Santa’s Workshop, Part 1

First up for the Christmas season is this lovely tanker I built for my big brother Rod. After he and Becky’s wonderful visit to the islands last summer he asked me to build him a suitable board for his home break in the great state of Maine. So we have the “Big Brother” model: 9 feet long, full profile with plenty of thickness. Fabric inlays on both sides; spray fade on the deck with masked rays and pinlines. A real beaut. It’s on a slow boat to South Berwick and should arrive in January.

Big Brother Time-Lapse Shaping

Big Brother Part 2: Shaping from rotorhead guy on Vimeo.

Winter Board 2010

Your basic high-performance shortboard. 6’6” x19”, 2 3/4” thick. Even with double 4 oz. glass bottom and double 4 top with a 6 oz deck patch, it’s still real light.

Uhu

The latest out of the shop is this unique alaia. Based on the success of the omilu model, I made some changes that I hoped would be beneficial. First, more wood. The omilu was a bit to thin and too light, making it flex more than I would like. Additionally I don’t feel like it would hold up to  overhead waves. Also, maintaining more width throughout would help in catching waves and planing. The omilu tended to downshift once off the face. While fairly easy to maneuver, I felt it was too loose – particularly when in the flats, where it was a chore to keep it from spinning out.

 

So, I developed the uhu. Very little wood was removed from the blank – just enough to give it a nice outline.Unlike the narow waist of the omilu I went with a “stinger” tail, keeping the board wide up until the last 20 inches or so where the tail steps in. For control I went with a Catch Surf setup – rounded 70/30 rails up front and hard, inward-canted rails in the tail (Catch Surf hand-makes finless soft surfboards which are really taking off).  The bottom is the standard single concave, with the addition of a couple of channels in the tail to help keep it straight.

So how does it work? I took it out on a nice chest-high day at an empty reef break out by the Coast Guard air station at Barbers. It was perfect alaia surf – long, gentle lines with reforms and multiple sections. The board performed beyond expectations. It was markedly easier to catch waves than the omilu, allowing me to get in earlier and really set up my rides. It tracked straight – almost too straight, and I really had to use a shortboard-like technique to turn it, unlike the omilu which really needs a light touch. The only negative was that it really wasn’t any easier to paddle than the others (alaias are a MAJOR arm workout). The extra wood didn’t make a difference – it was essentially neutrally buoyant weight. The positive side of that is that you can duck-dive the thing about 6 feet no problem, and actually “swim” underwater with it.

As for the graphics…after cutting the outline, it just looked like an uhu (parrotfish). I bagged my first uhu a few weeks ago (granted a red-phase, not a bicolor) and that sealed the deal. I just wanted something interesting on the back so I made some camo stencils and went with an aquaflage scheme. The logo is again just a reflection on my current obsession of spearfishing. I couldn’t bring myself to put a camera mount on the nose – it would just ruin the art.

I’m really excited about riding this board this winter. This will be my “co-number one” along with a “normal” shortboard I’m making for more critical surf.

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:

Brothers Board pt. 1

Rod's board pt. 1 from rotorhead guy on Vimeo.