I am sure Bill has some Croteau stories 
Not sure what you’re referring to? No responses have been deleted by me, and responses don’t self-delete when a thread is placed in a different folder. You’ll have to clarify.
Aloha artz
I never worked with Bill Castor directly, though he probably looked at the boards I had done for Chris. I also never worked shaping with Ed Wright. But his shop was a dealer for my boards for a few years, back when Michael WIllis shaped for him. Since he had a factory, I would send the boards to him Hotcoated and they would finish them there. Like with Castor, there was a lot of oportunity to examine my boards. I hadn’t seen Ed in decades but he popped into my store a while back and we had a good visit.
Michael Willis eventually moved to the North Shore maybe around 76 or 77 and later he did some ghost shaping on Japanese boards for me one summer, pre multi fins, pre Rusty. Michael did really good on my boards. He was a pretty good craftsman at the time and after teaching him Measurement Controlled Shaping, went on to become one of the North Shores more notable shapers.
I almost forgot, I did team boards for the G&S Team (McNulty etc). Also spent a little time at their factory and with their shapers. I can’t remember their names now. Some were more receptive then others.
Aloha Privateer
I just spent the last couple of hours answering your quesion and the whole thing went POOF!!. I will try again later, if I am still alive after I shoot myself… ARRRRRGH!!!
M
In the beginning there were no fins on boards and none were needed because the waves ridden then were smaller rollers rather than cresting waves. Additionally, they were ridden straight into the beach for long distances. As surfers desired to ride larger waves, the larger waves would not just roll on as gentle swells. These larger waves were the cresting type swells that couldn’t be ridden staight into the beach because cresting waves disperse all their energy upon breaking leaving only a weak, foamy, soup ride to the beach.
On a cresting wave, one has to ride down along the swell line to get a long enough ride. This meant negotiating irregular sections in the breaking swell line requiring the rider to vary his speed to match the wave and increase it at times to make it around falling sections. As surfers needed more speed they also needed to ride steeper and steeper parts of the wave. This greater need for speed and need to direct it, required more control of the board and FINS were a very simple solution to all of this. As surfers grew to ride bigger and steeper waves the fins beccame more and more important to the task at hand, the best example being them growing from ZERO fins into MULTIPLE fins per board.
So in answer to your first question, fins are everthing. Contemporary surfing would be hard pressed to exist without them. Proof being that, in spite of all the attempts to achieve the mythical “finless surfboard” they never work on a par with normal surfboards.
My Favorite fins are well… MY fins.
Most notably my standard Tri Fin Template that I developed shortly after tri fins came out and I needed to adapt them to Hawaiian waves. My template is now about 30+ years old and is regularly copied by some of the biggest names. None of them have given me credit for it, especially those who know exactly where they got it from. Here it is below. Print it out to scale 4 1/8" Base x 4 5/8" Depth, and compare it to the fins you like and see how it measures up. If you have access to enough fins, you will be amazed at how many are near exactly this template. Keep in mind this image is of a glass on version. If it were a fin system version, it would have a slightly wider base to better match the glass on fillet. See what you come up with and we will continue this discussion.
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[quote="$1"]
Bill,
3 known favorite shapers and why? 3 unknown shapers and why?
[/quote]
I am not sure of your question or how to answer really. I don’t have any “favorite” shapers, known or unknown. Maybe it is just the language you used. I respect the talents and craftsmanship of several shapers. Leaving anyone out, doesn’t mean they aren’t great shapers of course but naming a few favorites may create all kinds of complications. I will think about your question and answer if I can figure out a way to do so and not bruise any relationships or feelings. These things are delicate enough as it is let alone teasing the issue with a popularity contest!
Bill, absolutely beautiful.
Can you explain your thoughts on the little square tail on that design? Also, any chance we can see the foil of that board?
Thanks for being on the HOT SEAT!!
Mike
That board definitely captures an era, makes me feel old.
Bill, you said earlier that the rear bottom had concave V, did you mean like spiral vee or inverted vee. Can you Describe the later and where you like to use it in your shaping.
You always brought a ton of insight and info to Sways,
Mahalos for your generosity
Aloha peterg1
The big problem in discussing board design is language and how it confuses communications. You may recall that both Inverted Vee and Spiral Vee have been discussed on Swaylocks before, often with much confusion and only marginal agreement as to what those terms really describe in the end. So honestly and respectfully, I am not sure exactly what your question is.
In my world…
Vee in an area of the boards bottom, is simply stated as, where the center of the board is higher then the rails.
This generally creates two Vee panels, one on each side of the stringer.
Concave Vee means that each of these panels is concaved. That is, the center of the panel is lower then either side of the panel (as in the stringer or the rail) if the panel is adjusted to level. There are also Domed Vee, Rolled Vee, Flat Vee, Spiral Vee, Inverted Vee, etc, etc. Each, I am sure, is interpeted differently depending on the cultural language of the surf tribe it is being discussed within.
In my world, a very small and narcissistic tribe :-), neither of these above describe a Spiral Vee or Inverted Vee. Can you (and only you please) describe what these are to you so I can better understand your question and what you are trying to visualize when I say Concave Vee. And what you visualize when you say Inverted Vee. Draw a picture if you like. Then if I am using it, I can tell you where and why.
Aloha Lowel
I have never been invited to one of those things. I am a big fan of the energy they seem to have. It is really great to get the focus back on surfboads instead of what brand of Trucker Hat is cool enough to wear! I am not sure what my schedule will be like in May. There is something big on the horizon around that time that will require my presence…
Good answer Bill. Sick and tired of hearing people say they just learned to shape "V-Panels. Or they are designing a board on AKU-Shape with "Spiral-V, inverted rocker and “double barrrel” bull shit out the Ass etc. etc. and yada, yada, yada. Yeah and I just shaped a "double horse shit twat bottom.
Aloha Mike
Thanks for checking in! The tail on the board is a small Squash. No big revelations here. In the single fin days, pintails and rounded pintails ruled at Pipe. All in an effort to get the tail to sit down in the water a little deeper and keep the fin in the water so as to not spin out. With the advent of tri fins, and a fin near the rail it was possible to ride boards with much wider tails that wouldn’t spin out. Wider tails plane better, accelerate better, and turn easier. Most of Shauns boards that I made him at this time had Squash tails, therefore the decision to make his longer boards with similar but smaller and narrower tails is pretty simple really. I am always trying to create a strong sense of familiarity and consistency between boards in a quiver so that the rider will have little problem moving between boards quickly as wave and circumstances require.
Most beginners and even many established shapers see every board as their moment to project their individual and innovative brilliance on the world of surfing and hopefully magazine fame! While this can, of course, be a lot of fun and entertaining but it is pretty much useless in the process of learning to shape well or truly advancing design.
It is always amazing to me how many shapers often with notable reputations have little in their resume’s other then a few kooky designs that have never panned out, no longer exist or only did so for a very brief time. Don’t get me wrong here, it is good to push the limits to discover where they lay. But our industry tends to glorify these odd designs and give them a life and validation, well beyond all levels of common sense or marketplace reality.
My personal goal has generally been one of sifting through all the varied design ideas washing around in my mind, finding ones that make sense and then refining those to their limits.
Regarding the “foil” of the board, sadly, I had very litttle time to take pictures between its completion to its shipping and didn’t take any specific foil imanges. But I will look through what I have and see if any images show the thickness flow and foil better. I also shot HD video of the whole process but won’t have time to edit it into anything for awhile. But maybe among the hours of footage, there might be a frame grab that I can do which would show the profile.
Generally speaking the board has a well balanced profile with a slighlty beaky nose and slighlty forward thickness as Shaun tends to ride forward on his boards as you can see in the photo of him at Pipe.
hello Bill !
GREAT to have you on swaylocks !
two questions …
- what do you think has been the greatest thing in surfing over the last say 45 years [since 1970] ?
and …
2. what has been the thing you have most enjoyed , in your eras of shaping on the north shore ?
cheers !
ben [previously chipfish61]
I understand your frustration McDing. But I don’t want anyone to misunderstand my comments. I am not attacking anyone and I am not “sick and tired” of anything or anyone.
One of the big problems with forums is that the directlon and personality of a thread can quickly drift off into at new trend led by the most outspoken or dramatic comments of the new posters. Before long, anyone in the thread is seen to be in agreement with the more extreme comments. I don’t want to be caught in that kind of situation and I want to make clear that I am not in agreement with it.
Surfboard making is pretty much whatever anyone wants to make it. I am not saying that is particularily a good idea. I am just stating what it is. There is no University of Surfboard Building. There are no Trade Unions. There are no Standards Organizations, like there are for Engineers, Architects, etc. Everyone is pretty much winging it, like a bunch of grafitti artists painting trains and tunnels in England.
Except there is a big difference in that the surfboard builders product is also a tangible, functional piece of “Engineered Art”. Not just “Art”. And because of this, there are certain consumer expectations for performance, durability, safety and precision. Yet there is no governing body that oversees and demands this. I am not suggesting here that there should be either. I am just saying that the surfboard industry, like the underground drug industry is pretty much a buyer beware industry.
Everyone making boards, as they grow from begginer to a pro will eventually see how wacky the surfboard industry is. And the more their incomes rely on it, the more frustrated they will get with the easy entry into the market by horribly unskilled and often unprofessional players who can all too easily take a chunk out of the “pros” paycheck. At the same time the surfboard industry and consumers have embrased this business model wholeheartedly, especially since the shortboard revolution.
So where am I going with this… Like it or not, this is the industry we are stuck with and it isn’t likely to change anytime soon. In the huge pool of players there are all kinds. And because of the easy entry, there is no filtering process to make sure that the most skilled and best trained are the most players. In fact, it is probably more likely that most of the players are the least skilled with most having zero formal training.
There is then, little chance that there will be an accurate and shared vocabulary to describe design features. Who would establish this anyway? The surf magazines? Ha! Swaylocks… Heck, we have rarely if ever achieved agreement on anything here. Is there anyone in charge? Nope!
You can’t take anything too seriously. You have to have a huge sense of humor about yourself and others. You have to get comfortable trying to be precise in an industry that worships imprecision, newness, being different etc, even if it is stolen and not new, yet still requires great conformity to be cool and accepted. You better be wearing a Trucker Hat…! It is a wild ride, have fun and do the best you can and ignore the rest lest it drive you crazy!
Aloha Ben
#1 As a surfboard designer/builder Multi Fins. Even though they existed pre 70’s.
But… if I was a media guy… Digital Photography and Video! And Drones!
#2 Surfing the waves here, in particular Pipeline, before it became too crowded.
Bill Pipe Photo - Jeff Devine
Can you explain to me what a “Spiral V” is. One thing I do understand is the misuse of various terms to describe the same feature in a board. Hype etc.
Bill Thanks for clearing up the rumors that you were shaping at Sunset in Encinitas. Before the Willis Brothers moved to Hawaii I hd milton shape me a board turned out to be one of my all time favorite rides a simple round pin around 6’2’ as I recall.
You have said that surfboard design has changed a lot since the advent of short boards. In That time many design elements have come and gone. As one of the better shapers in the last 40 years what elements that have gone out of fashion do you think need to be revisted? One of the things I have noticed from watching some old lips of Lopez , Rory Russel and others surfing Pipeline is how early they get into waves. Now it seems everyone has to drop in right under the lip. Guess this is kind of a leading question on volum and foam distribution of todays Boards.
Thanks, Bill the question was about THAT board in IT’s bottom.I focused on it because its your current retro build which you posted and breifly/previously described as having “inverted” V in the rear. Just asking if it had spiral which is retro maybe a little earlier than that that era or angular inverted V = /, where it was placed, apex @ stringer? and if and where you use that configuration in your shaping.
I “think” I know V. Correct me if I’m wrong,
Both inverted Vee and spiral have the element of concave associated/configured with them, the former typically flatter angular, the later radial with a lower centerline and higher railline that eventually meets back up with the centerline/stringer in the very tail:, and both are completely, in orientation and configuration, opposite of flat, domed or rolled V ( unless you flank the with concaves)
AND moreover All are especially & completely unrelated to the double horse shit twat @Mcdings been smoking.