I know they never went away, but Geoff McCoy has done a deal with www.surfboardagency.com to build and wholesale his designs.
I had ridden McCoys often over 30 years, but in the end wanted nuggets in the 6’6 to 7’6 range, around 45 to 50 litres in volume, in epoxy sandwich and with removable fins. The surftech 6’6 was a bit small for me and McCoy customs did not meet my requirements (there was no way I was going to travel with 3 McCoys with fixed fins) and so, for the last 2 years, I have been trying out a lot of other boards, including some locally made McCoy copies.
A LBS got some McCoys late last year from the Surfboard Agency and they looked great but I was wary of the polystyrene cores glassed with epoxy resin. They were made in the Cobra factory however, that gave me some confidence, so in the end I did a deal and got two, a 6’6 x 17.5 (T) x 21.5 x 15 (N) x 58l and a 7’0 x 15 (T) x 21.5 x 15 (N) x 52l.
I just spent two weeks in Bali and I loved them from the very first wave. They are so easy to ride and so responsive. Suddenly I was once again concentrating on the wave and not the board. The construction is light but the boards had no pressure dings nor any transport damage on my return to Oz, so I have my fingers crossed as to their longevity.
I believe these boards are being marketed in the USA and Europe. Hope this post is not seen as just a plug for McCoys, as I know there are a lot of people out there who like McCoys (and dislike surftech), but are a bit overwhelmed by the cost and delay of getting them from Oz.
**Suppose it might be difficult to understand downunder. And what help was rendered! Aloha Sharkcountry! Watched the whole episode of the "Farmer takes a Wife" what memories!**
I’ve never ridden one, but I like all the stuff I’ve about McCoy’s boards. I have childhood friend who spent time riding/working for McCoy, and he said Geoff taught him how to shape. He’s been a proponent of wide tailed boards since the 80’s. He’s got his take on the Nugget and my friends say the board is really good. He also did a lot with Downing in the 80’s and I have to believe that probably had a lot of influnce on Keone’s Slipah design. I love riding the slipahs.
One day I’d love to have a Geoff McCoy nugget shaped especially for me. Shoots a nugget with wood by Kayu!
Yeah, Marshall started shaping again. I saw him in the surf around the end of 2012 and he showed off a new design with a concave bottom and quads. Very interesting bottom that he was all psyched on. Another friend of mine tried it and told me he ordered 2. I saw one at Downing’s shop last year, but it didn’t have any pricing on it. The next time I went in, there weren’t of his boards there.
Yeah sharkcountry, there were some of Keone’s Slipahs in Perth a good few years ago (popouts from Southpoint), I thought they looked like they had some inspiration from Geoff and bought one.
It was a 6’6 quad and it was a little too small for me at the time so I sold it without really putting it through its paces. I don’t think it had the McCoy domed bottom, can’t remember whether I checked it or not. Wish I’d kept it now as its the exact board I’ve been looking for lately
I got a 6-0 slipah shortly after Keone started making them. I saw it one day and called brother and told him that this was the one for the smaller days. He had Keone make him a 6-8. The McCoys and the original slipahs have a lot of roll under the nose then they go flat. I was using my brother’s 6-8 as an alternative to the longboard and it was great, but when you step up to the nose they’ll bog. I talked to Keone about making a 6-4 with a few changes to the bottom of the nose. He didn’t want to make a 6-4 and he didn’t want to change the bottom. He was very set on the design staying the way it was, and that you only surf it from the tail. A couple of years ago I went by the shop and saw a newer version with a flat bottom from the nose back and a slightly pointyer nose. I said I thought you weren’t making them with a flat bottom and he said it was altogether different. Well that would have been the one, but after the discussion about the 6-4 and flat bottom, I decided to make my own boards. That was late 2004, and I’ve been making my boards since then.
McCoy’s Nugget has a slightly convex bottom running from nose to tail, but it has a complex design that he calls the loaded dome. I’d love to ride the real thing because I’m sure it works. My brother had a surfteck 7-11 McCoy Nugget and that was a good board, but at 7-11, it was way too much volume for me. He had an early model with the regular single fin box and 2 side fin boxes, and he had the original McCoy gull fins too. My brother is more rear footed than I am, he’s also a bit taller and heavier, so he could make it go pretty good. I’ve made about a dozen boards with the nugget style outline and they are great for turning. Even without the fancy bottom, they are good boards, so I think that outline is genius. I also have a bunch of double enders and I love that shape as well. On my last board, I used the same template to make the nose and tail to create a true double ender.
This my version of the slipah/nugget, with a flat bottom up front, slightly convex bottom under the rear half.
Sharkcountry, I had the Surftech 7-0, 7-6, 7-11 and 8-2 for about 5 years.
The 7-0 was the standout for me. All of them had huge rolled v from nose to tail, and it was exaggerated in the dome that was placed between your feet, the rails were more than half an inch higher than the stringer.
The roll in my new McCoys is about half of that, and the dome is more obviously a rounded off hard v. I only had a few good sessions in Bali in January before the westerlies set in and I bailed to Chiang Mai to ride bikes in the mountains (I’m still there) so im not sure if the new ones are as good as the old as yet. I’ve got the rest of the year in Indonesia to find out though.
Your wood veneer version looks good, how much rocker did you put in the tail?
I don’t know. We took my Downing Slipah and layed 2 layers 1lb EPS foam on the bottom with a wood springer layer between the foam and a layer of wood on top of that. Then we vacuum bagged that to capture the slipah’s rocker. After pulling it from the bag I added wood rails to lock the rocker in, then finished the profile and deck. The bottom and rails are Balsa and the top is Wiliwili, scientific name is Erythrina sandwicensis. I would think that the tail rocker is low, but my brother has the board so I really don’t know. I could measure my slipah and see, but it may be slightly off.
This is another board I made using the slipah’s rocker, you can see the rocker in this shot.
