Got plans

I just finished drawing the plans for my mini simmons.  It's 5' 6", 22" wide, about 3" thick.  The tail is very wide and it'll have 7" fish keels for fins.  Rails will start soft and become harder toward the tail.  It's going to be mostly cedar except for the rails.  I'll probably do those out of spruce.  The vent plug and leash plug will be in the tail.

I'm excited about it because it'll be good for the waves here and it doesn't require a lot of materials.   I figure it's a prototype so, we'll see how it goes.  I hope I can keep the weight down so it's fun to surf.

Might have this one.

Since my last post I've been surfing.  I tried out my new to me surfboard.  It worked well and I was reminded how much more I have to paddle on a shorter board.  The good thing was catching waves goes a lot better when there is more rocker in the board.  The board went exactly where it was pointed and it didn't have any weird tracking.

I was talking to some surf friends about their mini simmons.  Lots of guys are riding these things and I was asked to modify my Keiki board bones to make it a mini.  Basically, I'd be making the nose hips and tail wider.  It'd be any easy project and might be fun.  I think that's the direction I'm headed in now.

Starting a new board.

The board I have in mind will be a copy of these.  There are somethings that I like about each of these boards.  I'll take the best features of each one.  The quad is a 7' 3" S7 Super Fish.  The tri-fin is a 7' 4" Gotcha.  My next step is to copy the outlines and design a spar.  I want to take the Gotcha out in the water in the next few days.  It's got more rocker, it's thinner and not as wide as the Super Fish.  I think that'll work better for the conditions here.

Reverse engineering

I've been experimenting with different boards for awhile now.  There are a bunch in my garage.  They range from 7-10 foot.  I've found the shorter I go, the better it's working out.  I'm anxious to try out a 7' 4" board I picked up last week.   It's a bit thinner (2 3/4" thick) and a little bit narrower (20 1/2").  My intention is to find my favorite and copy it.  I think that building with cedar and balsa should keep the weight down.  The rails will probably be pine. Anyways, making a board that works as well as my foam ones is going to be a challenge.  I know it can be done and I'm looking forward to starting one in the next month or two.

Ridin the inside

The groms were out yesterday.  I had a bodyboard session in the late afternoon.  There were kids all over it.  The conditions were blown out and messy.  The reforms were steep and nasty.  The kids didn't seem to care.  They'd drop in, bottom turn and rip the lip.  That's pretty much it.  They're cool about sharing with me and the water is still nice and warm.  It's fun to see these shredders surfing together.

Gettin' it dialed.

I've been surfing a lot more lately.  It's more fun than building boards for me but, I'm also getting better ideas.  The waves here in Ormond Beach are peaky fast beach breakers.  The rides are pretty fast and sometimes long.  Anyways, there are a couple of things that make huge differences for me.  The first is the volume of the board.  A couple of my boards have too much buoyancy for me.  What happens is the nose will flap up and down if I'm too far back.  It's a little touchy if there isn't much nose rocker.

My favorite board for bigger days is a 9' that's 2-5/8" thick.  It's fast and turns well.  The rails are slightly pinched and the fin set-up is 2+1.  I took out my shorter quad fish but, I didn't have as much fun with it.  It felt just a little bit corky.  Your results may vary.

Solarez

We've got a little swell headed this way so, it was time to pull off the stickers and fix my board right. I used Solarez for the first time today.  It worked out well and the UV curing is much better than mixing. Another good feature is the chopped fiberglass already in it.  I was able to fix all my splits and dings much quicker.