It was raining like crazy this morning, but now that I had the right fins, very little was going to stop me from taking the fish out.
I checked the buoys and saw 6.6@16. I checked the beach and saw maybe waist high waves and plenty of flatness. Hmm.
Thankfully there was just enough going on to try out this board.
Paddling: It paddles! It’s not as easy as my bigger boards, sure, but it’s not crazy hard! Yay.
Catching waves: It does this too! It was so small today I was worried I wouldn’t get much, but I got some. Nice.
Duck diving: WAY easier than all my other boards. 6@16 managed to roll on by and I made it under easy peasy.
Turning: I need to learn this! There wasn’t a ton of wave action to really try this, but I can already tell it’s gonna be fun. 😀
Stylin: Oh yeah, it’s styling:
Step 1- Give your block of foam over to your glasser. Watch foam get put in a pile, loaded in a truck, and moved to the glassing shop.
Step 2- When the glasser posts a workshop picture, assume every board that’s even remotely the color you asked for is yours. Freak out when you see even a hint of it in the background.
Step 3- Shamelessly talk about step 2 on twitter as a passive aggressive hint that you’d really like to see photos. Freak out when you get one. OMG OMG OMG OMG.
Step 4- Wait for glasser to post finished pics. Adjust expectations along with instagram filters. Freak out that it’s done and not be able to sleep wanting to go pick it up.
Step 5- Go get it!!! But maybe make sure they don’t close early that day cause you’ll show up to a locked door after racing across town after work and completely freak out (in the bad way, not the good way you’ve been freaking out all along.) Thankfully someone’s waiting for you to pick it up so it all works out. YAY.
Step 6- Take several thousand pictures and post them to the internet. Eventually stop before you drive everyone crazy, but have fun. (This step is optional and is based on how much freaking out you’ve done. OMG YAY)
Step 7- Surf! 😀
Thanks everyone at Sunset Shapers. This has been an absolutely blast.
If anyone is looking to learn more about shaping, or just wants a new board and can’t make up their mind, I highly recommended their shaping class. You get a sweet new board and you’ll have a lot of fun making it.
Back when Sunset Shapers opened, I recalled reading on their site about shaping lessons. I filed that bit of info away in the “Oh man, I’d love to do that” archives.
Just before Christmas, they had a coupon for lessons via Facebook. I got one, hoping it would finally get me to move shaping lessons from the “I want to do that” column to the “I’m totally doing that” column.
It did!
I had a little chat with James about what I wanted to make. The options came down to a proper noseriding longboard and a fish. Feeling like I’d get more use out of the fish in local waters (or on trips) I went fish.
The classes are divided up into two 3 hour sessions.
The first session is about the blank, the tools, the shaping room, the process of removing the outer “bark” from the blank, using the surform to smooth everything down, deciding on templates, measuring, measuring again, trimming the extra foam off.
Gordon was great. He answered all my questions. He walked through everything and was happy to share info.
We started here
A 6’5 blank. Nice and wide for fish.
We measured here:
Overall board length: 6’4
Width 1ft from the nose: 15 3/4″
Wide point: 21″
Width 1ft from the tail: 16″
We round a combination of templates that made a smooth transition between all the points of measurement.
The act of shaping is all about creating a craft with smooth flowing, lines through smooth, flowing strokes. The template needs to flow so the water can flow, right?
Tim reminded me of this scene:
At the end of the day, we had a square railed, fish shaped block of foam:
Day 2 was all about the finesse. Bottom contours, rail shape, tail details, nose details, basically everything that gives this board it’s character.
We started with lots and lots of passes with the surform to trim the board down to the thickness we wanted (2 3/4″) I got to do a lot of this work (since it was harder to mess up, ha) and was getting the hang of using the surfom correctly.
Here’s Gordon trimming down the stringer so I can do more surform passes on the bottom:
Next we worked on the bottom concave. Single to double concave. This took lots of very small movements, checking and rechecking the depth, and plenty of eyeballing.
So much of this is by feel or by sight that Gordon had me look at things in progress so I could see what it looked like if one side was less concave than the other, then showed me how to fix it. We did this with the stringer too, I’d look to see where the stringer was too flat, then Gordon would get it nicely into a smooth shape again.
It was really interesting to see how everything evolves. The board isn’t ruined if there’s a little more foam here, it is still in progress and can be brought back into check (within reason, you obviously can’t add foam back in.) The point being, every stroke or step doesn’t have to be perfect, but the change has to be slow and symmetrical so that the finished board is perfect.
I had so many questions answered. So many thing I thought maybe were aesthetics, actually had real reasons behind them. Like the swallow tail, there rails on the tail are very square on one side and rounded on the top, allowing the water to release under the board for speed and turns, but hold over the top to keep the board in the face nice and snug for more control.
Rail work was super delicate. Gordon did all of that work. I mostly said “yup, that’s even” or “looks a little rounder on this side”
The finished board:
Next steps: cutting fin boxes, cutting the leash plug, and glassing!
This part’s really exciting. I don’t get to sit in on it, but I’ve done a ton of sketching, holding boards, and talking to James about options. I sketched so many MANY options, dozens at least, before settling on this guy:
Now to wait for James to do his magic.
I highly recommend this class to anyone who wants to know more about what goes in to hand shaping a board or anyone who wants to be able to better read how a board will perform. It’s a great class.
I’d love to shape another board. Gordon said the best way to do it is to find a board I want to copy, bring it in, and book some time with him of James to help. They’d leave me to do more of the work myself and help guide in the hard parts.
A 6’10 Andreini Vaquero came up used at Mollusk. I’ve been drooling over these boards for a while and extra drooling since I tried out Mike’s Vaquero a few weeks ago.
Yeah, in the land of beachbreaks, it’s not that practical but man is it fun. Paddles easy. I got into waves right off the bat (which I wasn’t expecting AT all) and it did some fun swishy things to get around sections on the inside. Coming from a longboard and singlefin background, the board feels good. I only got one frontside wave to really feel the slide these boards have, but so far so good.
I’m taking this board to Mexico. I bet it’s gonna be fun in those right hand point breaks. 😀
I hit the beach early to borrow Mike’s 8’7 Vaquero. I’ve been wanting to try a hull for a while, but hadn’t been able to get the stars to align to be at the beach on the right day when a friend had theirs for me to try.
It was pretty fun. The board paddled as easy as my 9’4 and cutback smoothly. As it was crowded (and I was worried about dinging Mike’s board) I got mostly short waves. I managed few longer ones where I could see more of the swoosh factor in action. I’d probably need to change up my stance to surf something like this regularly. I’m a little too…braced for impact. I’m digging in when I should be squiggling.
When Mike was packing up, Chris said he was on his way, so I hung out in the lot a while. A dude in the lot was teasing me for taking pics of the meh surf and offered to take a picture of me instead.
Eventually Chris showed up and I took out my 7′ to pick up inside waves as the crowd thinned. I got a few slow ones, nothing fancy. We moved to a larger area of the beach, but I was too tired to get anything decent. After 4 hours of surfing, I opted to belly one in and finally get to work.
Surf: Small, clean, and a little peaky. WNW 6.9 ft @ 12.9 sec
The winter swells have been swinging wildly from huge to teeny. The buoys were looking medium-ish so I pulled out the 7’4 for more practice.
Rolling up to the beach…it was nearly flat. Crap. I put my doubts aside and paddled out.
While today would have been pretty fun on a log, it was still fun on the 7’4. I got a handfull of waves and several successful dives. Yay! No wobbling!
I still need plenty of work, but I’m satisfied.
I’m actually a little surprised this narrow 7’4 is working better for me that the 7’0 stub. While narrow, it’s really full out to the rails and a little thicker than my 7′. The extra rocker is probably helping in Linda Mar closeouts. Either way, having fun figuring it out!
Surf: Long lulls and closed out Knee-Shoulder high inconsistent waves. Not as junky as it’s been, but not clean. Froggies singing.
My 7’4 appeared in my quiver about a year or two after I’d started surfing. A friend had it in is garage and thought it might be a good board for me to learn to shortboard on. I took it out. I flailed and failed. I pearled every which way. It was a disaster. I laughed it off, put the board in a corner and forgot about it.
I’ll admit, I blamed the board. Oh it’s narrow, it’s too thick to duckdive, etc etc. I’d only been surfing two years at the time, and hardly regularly. I’d only had a few months on my 9’4. I decided to focus on longboarding to learn the basics rather than pushing myself to shortboard.
Fast forward two years and I’ve had a lot of practice on my longboard and a little bit on my 7’0 stub. I’d been shuffling this 7’4 around in the corner to get at my preferred boards. It was dusty. I decided to get it wet and see if I could do a little better than last time.
I’d expected to burn a day being tossed around. The paddle out was fine. I splashed around for a while. I had a little lumpy peak all to myself and I decided to paddle for a wave…and got it! Yesssss.
Paddling back out, I decided to give duckdiving a go. Sure enough, did that too! I started to realize this was a pretty fun board now that I had half a clue how to use it.
I got two waves. Neither of which were pretty. The longest wave I wobbled along the face like a newborn deer. Still, I’m a little closer to competence on this board.
Surf: 2-4ft, Mellow and Crumbly. Sunny.
Board: 5’10 Retro Fish.
With summer on it’s way, I’ve been eying a few smaller wave shortboards on craigslist. The shortest board I’ve been able to stand up on was something like a 6’3 or a 6’4 so I figured I’d try one of Josh’s little fish and see how it goes.
I spent most of the day practicing my duck dive. I’ve been working on this for a while, usually flailing around on boards that are WAY too thick for someone my size.
Shove, kick, dive, surface. Seems pretty easy, but with the thick boards I’ve been using I just haven’t been able to do it.
With Josh’s help, I practiced keeping the board stable under water, practiced kicking, and FINALLY got on some clean duck dives. I was really starting to get frustrated not being able to do it.
I also pulled off a spectacular arial display. I dove under the wave, the wave pulled the board out of my hands and then SHOT about 4 feet straight up. Josh got a kick out of it.
Mostly I stayed out of the way, went for a few waves, and floated around. I had pretty low expectations. This fish is about 4 feet shorter than my usual boards so I wasn’t expecting to shred. Getting in the clean duck dives was a pretty special bonus and the post surf BBQ was pretty extra special. 😀
Surf: 1-3ft. Inconsistent but clean. Warm sun, low winds, blue water.
Sunny and warm down in SC. Small waves, relatively small crowd given it’s a holiday, and lots of kelp. I got one very dramatic over the nose of the board pitch when I came to a dead stop mid wave on a big clump of the stuff. Lots of long rides if you could manage to stay high and I out of the kelp. Got a few into the beach. Really could have used the 9’4 instead of the 9. I went with the 9 just to try it out on that kind of wave and in case it was crowded. The 9′ is great for dodging kelp, but the 9’4’s big float would have made these soft little waves a breeze to catch.
Afterwards I headed to the O’niell shop for their Memorial day sale. The 9’0 now has it’s own bag. 😀
Dropped by Ward Coffey’s shop. I’ve been drooling over one of his boards on craigslist and was looking for an opportunity to talk to him about what kind of fish or shortboard would be right for me. Looks like I’ll prob need something in the 6’4 range, about 2 1/2″ to 2 5/8″ thick so my craigslist board might be too small. His custom boards are really reasonably priced and he had a few suggestion of types of boards and hybrid boards he shapes for people looking to ride the mellow small waves I like to ride.
I still struggle with the idea of a custom board. Not becauseI doubt a shaper’s skill or question resale value or anything remotely considered to be a rational concern, but because all my boards are craigslist finds, giveaways, borrowed boards and I’m not quite comfortable with the idea of a brand spanking new board just for me. Especially a shorter board. I don’t really feel like I’ve earned the honor just yet. Silly, I know.
SURF: 2-3ft, little bit of jumble but fun, peeling, and beautiful sunshine. Gear: 9’0 Stewart Hydro Hull
My 9’4 has been in and out of the repairshop lately. Poor board has been getting dinged at crowded breaks and, since it’s practically a new board, I have it repaired professionally.
With the week or so turnaround time this leaves me high and dry if the swell is too small for my other boards. After seeing the forecasts for small clean swell, I hit craigslist looking for a backup board. Wouldn’t you know, there’s another board similar to mine for sale. I checked out for a long lunch, looked to board over and bought it.
I was looking for an 8’6, but I couldn’t really pass this one up. Sure the finbox had been ripped out and repaired, sure it had a lot of not so nicely repaired dings, but it was in decent shape and cheap. Cheap enough that I can learn to do repairs on it. Cheap enough that I can lend it to friends when I take them out surfing.
I spent saturday sanding down all the lumpy repairs and blobby resin. I touched up the fin box repairs and waxed it up.
Sunday I got it in the water. At 2 7/8th thick it’s a half inch thinner and about a half inch narrower than my 9’4. The tail is pulled in and very narrow. It’s lighter and feels like there’s not as much concave to the bottom. All of which leads to a slightly different ride. It turns fast and seems to be able to get into the wave at a slightly steeper point. I need to test it out more to really see how it’s different.
I managed to get two really great waves out of it. Both nice long rights. I could chase sections pretty well, but didn’t get any of the clean stable shuffling my 9’4 is so good at. Aaron and I stayed out for about 4 hours. He got one awesome long left and a few good rights.
The weather was so amazing people were hanging out all over the place, even the parking lot. A few kids were sitting around with a pickup overflowing with boards and a lazy boy. I’m sure somewhere just out of sight of passing officers was an ice cold bucket of beer.
