Terry had an idea he had been thinking about for awhile and finally got a chance to shape it up. I thought it might be of interest to the Swaylockian community.
The board is 6-1" long, 20 1/4" wide and 2 1/4" thick. It has heavy concave with pinched rails with Terry feeling this will help lock the rail into the wave. The board doesn’t have a lot of rocker but the tail was adjusted for the ability to ride tail first, spin, etc.
Here are some pictures and as usual please excuse the amaturerish photo skills. I had difficulty capturing the rails and concave accurately but I hope that they will suffice.
You wouldn’t be the first to mention that possibility. Jeff and Terry are adament that this one will stay true to the finless concept.
It was totally cool to hear Terry describe the excitment and adrenalin of the slide. He likened it to dirtbike riding where you slide the bike on the turns and hang right on that edge of control, having to strike that balance just right between being too high or too low on the bike. He said that was his favorite part of riding and that’s the idea with the board.
After shooting the shots Terry took us to show the board to his son Josh who shapes and wanted to see the finished board. When we were there Josh showed us this ridiculous footage of Derek Hynd on a finless at Supertubes. Here’s the link (I’d embed but haven’t figured that one out yet): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3du0vEJM5yY
Its a pretty cool thing you are doing. His shapes are so cool. I am glad he is getting some exposure for his talent. It sure looks like he is having fun.
I sure seems Terry silences the crowds here in Swaylandia. I dig it though.
One of the main reasons I really enjoy coming to Sways is to see the homemade boards posted- guys like Rooster or Rob Royal (to name a couple of recent and great examples) in their sheds experimenting with the boundaries or just simply building something so classically beautiful the racks of ghostshaped/popout generic nonsense I see in shops don’t matter any more. Then every so often you get this- a gen-u-ine classic old school master craftsmen doing something completely wild and interesting and I realize how much I like surfing, the culture, as opposed to simply surfing, the act, again. I’ll never be able ride something like this, nor make it, but the thought and concepts behind it are fun to ponder, and it’s a really lovely piece of work. Thanks gents, made my day.
Quantum Field Theory
Quoted For Truth (website; slang)
Quantitative Feedback Theory
Quantum Fourier Transform
Qualified Funeral Trust
Quantitative Fluorescence Technique
Quest For Tech, Inc.
Quit Freaking Talking (polite form)
Quite Freaking True (polite form)
Quality Face Time
Both my sons rode the board this evening; I’ll post some video when
it’s edited. Their impressions were that you have to steer the board
into the bottom turn using your hands before getting up (and very
quickly too). There’s not the control as a finned board once you’re in the wave; it
tries to spin, you let it and try to regain control. It likes to go in
540’s, and didn’t seem to mind either tail or nose first. My oldest did get some cheater 5 on it as he played with different foot positions. My youngest son often takes the fins out of his HP LB, so he knew what to expect but didn’t have the length to use as a control factor. This was in
sectioney beach break, about 4-5’, and a better test would be in a
peeling point break like Moonfish says. My impression of the shape
is that the outline is nothing really special, but that the nose and
tail rocker were about equal and not very high. A wide, subtle single concave runs the full length on
the bottom. Because everything on the shape is so perfect and balanced, the finless feature is very isolated when you test ride it. Terry says it’s more of an experiment as a “refined” alaia rather than just a finless design. He’s talking about an 8’6" maybe for the next one.
This will be the fourth in the series. I’ll post pictures once the board is shaped.
One comment I’ve heard Terry and Jeff make about the “refined alaia” design is that they are looking for something that would carve more like a shortboard, making the comparison to the more traditional Alaia’s which they feel command more of a longboard style of riding.
The 8 footer was shaped today. Unfortunately, I could only stay for about half the session due to prior commitments but here are some in-process pictures of the shaping session.
Here’s Jeff arrivng at Terry’s shaping bay with the blank. Jeff uses that bike to do local deliveries of blanks. He’s been seen with as many as 8 stacked up on that trailor rig. Quite the sight to see. The blank for this board is the Ice-9 LGB 9-3.
Contemplating the template:
Terry templates the blank while John Cherry looks on.
Jeff, Terry and John discuss the initial templated shape. Terry used a template that he had previously used to make Jeff’s Monarch Gun.
Terry and the template.
On this iteration Jeff and Terry decided to add some elements of from the tail of the Simmon’s inspired boards that Terry has been doing lately. You can see the board they used to model the tail to the lower left of the photo.
The board only uses the high density foam stringer material.
Other then the tail changes the board will follow much of the design of the previous three finless versions from this line. The final dims are 8’0", 22 1/8", 2 5/8". It has a more subtle concave on the bottom then the previous three due to the extra length. The board heads to Bashams on Monday for glassing. I’ll post some pics of the final board when completed.
