Nohu

The nohu, or scorpionfish, is a real ugly fish. Thus I named  my newest design after it. It’s a 7’ twin fin fish with minimal rocker and a wiiiiiide tail. I made it for small days when it’s too mushy for an alaia, as an alternative to a longboard. We’ll see how it rides – the fins are real small, so it should slide quite a bit but still bite enough for control.
Here’s the inspiration (not one of my prints):

And my take on it. Meranti marine plywood interior frame, bookmatched redwood top, redwood rails, lauan ply bottom. I actually ripped the ply and alternated the light/dark faces for the bottom, using a layer of fiberglass to bind them into a single sheet prior to gluing to the frame. It’s not the prettiest but it’s easy and  inexpensive, and stucturally both light and strong (as it’s glassed on both sides). Fins are my own design; nose/tail blocks are redwood with paulownia on the nose and mahogany on the tail block. :

Manini – Done.

The newest model is a twin-fin fish that I’ve called the Manini (the Hawaiian name for the convict tang, one of themost common reef fish). This one has a nice wide bat-tail and low-to-medium rocker to keep it going in smallish surf. This one is a kids board which will allow my 10-year old to progress from mini-longboards and funshapes up to proper short boards. It’s still got plenty of volume and length for her. At 6’ it may seem small but fish are generally ridden 6”-12” shorter than ones “regular” board due to their design. Take a mini-mal, cut 6’ out of the center and there’s your fish.

 

Manini

The little fish progresses. Almost ready for glass.

 

“Little Brother” is also shaping up, ready for art. 6’ 4” squash:

Time Lapse Shaping: Fish

Here's a fish I did recently from a 6'2" EPS shortboard/fish blank. Making a board from a foam blank is like sculpting, where making a wood board is more of an exercise in engineering. The wood boards are more satisfying...but a hundred times more time consuming.

This fish is essentially ready for glass after less than 2 hours work shaping (I'm going to put color, fin plugs and a leash plug in).

Time Lapse Fish from rotorhead guy on Vimeo.