Rail action can be enhanced with fin systems and bottom contour. A quad with concave will react more quickly rail to rail.
Rail feel is far more challenging. It has to do with foot proximity with rail. Maybe fin placement could help there too but I have no experience in this area.
been a fan of small ever since TP’s Fireball Fish in the Search.
Got Bushman’s version in the early 90’s I think the genre got classified later by Parmenter as the post modern fish design. I even found this 6 channel painted white epoxy fish that was a hell of alot of fun afround then too. Needed gloves to paddle but back then everyone was doing a Glen Winton impresssion
GG’s 6’2" standard fish taught me alot about short, wide, low rockered super thrusters.
I’ve always had to surf 6’8" to 7’2" standard shapes to compensate for my weight and age but the extra length gets to be a big problem when things get real curvey on the face.
I surf with guys who are riding 5’6"-5’8" short wide boards now but then they are like 135lbs.
Having size 8 EEE feet wide tails have always been a problem but GG’s idea of pushing out the rears to the rail and reducing the volume of the rears really made a big difference for me. Stepping on the tail is like engaging a twin-turbo but also with the stickiness of some very low profile pirelli’s.
I think the future is in small and wide but its hard to say. Like what Ambrose alludes to Nat was riding 5’6"s back in the late 60’s early 70’s and the other GG was showing what you could do in the pocket with his super thin flexi-flyers. So how much of this stuff is new is questionable.
I am currently intrigued by Y’s Hagen quad from Catch Surf. I’d like to see Slater or Curren put it to the test in some 10’ Haleiwa or Indo. I think that’s the model of the future a soft/vacummed rail super shortie with four or five fins. Sort of what TM envisioned for the fuuture of surfing back in the early 70’s on Kauai with Lennie.
Does this have any implications for fin placement on a mini-Simmons style board?
ie right out on the rail and tail
Personally, I think that there are boundaries that will really affect performance. If you don’t care about that, then it probably doesn’t matter.
I’m only 5’ 6" and about 168lbs. I’ve ridden boards down to 5’, but for me something about my height up to about 6’ 4" seems to work better for my style. I also like boards at least 19" wide, but prefer 19.5" up to 21.5", after that I find that I have to work harder to move the board around.
I remember when 19" was narrow and then Kelly started riding these 18" to 18.5" wide boards. We have to remember that he was pretty young when he started riding those boards, and his goal was high performance. I would agree that those small narrow thrusters are probably the best high performance boards. Now Kelly’s getting older and doesn’t look at things the same. I think he’s learning what all of us older surfers have known for a long time, 19.5" to 21" is not too wide. 5’ 4" is probably too short for a round pin.
I like that comment someone made about boards being too narrow and that his man boobs were dragging. I had that experience proning out with my 18.5" semi gun. The water was hitting my shoulders and chest and causing quite a bit of turbulent drag. I didn’t notice any problems paddling though.
I also gauge width by how long my arm is, anything beyond 22" and I can’t get the board under my arm comfortably. If it’s a hassle to carry the board then it cuts down on the fun factor.
hmmmm...
Wonder if the underarm test has something to it....
Easier to carry for sure...but maybe related to arm length is shoulder width and upper body torque ratio to board width and ripping through turns...
Could patent that... then again maybe not....
The famous Curren/Peterson Fireball re-born
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2m0v8IL6Uis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yb3psEnHng
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqa5KrjxK1c
some of the bosses
huie the master
cdd
latest technology with classic outline
silly
did you the fcs install on those boards, or is it the mastershaper???
Fishes no longer need to be sub 6’, Frye and others around my neck of the woods have proven this time and again. I ride a 7’ fish / simmons quad that works great as does my 5’ 10" keeler and by “works great” I mean “is fun to ride”. Most of my boards are wide and have been since the first Caster I had at 16, I have big ass feet and as with skate decks for pools, wider seems to just stay under foot better. RK’s Mini Simms are legit and fun as hell, are they for everyone? Course not… but then what is? Oh yea, only narrow chips with 3 fins. Reverb, I wonder what parameters you would use to validate a design, to escape the subjective and get objective, speed down the line, turning arch, rail to rail and so on? Can’t be done, too many variables right?
I like short and wide. I’ve been riding this board for the last year. Usually in surf waist to HH and it works equally well in point and beach breaks. It has a convex bottom from nose to the lam, then flat through the tail. Originally setup as a speed dialer, but now has a generic set of LokBox quad fins which work suprisingly well. Kinda round pin with boxy rails. Sure looks like a pig but works great in small surf. 6’ x 14" x 21 3/4" x 15 1/8" x 3" I love this board and will probably make another next year. (oh yeah, I’m 6’1" and 185lbs. but this board could easily fit a surfer in the 210+ range.)
BTW- I have a 13.5 shoe size so tail width is a consideration.
Strange looking tail but hey, it works!
Marc
I likey the forward volume too. Fun looking surfboard. I have a round tail quad from Bob Mitsven that I’d bet surfs similar… again, the big skateboard in a pool kida feel.
Can you show more pics of the convex bottom? It looks concave in the last picture.
Optical illusion, crappy cell phone pic, yada yada yada…the convex runs above the lam to the tip of the nose. It’s subtle but there nonetheless. I left the board at home today but would be glad to take a few pics this weekend.
Thanks, I appreciate that a lot.
On a very anal retentive note, your signature spelled ‘surfing’ wrong. Not that this site is the grammar capital of the internet but I just figured since every one of your posts would have that visible, you might want it spelled right. Okay, enough nitpicking for me.
Thanks again
Bab Simmans had a bad sufing habbat. 
the horror!
Fixed, thanks!
the board are huies wouter. they are from templates influence from kevin platt who used to shape fo huie
circa 67 to 69 . with modern fins rockers and rails i might add. but the outlines are single fin vintage
Ambrose is ridiculously prophetic and prosetic…eloquent and elegant in speech that only those who speak The Queen’s English might endeavour to understand. There can be no gain without loss, and no loss without gain.
I long to stray from the maddening crowd. To learn ‘the craft’ without some great forefather is my legacy and dedication to pure art. Would Pollack have taken a muse or mentor to learn something that is pure spontaneous creation?
In shaper-speak, wide board have the ability for increased drive over narrow boards. Narrow boards can transition rail to rail quicker…a huge anD exaggerated overstatement and simplification when discussing a surfboard. Surfboards inhabit a universe of complex And compounding curves…yes, Martha, all tHose curves combine simultaneously to create a cause and effect. The rideR takes the composition and carves watery lines upon undulations of momentary blue. The canvas is ever changing and alive.
Surfing is the closest adventure to astral projection as any earthly being will ever experience.
Those beings that are preoccupied with being grounded and gravity laden to the planet will strongly adhere to a vocabulary embracing the terms “Never” and “Only”.
Is it safer to limit one’s possbilities by prescribing to such a samll box?
Shakespeare once said (and probably said it again and again thereafter) “Nothing is good nor bad, thinking merely makes it so”.
I ersonally think this is a time to explore wider boards. Particularly in the “drive section” whic is from center point back to the tail. By increasing overall planshape width in this area, you can make a board’s overall width narrower yet feel like a wider board. Not to be outdone, the wider board has tremendous potential for fun and performance for the every day surfer.
There are so many possbilities to be found by freeing one’s mind from “normal” or “acceptable” numbers. As I said to one friend “it’s not about the dims…it’s About THE CURVE”.
Open your mind, your ass will follow.
Today starts…NOW!