RealSurf Surfers' Forum

Tomo's ideas are great but they got a long way to go - I hope they get out into the general shaping/design arena and move things along a bit again.

Capt with respect, I think you have the pros arse about. I reckon you probably don't get to surf around 'em and watch from close quarters the way I'm fortunate enough to do. I think innovative surfboard design is now trailing well behind the technical abilities and power of top end pro surfers. That's why most of 'em ride fairly clean neutral boards; they're trying to keep the design aspect simple, so they aren't limited by any of the board's tendencies. I think you'd also be surprised at how much they do experiment with trippy designs, singlies, quads etc etc, looking for different feels and possible advantages. Mostly they seem to find such variations have as many minuses as pluses. Like I talked with Mick and Joel quite a bit about their quad trials and while they both like how quads hold high and low tube lines so well, which is why they employed 'em on the better day at Chopes, they don't feel they can trust the quad's inconsistencies when surfing directly into steep turns at speed.

Kelly's got a fair bit more involved with design in the past five years or so, but interestingly most of his work has evolved to very clean neutral designs, round pins and tight curve swallows, shrunk down and with a lot of work done on fin placements in the quads, but clean and simple nonetheless. He's not riding cutoff noses or dim-sim style wide cutoff squares other than occasionally for play – as do many other pros, when they're not going for gold.

They're funny what they think about with boards. Talking to Kieren Perrow about his current quiver, he was waving around this gorgeous 6'2" round pin (has a five plug set up) and suddenly said, "This is gonna be sick for solid Pipe." A 6'2"! I started laughing and he did too, "Yeah, a couple of years ago this would have been a 6'10"."

pinhead wrote:Yeah Cavie, I can see what he's doing design wise, I just don't like what he's doing with the English language - all surfboards are planning hulls.

Nick and others re: the 6'10 to 6'2 and other shorter boards in macking surf, do you think this is because the surfers are just better now or the boards rails, fin set ups etc..are engineered to handle the power or is it because that freak Slater showed them it was possible to go short in these conditions, or D) all of the above. Saying that Buttons surfed short boards and the footage today still look sensational while not to the level of the current pro's but he was on to something that guy (not "on" something).

Speaking of Fish Dick Van apparently makes a high perfmonance Fish called a Wasp that is meant to be great (not talking pipe and similar here).

Sidenote, has anyone been catching those Surfer Magazine shows from the Late 80's and early 90's they have been running on Fuel TV....its pretty good and funny, but also they have some good segments e.g. how to predict swells by taking stats and pumping them through a program you could by direct from the US Navy running it through your Commodore 64.

Most of the above.

They've always been good enough. I watched Mike Ho ride a 6'5" single fin at 12' plus Pipe in 1982.

But what happens at top end pro level is the same thing that happens in any group of surfers -- they tend to copy each other, creating a "norm".

It takes a circuit-breaker to bust up the groupthink and Kelly did that to some extent, but other factors have also played into it, including Chopes, where the trend toward much shorter boards has been rolling along for a decade, and transferring itself to other heavy reef breaks like Pipe, and the arrival on tour of a bunch of hot young kids who are making the established guys re-think a range of stuff.

JaM71 wrote:Hi pirate, i saw one of your boards on this site, looks awesome you made it right? What dims is your 5"2? Sounds like it covers 95% of east coast surf!

in your opinion how important is it to go super short and a little under volume with these boards.

Cheers

Dims on my 5'2 are 5'2 x 19 x 2 5/16 carrying about 29 litres. I am 5'9 and 90 kegs, so that's a pretty small board for me. For comparison if I were to be riding a regular HPSB it would probably look something like 6'1 x 19 x 2 1/2 around 30-31 litres.

with how straight the outline is and how much surface area the design has, I think going longer is just defeating the purpose of the design. I don't think it's so much about going a little under volume, more just having a similar volume come out of smaller dimensions. eg the 5'2 is only 5/16 thick, but the foam goes all the way out to the rails and is foiled pretty thickly to the tail to give me a similar volume to a hpsb. gotta remember you still have to paddle the thing.

As for 95% of east coast waves, maybe a bit less the downfalls i am finding are:
- tiny gutless waves - you can surf it but it;s hard work like a HPSB, better off on a full on groveller imo
- sucky reefs - a bit more paddle power and rail to get in earlier is more comfortable. It's fun once you're on the waves though
- choppy conditions - it is a little more sensitive to chop than more regular boards.

I've got a 5'3 1/2 x 18 1/2 x 2 3/8 carrying a bit more volume and a little less concave that i've finished now and only surfed once, with more of a rounded tail. Only had one surf so far and it was in 4-6ft backhand sucky point break waves, so a bit hard to judge, but it felt good so far.

pirate_agenda wrote:

JaM71 wrote:Hi pirate, i saw one of your boards on this site, looks awesome you made it right? What dims is your 5"2? Sounds like it covers 95% of east coast surf!

in your opinion how important is it to go super short and a little under volume with these boards.

Cheers

Dims on my 5'2 are 5'2 x 19 x 2 5/16 carrying about 29 litres. I am 5'9 and 90 kegs, so that's a pretty small board for me. For comparison if I were to be riding a regular HPSB it would probably look something like 6'1 x 19 x 2 1/2 around 30-31 litres.

with how straight the outline is and how much surface area the design has, I think going longer is just defeating the purpose of the design. I don't think it's so much about going a little under volume, more just having a similar volume come out of smaller dimensions. eg the 5'2 is only 5/16 thick, but the foam goes all the way out to the rails and is foiled pretty thickly to the tail to give me a similar volume to a hpsb. gotta remember you still have to paddle the thing.

As for 95% of east coast waves, maybe a bit less the downfalls i am finding are:
- tiny gutless waves - you can surf it but it;s hard work like a HPSB, better off on a full on groveller imo
- sucky reefs - a bit more paddle power and rail to get in earlier is more comfortable. It's fun once you're on the waves though
- choppy conditions - it is a little more sensitive to chop than more regular boards.

I've got a 5'3 1/2 x 18 1/2 x 2 3/8 carrying a bit more volume and a little less concave that i've finished now and only surfed once, with more of a rounded tail. Only had one surf so far and it was in 4-6ft backhand sucky point break waves, so a bit hard to judge, but it felt good so far.

I agree 100% - mine is a tad longer than yours - but needs grunt. Am not loving it much as a quad either and have been running different set-ups all over the place. Taking it to Tahiti next week. Wish we'd had some swell over the last five weeks so i was feeling a tad more confident....

Cpt.Caveman wrote:
The approach is that current boards have a lot of elements that actually increase drag in different ways by being an inefficient object trying to force itself through the water.

.....are you meaning boards with too many fins ?.....

No I think what is meant is more curvy outlines, rocker, bottom contour and the fins. From what I can see they don't have a lot of rocker as well as a straighter plan shape.

What kind of fins have you guys been riding in these MPHs?

Yu's in the big stuff. Wcts in medium. Josh Mulcoy quad set in flat faced or point style waves. Have tried a stack more and mixed and matched - this seems to be working for me.

So, with Firewire pumping out the Tomo Vanguard early next year, anyone thinking about getting one?

http://www.firewiresurfboards.com/surfb ... d=vanguard

I understand what NC is trying to get at with clean neutral board design, but I still think there is far more progression to go with board design for the top level pros. Going shorter and more wake-board like is one possibility, maybe one day with no leg-rope for skate style tricks? Who knows.

imo the firewire dimensions are a bit wierd.

too long for their volume.

wingnut2443 wrote:

Cpt.Caveman wrote: ... I still think there is far more progression to go with board design ... shorter and more wake-board like ... skate style tricks? Who knows.

Fins on the nose and tail ...

So, take off, surf rail to rail, air, surf reverse, rail to rail, air, switch, rail to rail ...

I wouldn't rule it out! haha

I remember when air 360's were pretty crazy and unusual, let alone variations in grabs etc. Shovits were completely out of the question... Now we have rodeo flips?