What's your step-up???

General Discussion
1

So, after surfing this wonderful swell we’ve had here in so-cal I’ve come to the realization that I need to step up and get/shape a step-up board for bigger waves. My go to board is a 6’2 Twinzer (6’0 may fit me better). It handles pretty much all conditions up to a foot or two OH (depending on the shape).  I was out yesterday and there were a handfull of drops I didn’t make due to the small amount of rocker in my board. I would also like something I can duck deep enough to get under some of the bigger sets.

I’ve never really ridden a standard thruster so I’m not sure what direction I should go. For those of you who surf fishies…what is your go to board on big days and how does it compare performace wise? Any and all feedback/reccomendations welcome. BTW I’m 6’2 185ish lbs. Muchas Gracias!

2

i used to ride mainly a 6 6 by twenty in DOH im a about the same wight and hight

i surf 5 11 to 6 1 by twenty thrusters in  up to headhigh

although im working on shorter board for big stuff. i think that its possible . with the wide point slight forward then usual and lots of volume under chest

3

Oh no...here we go again.

 

1st, where do you surf? reef's, point breaks, beach breaks?  Blacks?....or some backed off mush ball?  All this is important.   Surfboards are like golf clubs, you shouldn't use one club and play a round of golf.

Here's the deal, bigger boards will get you into the wave faster, and will be faster down the line...longer radius turns, cover more ground, good for big fast days. Big boards made for big fast days are a poor choice for small days..i,e, out run the wave, getting way out on the shoulder.  Bottom contour is critical, big fast days need to have the water running down the center of the board and out the tail. Thicker noses, thicker tails paddle power

Shorter will let you take a more critical drop and put into a hollwer section faster, shorter boards are easier to man handle, i,e. stalls, bigger gaffing slashes. Shorter board, shorter arch of turn, more work, less ground covered.  flatter bottom contours let you sheer water off the board bottom in more positions of the wave, i.e. redirection. But shorter board on big days equal wave running you down.

So depending on your waves surfed, your board will vary...and should vary.  Short peaky drop two turns and out waves. Or drop, cover-up and out, will call for a short board.  Longer lined up waves with a huge wall will be better handled with a longer board.  More turns per foot, or cover more ground? your call.

As for your size board and lack of rocker? WTF your 6'2" and riding a board the same size. Pretty much a death wish for the average surfer. The guys on better suited boards are catching waves on the outside, bottom turning and throwing water in your face before you get to your feet.....right?!   If that was the case, then everybody would be surfing 5'6"-5'10". Look at the equalized volume of the board you are surfing compared to a average sized surfers board? Now take that board and steep it up 3-6 inches on a bigger day...get the picture?

I'm not going to get into recommending a size and shape of board for you, because everybody thinks their size and shape it the best.  Hey, I'm your size, a bit heavier at about 200-210, it took me years to figure it out........We all can't surf Kelly Slater's little 5'8" board. I'm guessing your in your teens to early 20's or so. I used to think my 6'2" was the best board ever....then it was my 6'4", then it was my 6'6"...then oops God forbid I't was my trusty 7'0"....and you know what they all surfed great, just different.  The more experience in heavier days will shape your opinion on what a board should look like.

All this advice will be challenged..it always is. But unless you surf like a pro, and have sponsors (I could have been a contender back in my day....I had skills) Lose the fish on big days, go to a tri-fin or high performance quad (not a quad fish). But then if you surf like a pro, you don't need advice?

Make a bunch of boards and experiment, you might be amazed there big man?

 

I'll crawl back under my rock with my bigger board.

 

4

we are not the same size but to give you an idea of what I have as my step up I will post a description. I am 5’10"145lbs and ride a 5’10"x18x2 minimally volumed squash tail thruster(I need a little more float as I have put on 5lbs in muscle since the purchase and push the board out the back on a lot of turns in marginal surf) my step up is 6’2"x18 1/4"x2 3/8". It has considerable more rocker and pretty pulled in nose and pulled in a round tail.I really like double concave on my step ups but this one is a single and I have like it quite a bit. Living in NJ and southern NC, I only get to ride it once or twice a year in dumping quick barrels. But something around 6’6" to 6’8" with a pulled in nose and tail should fit the bill for you. If you are into the whole retro deal look at a bonzer or single fin. the previous post is a good guide line to match the waves and how you want to surf to the board lengths I mentioned before. If you are wanting a good ol’ truster(aka thruster), take the above guidelines and examine boards in local shops to get an idea what you should shape into the board.

5

hahaha…RH I can’t believe I forgot to give an idea of where I usually surf. I’m my own worst enemy…drives me nuts when people do that. Anyway, I most often a surf a semi-mellow reef which my 6’2 fish can handle quite well. I’m looking for something to hit bigger beach break with though i.e. O’side Harbor. I appreciate the info you dropped.Every little bit helps.

Thanks Rider. All this is good stuff from you guys. I wouldn’t consider myself one of those guys that is completely into the whole “retro” thing, but I am more of a front footed surfer so maybe a bonzer or single fin would work better for my style of surfing? Maybe trial and error some boards off craigslist that I can resell if they don’t work for me. I know there are sooo many diff opinions out there when it comes to this and I was just looking to get a few.

 

6

I’m 6’1, 190lbs, and I ride a 6’4 quad as my go to board. On the biggest days around here (Long Branch to Sandy Hook) I ride either a 6’8 rounded pin thruster or a 7’0 double wing swallow quad.

How was the Coil party?

7

it was good, I’m sorry you didn’t make it. the waves were weird and these to kayakers kinda monopolized the peak later in the morning but other than that it was cool to meet some swaylockers and try out their coils.

8

O'side, land o lefts', south swell marchs up the beach. Fast dumping hollow beach break. Jump off jetty get sucked north kind of surf.  Personally I'd stay with a 6'4" style tri fin....anything off the rack, there all the same pretty much don't let some one tell ya different. 6'4"x 19 x 2 1/2 single to double...bab, blab. whatever...cookie cutter. But you might look at going 2 5/8 thick and add a 1/4 inch all the way around the template something like 12 1/4 x 19 1/4 x 13 1/4,  Then I'd use the step up as in 7'4" for the reef when the waves get bigger...as in Blacks, Swamis, Sunset Cliffs bigger.  O-side still calls for a beach break style board....drop in, cover up, maybe a turn or two, then WHAM!

 

9

Shaping a step-up right now for OH++ heavy beack break.  I am 5'6" 140lb.  Normal board, 510x 18x 2.125.  Step-Up is an experiement.  I added rocker and left a lot of foam under the chest.  Stretched out my short board template in Illustrator, 3 inches in the back to create a rounded pin.  Pushed the wide point +3" of center.  Made the bottom a single to slight V out the tail.  Tri Fin set up.  The foam is 2" thick under the chest area.  The rails are normal.  It creates what looks like a deck channel but it's actually a "step", I guess.  Any how, can't wait to finish it and get it in some sizeable waves.

10

[img_assist|nid=1045354|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=0|height=0]

[img_assist|nid=1045357|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=0|height=0]

[img_assist|nid=1045355|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=0|height=0]

 the only step I'll ever need in my life.

when the sh*t hits the fan kind of board...

 

damn I hate these thumbnails..

Even when I select the Preview option it posts as a thumbnail

I give up.. computers suck

11

The wonderful world of custom…one man’s magic is another man’s poison?

Yes, and where do you surf? You wanna go shorter, but that’s because you are surfing a little peaky reef down the street, but Kiki is ridng quadruple overhead Hanalei…Chris has to drop in over the ledge at East Point, and Mardy is trying to survive at The Box.

Custom.

12

You’re right on the money about the harbor, I lived there for 5 years after moving up from Leucadia and surfed it all the time. But I used my 8’5" nose rider most of the time and would typically cleanout the lineup by the south jetty. It worked for me :-p… Just another example of different stokes for different folks.

13

For OH to DOH it’s my 7’ CB 5 fin bonzer round pin. Nuff said.

14

I’d love to see a photo of said bonzer.

15

howdy shacked; sounds like you need to transition to a decent shortboard. to make it less painful go for something a tad big at first, say 6’5" or even 6’6", 19" and 2 and 3/8". may sound big but any decent shortboard shape will surf circles around your twinzer/fish in good surf. i surf o’side all the time and it gets really good about 6 times per year and on those days I use a thinned out, high performance shortboard 'cuz all you’re doing is pulling in . . . there are tons of great used boards locally on craigslist.com. good luck

16

Best thing is to ride a few different boards and see what goes best for you in bigger waves...maybe start with a 6'4 - 6'6" , more standard shorty shape with narrower tail and more nose lift than your twinzer....after a few surfs on something else, you should know which way to go from there.....

17

yup I’ve gone for 4 inches of step up on my regular board. I think the idea is to retain some of the feel of the regular board so as not to feel in an alien environment when stepping up. What I’ve done is scale up the rocker and keep the same front to rear distance between front and back fins (but moved the whole cluster up to compensate for narrower tail and extra length). However I can see a problem with doing that for your twinzer so I don’t know how to answer this from a fish/twinzer point of view.

However… I agree with the following:

I don’t know about modern quads, I’ve never tried bonzer, but I’ve invested probably more time than is good for me on pure twins. I have some exposure to twin variants. I liked the pure twin (late 70s/80s style) but for me nothing beats the thruster for overall performance even in small waves. Despite what I’m saying I nevertheless PM’d speedy to see about borrowing a twin from his considerable stable of boards, but this is for the novelty experience, i have no plans to make them the regular ride.

then you can re-train yourself! I’m not sure about exactly what front-footed vs rear footed surfing is: I’m inclined to think that there is even footed, rear footed and combination footed (where we do both even footed and rear footed depending on the situation and surfboard.). True front footed is awkward? I have many pics of myself and looking at them I would say I’m even footed, with some back footed moments - this is also my impression while surfing too and thruster works good for me. So I think give the “cookie cutter” thruster a go in all wave sizes and only if you can’t get it to feel good start seeking the alternatives.

18

My Pu 6’6" x 18 & 3/4" x 2 & 1/2" step up by Steve Friedman.

My Sunova Pro 6’6" x 19 & 1/2" x 2 & 3/8".

 

19

g’day onelua, I’ve had that problem too, Swaylocks has some bugs although I can see Mr Palers vision and he is gradually improving the site all the time.

so I can see your stepup is called the T Chung Fatgirl - Alekai Kinimaka Model P3!!! its a serious looking stepup, solid stringer, looks like its getting some heavy use too. Could you tell us more about it please. Every dimension that you can be bothered to measure  - length, width, fin positions, fin sizes, rocker etc

here we go

20

this is the excellent GTS stepup designed and built by Josh Dowling aka [url=http://www2.swaylocks.com/user/speedneedle]speedy[/url] from specs by me. Rocker design by ME :) 6' 10" x 11" x 19.25" x 13.75" x 2 3/8" divinycell sandwich with goretex vent.
[img]http://www2.swaylocks.com/files/images/2009/08/p1010048.preview.jpg[/img]
nose rocker 6.25 inches, tail rocker 2.3 inches.

 This is a decent helping of nose rocker with a slightly lower than normal tail rocker, but not too low. I can't explain why I like rocker like that but I do. The flyer 2 and the clark hybrid blank upon which my silicon valley boards were based all have this sort of rocker. The McCoy nugget is an extreme example of a generous amount of nose rocker with reduced tail rocker.
rear fin distance from tail 3.86 inches, front fins 11.73 inches.

[img_assist|nid=1045402|title=the GTS stepup|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=0|height=0]

double to single concave.
[img]http://www2.swaylocks.com/files/images/2009/08/p1010046.preview.jpg[/img]

light double in the front just 2 - 3mm to be stable in heavy texture as tends to happen when conditions step up.

Josh uses racing stripes to increase speed, its an alternative to the red board.
[img]http://www2.swaylocks.com/files/images/2009/08/p1010047.preview.jpg[/img]


moderate single concave in rear 3 - 4 mm, single concaves are stable if they are narrow and the tail is narrow.
[img]http://www2.swaylocks.com/files/images/2009/08/p1010045.preview.jpg[/img]

however whether to believe what I wrote is the question, the wife of a friend once said "all surfboard design is bullshit" when listening to us talk. Enough of that blashpemy and time to put the tin-foil hat back on and talk about the fins.

they are the 4-way "4A" which means medium small and I am happy with them.

They are noticably smaller than the Merrick AMs in my 6' 6" shortboard. When I tried smaller in the shortboard it lost drive and glide speed, but the 4A are a comparable size to the Future F4s which I really used to love in my bigger hybrid boards I used to ride. However it doesn't seem to be as simple as bigger boards smaller fins, coz my longboard goes much better with quite big tri fins, so I'm confused on this issue and I think the only way to find out is to try different ones. Its next outing will be with the 4-way yellow plugs to increase the cant - to compensate for the way the single concave tends to set fins with less cant.

 [img]http://www2.swaylocks.com/files/images/2009/08/stepupstuff.preview.jpg[/img]

aug 2009