Each time I post on Skurfer or elsewhere I am challenged with wing airplane studies .
Most recently this :
In response to Mr. everysurfer
Clamsmasha
Has felt speed that you never will .
It comes from well designed fins and their positioning .
Gathering enegy and releasing it with an unlimited top end .
This concept is not based on Airplane wings .
Another non airplane based design
first day I took the board out was in 6 to 8 beach break with quite a strong sideshore lump on it. fins all the way back. was able to get into waves with ease, the speed it reaches right at take off is unbelievable. it makes close outs a whole new playground. effortless, goes where you look, so much fun. in glassy offshore conditions I got a whole new sensation. flying down the line you get the feeling of hovering. a bit hard to describe but its like the board doesn’t touch the water surface any more. really weird. and the 3fins/placement work as we expected - or wished for - you can lay it on rail as hard as you want, there is zero sliding out.
Greg - that’s the best board I have seen on swayz or elsewhere! Good job.
The water aint the air! If any thing, lift is prob a non issue… foil is prob more like it…but I’ll leave that to the fin designers - like yourself and others . Cheers! Don’t listen to these people. The proof is in the pudding.
Since you mentioned me, I’ll reply directly. You can’t “gather energy” to release it later. The speed of the water under a surfboard is not sped up in relation to the speed of the board by the fin foil. The best you can hope for is to minimize drag, and gain forward movement by the fin directing the water flow, and also the fin acting similar to the sail on a boat, to change the energy of gravity, and the kinetic energy of the rising wave to kinetic energy of the moving surfboard.
You make world class surfboards, and I would be proud to ever own one. No need for more than that.
I made a twin fin with similiar outline (but it was diamond tail) back in the early 70’s. I put the fins back like you have and it worked great. The tips of the fins were about flush with the end of the tail. It had really flat rocker and was pretty thick. I like what you have done.
Ever ride it as twin with center fin removed? I was thinking about making one around 7’0" for a big guy. Probably use one of the Rawson fish blanks from US blanks. Surf around here is mostly east coast slop.
So it looks like you are doing about 4 degrees of cant, and pointing them about 4 in off the nose? It looks like the fins have a little something going on at the tip? Board is fairly flat out with minimum bottom countours?..hard to tell from the pics. So the theory is to eliminate drag with thinly foiled upright, minimum canted fins? I bet it goes ike a bat ot of hell!
I’ve been riding Greg’s 5-fin boards for a while now. I currently own #0004 which he made custom for me and and have #0003 which was made for my brother, both are about 9 years old. Before he made these boards for us he let us use one that he had and even in small mushy surf I knew it was different in a good way.
Once I got mine into clean solid overhead waves at Tennis Courts in Ala Moana Park, I got to see just how special these boards are. Tennis Courts can be a great wave that lets you make quite a few turns or get in the barrel, and can be a 100 yards from the outside to the inside. Winds are usually off shore, so you get really clean waves out there. There is something about the fin layout and design that causes the 5-fin board to create lift in the tail. When you press down hard on the tail in a turn that compression is converted into thrust and the result is quite a bit of acceleration. Every turn adds speed, even the hard cutbacks. There are ways of weighting and unweighting a board to cause it to release from the water’s surface reducing drag to a minimum, combine that with the way Grif’s boards turn and you have a rocket. So I would say that these board can harness or gather energy then release that energy. I rode my 6 x 20 5-fin in maxed out courts and the board was so fast I had to learn how to slow it down. I was scrubbing speed off instead of trying to go fast. A lot of times with other boards, I’ve been trying to go faster not slow down.
Something in the combination of Grif’s fins, layout, board’s bottom and the rails that make these things fast, very fast. But they also have a very solid feel, they are very sticky. Every time I ride one of these boards I am amazed at how good they are. The only problem I have is that I don’t want to kill them, so I don’t ride them as much as I could. If you go from a board that is not quite as fast, the first turn or two will be eye opening. It’s not unusual to turn so hard you fall off the tail. It’s like stepping on a bar of soap.
I haven’t tried this newer design of board, but if it rides like the 5-fin, it’s probably another rocket. My best guess for the center fin is added control. A rock solid feel in the hardest possible turn, no slipping or drifting. But it could be to create lift, all that interaction between the fins making the tail lift.
Gotta drop you a line on the 7’8 with the c-6 fin combo. Holy Molly! When you said the board was going to be fast that was an understatement. Fastest board I’ve ever been on. Insane!
But sometimes it is just too fast. The board actually lifts, I’m used to it in double concaves doing that at times but this was even more, I almost felt like the board was out of the water at times hydroplaning, then I realized that I needed to roundhouse quick or I just wasted the wave. I did feel i was on the cusp of being out of control but never was, never caught a rail. Ultra high performance. Then when I put it on rail to roundhouse, wow, the board turned amazing and on a dime. Being 7’8 and with three fins on each rail I thought it was going to be a harder to transition and more drawn out. Just the opposite. The board feels like its a foot plus shorter. This 7’8 feels like the 6’6’s to 6’8’s I used to ride in the 90’s Love it. You made a big high performance shortboard out of a 7’8. Thank you!
I surfed it. Only as a twin so far. I've never surfed a twin before.
Neither the conditions nor I were at peak....:) 2-3' and confused with hollow bowls from time to time.
I'm a little bit blown away. It took a couple of waves to get my feet right, and get in sync with it, but its just so fast and has such a free driving feeling. Also paddles and catches waves better than anything I've surfed.
I had such a feeling of purchase when I was driving into the peaks, it felt like just about any wave was makeable. As if there were a few seconds to setup and decide what to do. I covered distance and turned around sections with ridiculous ease. It loves power, and I would love to get it into some grinding reef waves.
I'm really impressed, it's what I've been looking for. I don't know when I'll try it in thruster mode, because the twin is so addictive.
I’m stoked, not bad for a first session…
Have you ever done twins with channels? Would you?
My mate rode it and is talking about getting one too.
Thank you
This is what he said when getting his new one .
OMFG, That outline....so nice.
Can’t wait to ride it.
If you’d told me a year ago I’d be riding a twin at all, let alone every sesh I’d have laughed…
This is my DD, and it covers me nicely. Nothing I’ve ridden feels as good in the drive/project/thwack department. Front and backside to. Really exciting.
Is this a discussion about fins or another one of your advertisements Not complaining about your boards at all. If it’s just an ad then I’d like to see some bikini clad women posing with your boards. Do it, Greg, I dare you.
