handboard, but is made from a pair of broken swim fins that i bought for backpacking because they turn to nothing. I broke the fins and realized the strap system might work on my hand, then shaped and smoothed down the front end. Gives you endless power to enter the wave and makes it easier to move up and down the face bby grabbing the wave with the ridges on the bottom
for me kickboards and foam boards remove the bodysurfing feel of using your body to controll your speed by lifting too much of your weight out of the water. THe most important part of a handboard is simply the extra tracking area in replace of your hand, and the ability to do a much stronger pull to enter the wave and the holding power of a larger surface.
Of course we all have our preferences
Where can you get a good handboard or is it just something that one creates? I know nothing about body surfing and trying to find out as much as possible. Fins and handboards…all new stuff for me. I have surfed for a long time, but a knee injury will keep me off a board until December. So bodysurfing it is. Any advice?
i recall a thread in my earlier days of Swaylocks about making a set of balsa handboards…see if you can dig it up.