Time to shape my Bonzer

General Discussion
41

Ok - have seen / heard a lot.

I have an Octafish (6’5"x22"x3") bonzer 5 with e-wing, la la la…

It is an incredible board.  Love it.  There is somthing about a bonzer - it kicks in and when it does you know it…  It loves really down the line waves - hence it’s reputation for steep and hollow waves. 

Here are a couple pics of the tail to help.  In addition, I am actually shaping a hollow cedar board based on it and have the dimentions of the bottom from a shape replicator based on 8" measurements from this board. 

The haze on the board is salt – sorry.  I ride 'em hard and put 'em away wet…

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42

Well, I went into work late last night to shape my Bonzer…
Firstly I have to apologize for the Shitty photos, I was going to Blog this else were but now its just for Sways, Ha Ha.

As this is my 1st Bonzer I chose to use an old 3 1/4" thick blank that was sitting around (I cut out a board a while ago and didn’t like the look of it so in became dead stock) also I wanted a lot of foam to play with so it kind of worked out Ok. Only had to take 1/14" off the crust on the deck which surprised me actually.

43

After I shaped the rocker in it was time to tape up the edges for the single to double concave. I chose a curved (hour glass?) shape, I measured 1/4 up from the tail (5’ 11"  divided by 4 = 17 3/4") and took a width measurement, approx 16 wide and then found this width on the nose and exited the tape here. I used a radius curve of 32 foot for this curve.

This gave a wide point of -3" of the total length of the outline.
The bottom is all flat at this stage. Also I Taped up the tail edge from the wing back so I wont  break the rocker line when adding the deep concaves.

Rocker specks approx at flat bottom stage
Nose 4 1/2" Late kick
Tail    2 1/2" long and smooth


44

Here I put in 3/16 single concave at the wide point then ran it out to a flat tail pod, also out the nose to a  flat approx 12" down.
In the deepest parts of  the concaves (from the single running through the double on each side) I used a concave rocker stick of radius 24’, running from a touch over half way to meet the tail pod (to keep a smooth consistent feed out the back of the board.
I used a regular surform for the shaping of the main concaves.

Then I added another tape line running on the outside of the main concaves 1 1/4" wide as a guide for the smaller concaves that run between the side fins, but do not break the rail line.
I searched the factory and came up with a rather shit tool for this job, but all things considered the small concaves came out ok.



45

Can't wait to see it glassed!. I like the outline as well, looks like a lot of fun.

46

After finishing the bottom (except for some minor fine tuning) its was time to apply the deck bevels, to control the desired foil. I chose for a high angle off the rail for a flatter deck and I’m going to drop the rail into low and pinched.
Its a bit after mid night now and caffeine is doing nothing but make me delirious. Long Day.

The real Bad photo kind of shows what I tried to do with the rocker. Low to hyper kick.


47

Yup.  Looks like a bonzer to me!  Only thing different from most bonzers I've seen is the main channel scoops continue on out through the back, although the little channels flatten out at the back.  Your big channels seem to flatten out at the back too.  But I've seen it done that way - in fact, it looked like reverb might have done his that way.  Are you still gonna go with the e-wing?

Congrats on a very nice shaping job, looks like a winner!

(Hope to do a bonzer someday myself)

48

Time now for the tail shape,It was intended to be a Swallow but I never liked them that much so I changed that to a Thumb tail. Then the process that I had to put the most thought into, E- Wings. Actually, they weren’t that difficult so I was happy. They start at the trailing edge of the side fins and then I blended them into a few inches past the leading edge on the side fins.

I don’t think a conventional Performance Bonzer really needs E-Wings, but I wanted to chuck every thing into this board, To see if I could shape em ok and most important to see how they feel to ride.

Also I cut 1/2" off the tail when I added the tail shape…It just looked better in my eyes. So the board is now

5’ 10 1/2" x 18" x 2 1/8" my normal is a ultra fine 5’ 10" x 18 1/8" x 2 1/8" so I kind of feel better about that anyway. With the flattish deck it should have sufficient float too.

So that’s it, just rolled off all the Bevels, screened it off and shes done.

Fins

Side; 10 1/2" up back/side aim to nose 1 3/4" (gives 1/4" tow), front side aim to nose 2 1/8" (found using ratio). fins have a 1/2" over lap between them and are 1 1/2" off the rail and 1 1/2" apart.

Back fin; don’t know yet, its a 6" glass on fin now but i’m going to cut down to maybe 5 1/4" and set it in line with the back of the side runners i’m thinking…we’ll see.

Side cant = 20 degrees maybe

All glass on fins, even the back. and there all Black.

I’m going to glass this one in Epoxy 4 oz Bottom and 6 oz Deck, with small vee tail patch (not with Inegra a stated before).

Spray; I intend on spraying the bottom one color up over into a rail deck spray. (maybe tint the Epoxy)

I will be doing all the glassing, spraying and sanding on this on too. Later i’d like to ask some advice with the sanding, just a team finish.

Well that’s that for now.

I’ll keep the posts coming as I continue the build.

Enjoy!

 

 

 

 




49

I should have posted this earlier.  I figure anybody researching bonzers knows about this website- for Moonlight Glassing- but if you don’t this is the best archive of bonzer photos anywhere.  over 250 posts.

 

Surfy Surfy: bonzer

 

Click on the photos for larger view.

 

Board’s looking nice Yorky.

50

Huckleberry,

I never have liked Vee out the tail, I feel it fights tight turns, and slows the board through turns also. Thats just me.

51

Saw this on surfysurfy.  Might help-

 

52

…Yorky,

the shape, at least in those pict looks good and the channels seem right (better-the channels- than previous posted did by Hamilton I think)

may be we need more pictures of the foil, etc

 

-1/2 is too much overlap in this case

53

Ok, reverb.

Thanks, will be post photos up until I ride it… And then some.

54

reverb, If you give a statement PLEASE back it up with a comment/answer/sugestion/reason, you know!.

e.g “1/2” is too much overlap in this case" Because;

*Its not what everyone else does

*its makes the board too loose

*it will make the board track

*it looks like dog shit

etc etc etc.

do you know what I mean reverb???

 

 

55

Thanks Huckleberry, it took a while.

Thanks also llilibel03,

cheers.

56

MrJ, Reading back through this thread your idea of canting the front fin more then the back got me thinking. It makes sense to me.
…As far as offering this design to Japan as a model goes, I say that lightly. Maybe if It works really good, ha ha. Even then I would want it to be a more a novelty board, you know Tint’s, polish, box fin. With the extras i’d want to charge en extra $350 - $400 each,
This board i’m building, I never was expecting too much “High Performance” from it. Just for fun, I want to feel that pure Drive.
I’ll definitely let you know if I choose to go with your method.  

“HPSBZ+”

57

Hi Yorky -

I don't know if these pics will help.  I can give you more details if you need but am headed out of town so it might be a few days.  Just shoot me a PM.  This one does not have the deep dual concave feature.

 

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58

John, there cool photos. I really appreciate it…It look kind of like 1/2" overlap there.

Thats such a classic board.

I am surprised that the side fins start at 10 1/2" up. I Thought it might be a bit further up…

(How’s the Campbell Brothers system in a pencil square on the bottom) Love it.

Have a good trip!

Thanks… We all learn from Sways.

59

Yorky, yes I did get the impression that making it suitable for the Japan market was more of an afterthought rather than the aim of your project which was to have fun with a personal board. But you never know you might pull it off. Novelty boards are good for those who surf a lot, stops them from getting bored with their daily driver. The HBSBZ novelty board concept could be good for the HP shortboarders who want something different that doesn’t require getting used to a bigger or a shorter board.

It would be going beyond what you originally planned, but I think to have two shots at the HBSBZ design would be ideal - first the proven Campbell bros fin specs with overlap and then another version with the dual cant and no overlap and a shorter runner length for a more compressed cluster, that way you could compare them. None of the pics of traditional bonzers seem to show dual cant and no-one has mentioned it here so maybe the dual-cant HBSBZ is a new design (well major design tweak) waiting to be discovered?

You would have your own ideas about the fins, I’m just thinking out aloud here based on what John has posted - the Hamilton bonzer is presumably a mid-length board - maybe a narrower tail than yours too - perhaps John can fill us in with more details?

So if that one has its back fins at 10 1/2 then maybe you can go a tad further back. You are getting Campbell templates with just 1/8 chopped off the bottom which means the fin base will be much the same as for bigger boards.  I like the idea of no overlap coz of my twinzer experiment experiences, however no overlap with the standard Campbell template would spread the cluster out even more which I would guess would make a stiffer trackier board. So particularly if two shots at this design were to take place it would make sense to me that Version 1 using the standard Campbell template did overlap to Campbell specs and preserve the cluster spread and not widen it more. Version 2 would then use runners with a shorter fin-base and no overlap + the dual cant . Or maybe overlap but with extra front cant. (Jobson puts what looks like fairly extreme dual cant on his twinzers and they do overlap)

However I don’t know what I’m talking about, I’m just enjoying a bit of virtual design here. I’ll be interested to get a full ride report and critique of whatever you decide to produce. I like the way you walked us through the concave templating tools you used. Huckleberry spotted the way you did a sort of reverse V’d concave instead of running them all the way out the tail - I don’t have a good eye for shapes and hadn’t noticed that, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate shapes - whenever I get a new board I go all over it with a straight edge, tape measure and rocker stick.

60

John: who glued the stringer?

Looks like they used too much catalyst?

Such a nice board to have blank failure.

Surfding