More rocker less toe, Less rocker more toe

So those of you that know me, know that I am not even close to an Engineer, unless it’s a sanitation Engineer. I need explainations fairly simple, so if more rocker less toe is good, and less rocker more toe is good. What happens with more tail rocker, flater nose, and more toe? And in everybody’s humble opinion is it better to have a more rockered board with straighter fins, or a flater board with more toed fins? And for sake of argument lets say all the boards have triple barrel bottoms, mild vee out tail, med thin rails, tri fin set up.

500 word essay do to me by friday by 12:00 noon, there will be a test on this subject next Thursday, so i would recommend that everybody study up on this subject…please readpages 205-423 tonight in your required reading.

Mr. Hand

im in the less tail rocker more toe camp…

they both work tho…

if you have less toe your board is more prone to drifting and sliding coz your fins are working harder in turns , a little xtra tail rocker , will cause a slight pressure drag ,pulling the tail down, so it helps the board hold ,keeps the tail at the back where it should be…

on the other hand a flater tail will be more drifty and not fit in as well but be fast,more toe on the fins means you can push way harder before it spins out so theres an off set , you can force it into places it doesnt wanna fit …(generaly for better surfers in small waves)

this could wind on so ill leave it there

regards

BERT

sorry dude i never answered your question…

more tail less nose more toe …will give a board your can surf hard and deep in the pocket off the tail ,as long as the waves are bowly ,wont drive off the tail on soft sections ,but will carry through a dead section if your weight is forward ,wont be a real performer in softer waves , paddle ok ,good take off speed ,a bit of carry without any effort soon after take off ,may get a bit rail graby if your not snaping right off the tail…which you would only be doing if you had speed , hence pointing you back to a suckier wave…

regards

BERT

Thanks Bert,

I’ve been shaping a few boards that are flatter in the tail with standard toe / cant, ie, pointing the fins at the nose and about 6 degrees cant. The boards are really fast, cut back really well, but they feel somewhat stiff (works fine in bigger surf, but a drag in chest high and below). When I thin them out and pull in the tail a bit they get a more twitchy & sensitive but there a drag to paddle. Here in San Diego our surf rarely get what I’d call thumpy, it gets fairly big, but not island dredging. So maybe I’ll try more toe, but less cant at about 4 degrees?

-Jay

Jay,

I like the more rocker less toe formula myself. We never really get big juicy surf here so I can’t tell you what happens on the high end. I personally think I can feel the fin drag/effect from the toe-in. I put a little more center width in to get a fuller outline then use more tail rocker with just a slight less toe in than what I think is standard (1/4" @ 5" fin length). The effect is quicker release with a little more speed down the line. I use a long low entry with the apex (another controversial term) just behind the front foot. Very tail oriented response but will turn loose and haul ass when you “step on the gas” with your front foot. Comes back to surfing “style” whether you are a front foot or back foot OR both feet type surfer. I’m a back foot surfer, I don’t really do well with slop and mush but…let it clean up and get juicy and it all comes together.

Lots of opinions out there… mine…1/2 cent!

Krokus

thinning gives more sensitivity,pulling in your tail makes it turn a tighter arc…

why dont you leave the tail the same width but add width to centre ,that way you still increase your outline curve ,for a tighter arc but keep tail area to drive off and have more planeing area for paddling…but still keep it thin for twitchyness…

another option

regards

BERT

Changing the nose rocker isn’t going to be the big impact on turning, but as the board lays over on the rail, the water is flowing around the bottom curve of the tail rail. By virtue of these curvatures, this is what is determining the radius of the turn. So with a rockery board you have in place what it takes to get a shortened turn, add overly toed in fins and you have a board that is good for getting 300 turns per square inch, but not much drive. For setting toe, I have 3 different template that lay along the stringer. They have the toe for one half the bottom and are marked for every half inch of distance between the fins. It goes from the extreme, fins 14" apart, to the narrow tailed boards with fins 9" apart. The 3 templates are set with different degrees of toe, so all I have to do is use the one I feel will work the best for this board, lay it along the stringer, find where I want the placement to be and slide then temp along until it is the desired distance from the rail, flip and mark opposite side. I find I get more accuracy than using a square and subtracting an 1/8th or 1/16th per side over a distance of 4-5". In such a short distance, a mere pencil line discrepancy can result in fins being off by iches at the nose.

I had an employee in Fla. that used to grumble that I would spend 4 hours making a template that would only save me 2 minutes work, but for the rest of my life, I can reach for those templates and save that 2 minutes for every board