Don’t want to talk about the theories behind the design, some interesting posts about it, just want to get some feedback from those whom ride these boards! Differences from a traditional fish, a Simmons, or a classic thruster? Plus ans minus… What kind of waves, etc… Curious about these boards and may be my next shape inspiration!
i really like his fresh approach and the looks of his boards. never ridden one tho...
i'm interested to hear what people think too
i dont have one but had a chance to use one for a session .
its a fun board and rides like a standard HPSB mixed with a fish . it really felt good backside , could go all over the wave without the limits of a retro keel . frontside it was much more predictable and precise than a retro keel .
the bottom had a deep single con and a slight " tuck " up the length of the board .
Dan T. is in san diego now and can set up a demo if you need to try one =)
hi marc, same here i have never even seen one but surf 5´7 x 19 x 2 5/8 wide tail, as my every day board, switching between twin and thruster and can only say its the best i have done for average days. i would love to try one of his.
salu2
uzzi
Thanks Knowaloha and Uzzi! It’s going to be difficult for me to try one: i live in Martinica, french west indies… It could be interesting for the surfers in the San Diego area to test the design, ride some waves to approve it! Wish i was there. BTW, here is a pic from the North Shore last week. Tomo’s style board or some more craziness from Dane?
http://markissurfboards.blogspot.com/
i get the impression Tomos use of the bernoulli stuff gets kind of frowned upon amongst the more scientific swayers and errbbers out there but his boards do have a certain something in there appearance.
they certainly work quite well in the hands of a ‘pro’ level surfer such as Tomo and he has stated that his boards are aimed at ‘pure performance’ which could alienate a lot of surfers, i’m sure he could dumb down his measurements tough to be more user friendly.
watching a few of the video clips on his blog i couldn’t help but think that the twin fins looked a bit edgy through some turns and not as smooth as they could be although they dont need 3 stage bottom turns like a lot of thrusters do which has got to be a plus.drive on tap,whats not to like?
intersting to see a few guys in te states running the same tails/planshapes(ian zamora)as Tomo now and getting positve feedbacks on them without the use of the cutaway keels Tomo is so proud of.
the mini sim ‘style’ round nosed boards look like a whole ton of fun though, good luck with your next board.
I’ve made a few with an outline and tail design inspiration from TOMO. Mine were not as small and not quite as narrow as he does and with a few of my own bottom designs but fully coping his tails and outlines. The orange channel quad Is a 6’3" I made for myself (I’m 6’4" 200+) and it works great. It’s supper fast, turns very well and has held great in some good over head beach break and it also worked good in some of our softer summer reefs. The strait outline has never seemed to make the board hard to turn but maybe that’s because like TOMO says you counter the strait outline with a small light board you can still throw around. The other two boards are in the 5’10" range and the twin fin I just sold to a friend and he loves it. I used the MR glass on fins and the guys says the board is super fast and fun. I am sold on the outline’s and wild tail shapes and I can report no negative feed back for the few I have made and surfed so far. Special Note: Due to TOMOs idea of a small narrow board I have made a few of these out of old boards. The Twin and the rainbow quad are re-shaped out of old boards. Make one…you’ll be stoked.
this just turned up on the surfer magazine forum,looks like fun.
wow, what would Tomo think about all that copying ???....
Interesting… Billywillgo, nice work, did you copy a Tomo board or just “imagine” and shape with your own dims? Good video clip Bobbins, and with such a radical board (5’4"/ 18"/ 2"… 14"@ the tail block???) Tomo rides great. Pridmore, no big deal with some copying from garage shapers, in my opinion. And Tomo should be honored to get that buzz! I don’t want to copy one but my reflexion bring me to a similar result. In fact one of my magic board is my twin keel fish shaped in 2007 (5’7"/ 20"/ 2.25", nose & tail @ 15.5", tail block @10"). Really small boxy rails and ultra thin behind the fins. Fish rocker and concave + spiral vee bottom. Weight around 2.7 kg with fins (@6.7" from the tail block), CI model from Rainbow. I love this board, great in mushy small waves but even better with some power! No problem to be radical, ride backside or in the air! So, my idea was to go further: shape a board with the magic elements of this one: 2 fins, low volume, speeeed, but better and more performance oriented. And here are the boards from Tomo: THAT’S IT! Funny Billywillgo my first try will come from an old board too, at: 5’6" /18.5"/ 2.125" nose @ 12.6" but don’t know for the tail and tail block… some ideas? (my regular board is a quad 5’9"/ 18.5"/ 2.125") Twin set up, may be the hatchet style… Concave + spiral vee, don’t know about the channels, we don’t have glassy conditions very often. Voila!
MARC- My boards were all just “imagined” after looking at his boards and website, along with a little help from my AKU shaper program to get some solid numbers for my outline by copying a few pictures of his boards. What I think as far as tails go is it’s not so much about the shape of the tail as it is about the width right at the tail. You can see he also does all kinds of different tail shapes. What TOMO is doing with his weird wide noses, wide tails and 17" to 18" middles is keeping the outline as strait as possible. That’s what makes the boards so fast. But like we all know strait outlines are fast but they can be stiff, so he counters the stiffness of that type of outline by making them super small and light so you can still throw them around…yet when you need the stiffness like in more hollow waves it will be there and the board will hold. I also think thats why he’s doing a lot of twin fins…to keep them loose. He’s into the Mini Simmons plaining hulls and old school fish’s but he wanted something that rode with more of a new school performance feeling. So no matter if it’s a square, a diamond, a quad bat or a raptor swallow tail I think they will all work good.
One other note…When I was making my copy boards I wrote TOMO and asked him if I could get a set of his custom fins…he wrote back and told me only if I got one of his boards! So I just ordered the MR’s :)
I have been riding the Hydrofish on and off for about a year. real fun board. Performes in anything from knee high to overhead barrels. I was very suprised how well it performed in hallow waves. The twin fin holds like glue and just smashes the lip. All over fun board. I picked this board up in SD at surfy surfy and my buddy thought i was nuts for buying it. After letting him surf it for a couple weeks he put in a order.
I have ridden the following Tomos
5-5 x 19.5 x 2 7/16 MPH V3 http://tomosurfboards.com/images/photogallery%20images/album/MPH%20BOARDS/mph%20dual/v3/index.html
5-6 x 19 x 2.5 MPH Psyko (look on the erBB for pics of nkpheous’ red board (nOCsurfer on here))
and I weigh 195.
They are crazy boards that work really well at small sizes. Also, they allow me to do things on waves that I didn’t realize that I could do, and this was only in 1 session on each board. I have a 5-6 x 19.5 x 2.5 MPH Nano on order that I plan on becoming my daily driver based on these sessions and experienced Tomo riders inputs
I thought it was pretty obvious what Tomo is doing with the straight outlines to create speed. It is said he offsets the obivous tendency of straight outlines to go straight with the short lengths. Does anyone know if he also offsets the staight outline with exaggerated or at least abundant tail rocker?
Also I’ve heard many people comment that, despite the short length and narrow width, his boards paddle and catch waves really well. I’m wondering if he has redistributed volume in such a way as to keep the overall number similar to a standard shortboard? Or if his boards are really flat, low rockered? Although that, combined with the straight outline would seemingly make for a very stiff board.
tomo’s stubby boards have a pretty continuous rocker line ( from what i’ve seen) with a reasonable concave through the back,i put a stick on one i was able to play with recently and it showed 2 3/16 tail with 1 9/16" at 6" and 1" at 12", nose gave 3 5/8" tip with 1 13/16 at 6" and 7/8" at 12, this board was 5’4" x 18 1/4" x 2 1/16" made from EPS .
it looked and felt like it meant business if that makes sense.
the guy has some very nice shaping skills, very nice indeed.
Very interesting… I’ll compare to my own measurements. Thanks Bobbins.
That’s a huge tail rocker (1" @ 12") for such a small board ! But yes it make sense to get some vertical ability.
Make me think that Mr Stretch could speak about Tomo’ designs for his “Mr Buzz” revolutionnary model…
http://markissurfboards.blogspot.com/
Hey Bobbins …
He sure got his shaping down thats for sure … met him at Aussie fish fry … was lucky to share and listen to discussions between him and Dick van S
Need to ask … the rocker numbers you have above are concave rocker numbers or rail rocker numbers ???
And, … ( and theres always an “and” !!! lol) did you mange to secure any fin placement numbers ???
many thanx for data thus far
W