I came to this bit and didn’t know whether to laugh until I cried or puke.
[quote]
Types of Rails:
Round Rail - a rounded rail looking almost like a complete semi-circle
Down Rails - A rail coming to an edge at the bottom of the board
Rolled Rails - Down Rails that are rolled under the board
Egg Rails - similar to Round Rails more egg shaped
50/50- A description of where the widest point of the rail is positioned along the board. This tells us the widest point is no closer to the tail than to the nose of the board.
60/40 - Again, this is a description telling us the location of the widest part of the rail. In this case, the wide point is closer to the tail than the nose.
[/quote]
Can you believe that?!! My conclusion is that this guy got his diploma from a surf school and figured with his "degree" he was qualified to start giving expert information about surfing and surfboards. What's the world coming to?
Pretty cornball. I'll say that. Did you check out the video of the guy who holds his breath for 1 1/2 minutes and then swims underwater 50 yards? That was impressive. See, even on a goofy site there can be good stuff. I venture to say some view Sways in the same light as some of the opinions voiced concerning surf science on this thread. Mike
the guys on the surfermag design forum are very good at evaluating the latest surfboard and fin offerings from the market, but Swaylocks is THE forum for Surf Science! I suppose I can see why some of the other forums have their doubts about us, we do like our diagrams and apply aircraft wing theory to our fins.
Anyway its time for me to put my tin-foil hat back on, type some numbers into the calculator and start thinking about my next post to swaylocks regarding the truth about surfboard design
I am one of the guys from SurfScience, and happy to take a bit of abuse for that error, but let me defend myself. I’m not an expert shaper nor a pro surfer. I’m simply a guy that knows the internet and loves surfing. SurfScience.com was designed to be an online resource for the average surfer. We have surfboard reviews, surfing tips and some info to help them appreciate the complexity of surfboard design and how it affects the way we surf.
That post was wrong, I feel like a kook and have since changed it. That was one of the first articles we wrote about six months ago when we first started learning about shaping. I know better than that and really it was just a matter of misunderstanding top/bottom from nose/tail as I first read about rail shape. Sorry.
There is a reason we’re promoting our site on sufer’s forums and not here. You guys know your stuff, you know more than we do. We just want to be the middle man to help put your expert knowledge into terms the average surfer can use and so far we’ve been happy with the results. I think most of you see the value of the site as well judging by how much time you spent on it on average.
So, thank you for pointing out an error we had overlooked when uploading old content to the site, and if you see anything else we said wrong, please let us know. Also, if you have any interest in contributing to the content, we would be happy to let people know you helped out and help promote your brand of surfboards in our directory.
Hopefully I will see some of you around and that you can appreciate our love of the craft of surfboard shaping, despite our being a little green behind the ears.
Just curious- how long you been surfing? That piece of advice is so wrong on so many levels, I think you should just close the site and surf for a couple more decades before dispensing advice. I'm not saying this in a malicious way, but I'm sure some might agree with me.
Personally, I agree with you on tip #3 of the surfing in crowds article. I much prefer to go surf an off peak by myself or just wake up earlier. SurfScience is a collaboration though and there are a few different writers. We can’t all agree with everything written.
In all honesty though, this post has generated over 100 visits with an average stay of 7 minutes and there have been maybe two or three things brough into question. I’m pretty stoked with the site based on that. We’ve only been up since August 1st, so we know we have a long way to go.
Oh, and before you tear apart the surfboard match, I will tell you that the programming of the full version is nearing completion and its goign to be pretty cool. I think you might be surprized by its ability to utilize expert opinioin and crowd preferences to match people to boards that perform well in local conditions. Hopefully it will help a lot of new surfers learn what to look for in a used board and keep them from buying costco boards.
I’m in 100% agreement. I only took a quick glance at that site, and it was immediately apparent that it’s done by a bunch of uninformed noobs.
Just another example of the bad side of the 'net. Anyone can declare themself an expert on a topic, and proceed to dispense bad info to those who are even more clueless.
Add surfscience to the long list of websites that should never have been created.
My little sandbar (Cape Cod,
Massachusetts, USA) is currently experiencing an increase in our
Great White population, which has been attributed to the increase in
our local seal population. Last weekend a very popular stretch of
beach was shut down when beach-goers witnessed a 'hit' on a seal.
(About ten miles south from where I often surf.) So I was curious to
know what Surf Science had to say about “Avoiding Shark Attacks.”
In a nutshell, their advice amounts to
'don't go surfing if there are sharks around' (that's not a quote,
but my interpretation), which is pretty much what a rational and
responsible surf scientist might say (… or your mother.)
So I guess I'm sold, and I'm looking
forward to more rational and responsible insight from the people at
Surf Science.