and what would you be replicating?saw a special on national geo yesterday about ferraris plant the human element was very apparent what does that say about surfboards?.there is no magic board or one formula the variables are too many to expand on, suffice to say the relationship between man and a wave will be the final factor in the outcome and those variables change as life unfolds be here now is very discript to that condition.the one surfboard to cover the world will never happen and if it comes to pass, out of the primordial soup will come a shaper to take on the empire.there is nothing new under the sun, some kid in his hideaway just made the best board of his life but why should that matter to you, you would not believe him anyway.read a article to summarize; this guy as george greenough to look at his board and critic it ,gg asks him about it the guy raves about it,gg hands it back to him and say it must be a good board there is a life full of wisdom there Aloha…
Hmmm… Interesting perspective. “It’s like burning music. Buy the CD, then make as many copies as you want.”
MW
I’m a patent lawyer, so I’m going to complicate this a bit … Just playing devil’s advocate for a moment 
There has always been tension between the interests of copying on the one hand, and exclusivity on the other hand. Allowing copying creates competition in the market for the article in question; giving exclusive rights encourages development of new products (or that’s the theory anyway).
As mentioned by others, there’s nothing new about copying boards; it’s just that the technology now available makes copying a whole lot more accurate than previously. Does the fact that you can now copy accurately now make it morally worse? Now imagine for a moment that someone really did develop a new board that was so much better than all existing boards that it made other boards obsolete. If they didn’t patent it, would you copy it? When would it become morally acceptable to copy it? (When the patent term would have expired?) Is copying the exact dimensions any different from copying the “different” features that make it better?
OK, hands up everyone who made a Thruster before 2001. Is that different? How?
Tim
Any shaper worth his salt can “copy” a board and get so damn close that 98% of the surfing public can’t tell the difference when the board is under their feet. We’ve all been asked to do it numerous times, and nobody I know has a problem with that. So it’s OK if we copy it by hand, but not OK if we use a computer? In other words, as long as it gives somebody a chance to earn his buck and pay his bills, then it’s acceptable?
But… if we’re really good, we can even make slight improvements, based on how the rider surfs and the conditions he/she will use the board in most of the time. THAT’s what the CNC can’t do. (And we don’t even have to tell the customer we did it! shhhhh…) And THAT’s why good shapers have guys coming back.
Your are a CNC expert?
Tell Eric Arakawa your theory or Pat Rawson?
How about Rusty?
Merrick?
one moral is
make a copy
you gotta copy.
make an original
it is an original
and so are you.
...ambrose...
if you dont cop
you gotta get high
on endorphins
if you do cop
you are a jumkie .
where th puk is aseop
it's friday!
oh yeah I gotta at least say
Diffenderfer,
brewer is so
passe...
CNC can do what ever you tell it to (within reason, it won't sit or roll over).
If you want to tweak a file then....well.....you tweak it.
I'm no expert but I got some experience. What I like most about the CNC machines for surfboards....minimal tooling
I think I was pretty clear… never used a CNC, most likely never will. Never used CAD either, most likely never will. That’s not how I do it, or why I do it, and that’s why I’m not, and never will be an expert with those tools.
Arakawa. Risty, Rawson… and I’d bet all the other big time guys, would argue with me, but once you buy a board, it’s yours to do what you want with… except decieve somebody and sell them a lie. That’s a crime, and it should be. But scanning a board you bought, as far as I know, is not a crime in any sense… legal or moral… and weighed against waiting for a big name guy to shape you a new one (if he dosen’t CNC it himself anyway), and having it cost considerably more than having one scanned and machined, I can understand why somebody would do it. All they want is that same board back under their feet.
But again… I’d never do it. And not because it’s immoral, but because that’s not what it’s all about for me.
But… if we’re really good, we can even make slight
improvements, based on how the rider surfs and the conditions he/she
will use the board in most of the time. THAT’s what the CNC can’t do.
(And we don’t even have to tell the customer we did it! shhhhh…) And
THAT’s why good shapers have guys coming back.
NJ: I think we have a misunderstanding here.
That’s fine if you are opposed to CNC and CAD programs I understand!
I’m a wood worker and build furniture and other things with Japanese hand tools. If you have your ZEN time templating and mowing foam with your electric hand planner then so be it. I have my ZEN time building something without power tools period! Different strokes for different folks! However with CNC you can take and capture the perfect model in a particular category and reproduce it over and over with slight improvements each time. So when you make a comment like. “THAT’s what the CNC can’t do.” I’m sorry but that’s what CNC does best. Customers keep returning because I have a library of their boards on file that we can tweak for whatever is going on at the monument:
Gained weight after getting their wife pregnant for the 4th time = Increase volume
Lost weight after P90X = reduce volume
Going to INDO = Increase tail rocker
Need a quad = expand outline in tail + add 1/2" to nose + 1/8" to width (subjective)
Hit 50 = Increase board length from a 6’1" to a 6’3" while maintaining outline flow
Make a better nose rider = Reduce nose rocker widen tail roll your rails and add some belly
You can go on forever!
Here are some cases:
- Let’s say you have a magic shortboard that is: 6’1" x 18 3/8" x 2 3/16" with 5 1/4" nose rocker and 2 1/2" tail rocker and a 26 year old surfer 168 pounds or 75 Kgs give or take a couple of grams and is 5’10". The guy tears up the waves on this board at his local beach break and the younger kids all want one! Obviously you don’t make the same board for a kid that is 13 years old and weights 100 pounds or 45.36 Kgs and is 5’4. That’s 50% less in age, 59.5% in weight, 12% in height.
CAD will re-size the board:
6’1" x 18 3/8" x 3 3/16" 25.3 liters to 5’6" 16 9/16" x 1 31/32" 18.5 liters
Let’s say the 13 year old is a good surfer however needs a little adjustment in the width of his board is give him a little forgiveness on his cut backs so we bump up the width from 16 9/16" to 17" now the volume changes by 2.6% or to 19 liters.
We just made the perfect board for this grom. 5’6" x 17" x 1 31/32". I left out a few other details like rocker, (nose and tail) @ 12 and rail foil. Wanted to keep this example as simple as possible.
- Let’s say you have a Retro Fish that has full rails flat rocker and a 12" tail block?
I guy comes in and want’s a Fish however doesn’t want the full Retro. He want’s it modified to fit the way he surfs. This will be a board that he adds to his quiver.
So you take the Retro Fish = 5’10" x 20 1/8" x 2 1/2" with 3 3/4" nose rocker and 1 3/4" tail rocker and a 12" tail block
In the cad program you take this board to = 5’10" x 19 1/2" x 2 3/8" with 4 1/16" nose rocker and 2" tail rocker and a 9" tail block.
Reduce the rail volume and modernize the foil. Guy’s Stoked out of his mind on those hot summer days!
- Then we have Tow Boards, SUP’s, Mini Mals, Nose Riders, Trim Gliders, Big Wave Guns and so on. The possibilities are endless!
“THAT’s what the CNC can do!”
If you want the full ZEN experience I would suggest a draw knife and go fully unplugged!
How about a seashell like in “Surfs Up!”
Don’t want to start a war just want us to keep it all in perspective. You sound like your the regulator at you local watering hole so you would most likely pound me out.
If your are ever on the west coast your more than welcome to come to the shop and check out my set up? I don’t thing that there is anything wrong with being open minded?
I know I will get blasted on this one!
SD
I totally respect those who use CAD and CNC… in fact, I admire them. It’s something I can’t do. I don’t know if I can’t because I won’t, or won’t because I can’t. Either way, I see them as tools - pretty amazing tools as you’ve described them. Just reading your post makes me think about how much time and sweat it would take me to do the same job… and with a much greater margin of error… by hand, compared to the use of technology.
Saying you don’t know what you’re doing because you do or don’t use CAD, is like saying you don’t know what you’re doing because you do or don’t use a Japanese plane. It’s just a matter of personal preference. I also understand it’s a time management issue… gotta get the job done. I’m not in the industry, and I’m not trying to be, so the time factor is not an issue for me. But it is a real issue, and if you’re gonna make it in production, and you’re trying to manage your costs and personell, you better get on board with the technology, or get left in the dust… unless you’re a legend, I guess.
Thanks for the offer to come visit. Maybe some day I’ll take you up on it.
it sounds like were are on the same page!
CNC stands for Computer Numerical Control, and is a collection of
technologies that enable precise computerized control of a variety of
machines.
I reckon’ it’s immoral not to document the shape of masterpieces as accurately as possible before they perish.
Look at some average 30 year old surfboard: The foam has shrunk, it’s hard to get accurate measurements from it.
As the masters of hand shaping boards retire, their achievements will be lost if their shapes are not stored electronically.
Go shape. It’s unethical for a Sways member to use CNC. Not to mentionable immoral.
Naw, McDing, I don’t agree (and I have been a Swaylocks member for almost half an hour… and that’s the only reason I didn’t mark your post as offensive).
FWIW, I am working on computer shapes. I did shape my first handshape 30y ago (with a friend) and have had many, many custom shapes and worked closely with a half dozen shapers over 40y… but I want to use the shaping machine for my shapes (for my own use).
Ah…
Da machine
ONLY as good as da shap’a (or operator)
and the mouths said shaper needs to feed
Nuff said…
I reckon scanning someone else’s board and selling the copy without permission for profit is probably immoral. Scanning someone else’s board for your own personal use is probably okay.
That said we are all surfers at heart and I reckon most of us, by nature, exist slightly outside of society’s norms. Surfing is in many ways an act of rebellion. It doesn’t surprise me that there are very few patented designs or processes in surfboard manufacturing. Being corporate clones is not in our DNA. If it was we’d probably have chosen a different obsession!
My first few boards were all nearly exact (attempted) copies of shapes I liked. As I got better I started making my own templates etc. My boards are (hopefully) fairly unique now. I guess they should be since they’re all hand-shaped and even if I wanted to I could never copy someone else’s board exactly! Now that I think about it there probably is a moral fault line between hand shapes and machine shapes. They are two rather different things really.
Finally I think that anyone who’s making surfboards and has made a thruster, and is thinking about the moral aspects of copying someone else’s work should consider Simon Anderson’s contribution.
Let’s throw the cat amongst the pigeons:
“Scanning someone else’s design is OK if it is not sold for profit.”
But these days, you could share the design (scanned accurately to the closest milllimetre) with the entire world, for free. That would of course potentially remove much more income from the designer than the selling of a few pirated copies.
And forget about CNC machines, hand finishing and then glassing the copies. That technique for building surfboards may be as extinct as the Dark Room with multiple chemical baths to develop your photographs, soon.
In all likelyhood, we will be able to 3D-print surfboards from fully recyclable materials within a couple of decades. Maybe much earlier. If you don’t like the board, throw it into the recycler to be melted down, then re-print it after tweaking the electronic image of the board to your liking.
The program will likely obey voice commands, like “Make the board paddle faster”, “Modify the shape to work well in sucky waves”, “Reduce strain on left knee in right turns” or “Print with FCS2 boxes in McKee configuration”.
I want records of my favourite boards that will allow me to get another copy made once the shaper does not shape any longer. Until then, I’ll happily pay for more custom boards, as they keep getting better.
It is seldom, but when asked to make a copy of a s Stewart or Lost, etc. model, I tell the prospective customers to buy the CI or what ever they are asking for.
If you are incapable of creating rocker templates, outlines, rails, of a design on your own, you are not ready to hang out your shingle and call yourself a shaper. We now are in about the 3rd decade of CNC design and the ability to learn tool use is rapidly declining. I have 2 files at Precision shaping, I seldom use them, why ? I can can have the same board finished and in the glass shop while I am still in line to get it cut, it’s worse at KKL, I wait months, customers DO NOT understand this or want to wait extra months for a surfboard.
I am in my 55th year of shaping, nothing wrong with accurately duplicating mass models off the machine, but nearly every board I do has a nuance that is particuar to the customers choice, in the time it would take me to modify a file, I am half way through the hand shape.
Some of the foams have problems with tool passes being very difficult to completely remove easily, I saw boards coming out of glassing with them still very visible, I keep my planer work extremely clean and can clean tops and bottoms faster than a machined blank shaper can remove tool passes, even with the aid of a sander, which I do not use, but I am, not trying to finish a half dozen shapes a day either.
Quality is job one
IN A NUTSHELL.
Take it all the way out to the extreme: Would it be moral for me to take a collector board and make an exact duplicate…say a DaCat or a Bolt? Relic it a bit the way they do with guitars? Sell it for top dollar to some fool who doesn’t know the difference??? Heck, enter it in the vintage surf aution if you are so bold.
Can we agree that would be immoral?
Where is the distinction then between that and scanning a Channel Islands, slapping your own logo and selling it as your own?
I see both practices to be equally reprehensible.