I’ve reached the “time to mark in the fins” stage with my latest board, a quad, and I have a question about technique. Please feel free to tell me if my explanation makes no sense - I get the ceoncept intellectually, but it’s actually a lot harder to describe, now I’m trying to put it into actual words.
I’m going to be FCS compatible plugs made by a competitor. From what I can gather, some people mark the spot for the back of the fin and then measure the toe-in in terms of how much closer to the stringer it lies, along a line parallel to the one they used to measure the first point. But Bruce McKee’s measurements rely on calculating toe-in in terms of angling the fins towards a point just forward of the board’s nose.
Now I can grasp that concept intellectually too, what I can’t work out is how he actually does this with any reliability. What tools would you use to achieve this, given that you’re pointing the fins towards what is effectively thin air? I can see that using string might work, however what would you attach it to? I don’t want to use a chalk line for the obvious reason that I’d then have to go back and get rid of the chalk somehow.
Has anyone done this before and if so, how did you do it? Remember, when answering this series of questions, a picture tells a thousand words.
If Bruce is still lurking out there somewhere, I’d love to get the good oil from the horses mouth…
You can use a long piece of wood, metal anything really that is not warped to use the mckee setup. but usually the mearuments come out to be about 1 1/8" - 1 1/4" toe-in.
You take a thin 4" x4" piece of wood or plastic or metal.
Bottom right corner is zero.
Top right mark in 4/32".
Cut bottom zero to 4/32" mark. You now have a 1/8" toe templet.
Make a 5/32", 6/32", 7/32" and 8/32" templet Clearly mark all.
Marking on foam, just place tape under back fin point. Lightly draw perpendicular line on tape with sqaure or pleskin
Place needed template on back fin mark at zero and line bottom on drawn line. Trace toe on board. For the other side fin just repeat and flip templet. Eyeball lines and remeasure if they look jacked up.
I use mckee for distance from tail mostly. I also maintain same front and back toe in when using Mckee.
Just have tape down and experiement with the toe templets and place a long stick to nose to see if you are close to Mckee specs. Everything is relative with different lengths of boards. After a while you will know what you want with the initial board design. I haven't used a stick to nose for 15 years. Mostly use 7/32 and 1/8" toe templets
Bill Barnfield may have explained his method once upon a time.
I guess I’m a kook, I use to use string. Now I’m useing 4-way boxes, and I can try different things. I still like @ 1/4" for the front and 1/8" in the back, I think Robin Mair brought me back to that, but don’t quote me, look it up here in the archives. I do love @ 3/8" for the front for my mush set up, w/@ 1/4" in the reat.
I prefer the batten concept or straight edge. Because the longer the board, and the further you place the fins out on the rail, the potential for more toe is amplified if you just do a number fraction like 1/4 toe in. But then 1/4 toe in on a 5 ft board might be 3" off the nose?
I subscribe to the Robin Mair school of thought. Regardless of what fin setup works for you (experimenting is good!), it is best to keep the setup the same on all your boards that are of similar style. By keeping a standard for your fins you take one variable out of the surfboard equation. So changing the length of a board design from say 5’11" to 6’4" shouldn’t change how the fins interact with the water and edges of your board. The fins don’t care how far away the nose is so they shouldn’t really change any angles.
For me I go with 1/4" front and 3/16" rear toe-in for my quads, 1 1/8" from the rail. Then I tweak the positions with ProBox.