Showing posts with label shaping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shaping. Show all posts

“Joker” EVO5/6 Longboard bonzer

This is a board I'd been thinking about for some time… a long board with the volume and trimming of a 9’6”+ but the foam and manoeuvrability of something much under 9’0”.

The Joker 9'0 bonzer longboard from Tim Stafford Surfboards P1050697 P1050700

The wide nose is effectively “cut off” and has part of a teardrop concave, with the cut providing an initial straight entry, similar to a Harbour nose channel. This will provide a more stable lift that should trim from the nose through the flatter sections that often pop up on our waves here.

The mid section features a straighter, soft rail line for nose riding and high-line trimming. Don’t expect it to turn from the middle though, this is a board that want to be ridden classically, turn off the tail and walk to the nose.

The tail has a distinct hip to pivot around when you do step back, and then the foiled out narrow tail with bonzer concaves will provide the acceleration, drive and holding power.

The rocker is appropriate for an all rounder of its true length, 5 1/8” in the nose and 3 1/4” in the tail, even and with the apex slightly back to allow for off the lips and floaters when riding off the tail.

Glass job… not sure to go for a classic red tint or clear with some nose bands in khaki + orange pinlines. Views in comments or on facebook welcome.

Offshore Tuesdays // Paipo Preview

Some days when it's small and blowing super hard off-shore, it's nearly-impossible to get into waves on a surfboard. With the Santa Ana winds in mind, as well as the coming close-out South swells in the summertime, Cameron and I decided to make ourselves a pair of paipos.

I hadn't ridden a body board since elementary school, but it seemed like a reasonable enough experiment; and a perfect option for windy offshore days with nobody out. We've dubbed days like this Offshore Tuesdays, regardless of which day of the week it actually is. Tuesdays seemed to embody the most exciting day for the surf to be perfect, because people are at work, and there's still nearly a whole work week ahead to enjoy offshore conditions.

Oden put together a little clip of the paipo creating and riding we did this weekend.

Not ready to make a full-time switch from logging to paipo-ing, but definitely a good option to keep handy. I still need to try this matting thing I keep seeing and hearing about.

Look for the paipo video tomorrow morning...


Dave Allee by Simon Perini

This is a photo Simon took during our mini-mal reshaping project. We cut an 8'2 down to a 6'2 and bladed it out a bit. It was a fun project to work on together, one that I hope we can make into an annual tradition.

Thirroul Backyard Shaping Session #1

Photo: Simon Perini

Reshape at Casa del Perini

Simon and I stripped the glass of an old mini-mal at his house while I was staying with him, and I reshaped it into a 6'2. It ended up pretty hully because of the thickness flow of the board once we got it all cleaned up. One of the first things I told Simon when I finished the board was "Don't show it to Kyle when he comes to visit, he'll be too critical of the rails"

I know Lightner all too well... he went straight for the rails when he saw the board. But I was relieved to get an email from Kyle saying he was stoked on the board, and the rails, and he gave it the nod.

It was a fun project to do with Simon during my stay there. Now it's up to Simon and his friend Brett to glass the thing.

Stoked you're home Kyle.

Malcolm Campbell European “vacation”

To all those looking for one of Malcolm’s originals he will be back at the Ocean Magic factory in June. Contact Guy Penwarden via the House of Bonzer to place an order. Hopefully we will actually manage to brush the dust of him long enough for a beer this time Smile

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D'Arcy Surfboards keeping it clean...shaping up Benny's board


Thanks to the talents of Benny Morison for putting this and many other awesome D'Arcy shaping video's together....

Australia Trip | Simon Perini

Been staying with Simon Perini in Sydney this week. He and his wife, Jazz, have been the most incredible hosts. They even drove me an hour last night so I could have sushi on my birthday. And it was incredible sushi. If you're in Sydney, check out Sushi Train in Cronulla.

Here's a rad photo Simon snapped of local shredder, Matt Chonjacki.

I stripped the glass off an old mini-log in Simon's backyard today and reshaped it into a hullish looking 6'2 disc.

Been hanging out with CK at FinBox in Thirroul. Headed to Six Ounce Boardstore and the Sugarmill tomorrow. Then a few nights in Bondi before I head home.

Australia is wonderful.

Aquatic Almond for Cam Oden

Griffin Neumann-Almond, putting the finishing touches on a new Cy's Aquatic Almond for CameronOden TheVisualCreator.

Photo: Oden

7'9 Stepdeck

I've been inspired by some of the midlengths that I've seen in the water recently. Cyrus has been making himself some fun looking 2+1 boards. I traded boards in the water with Knost a few weeks ago, and really enjoyed the midlength he shaped for himself, and I haven't been able to shake these boards out of my head.

With that in mind, Griffin and I put our heads together the other day to come up with something new and interesting. We started with the original log rhythm template as our foundation (21 1/2" wide log) We narrowed it to 20 3/4"

I really wanted to keep plenty of volume and rail through the middle of the board (50/50), but then transition to a modern edge in the tail. I don't really like displacement hulls, personally, but I do like boards that glide and trim effortlessly, so the extra volume is intended to make this board glide like a log, but turn and respond like a midlength.

We ended up pulling in the nose, because we agreed we didn't need so much foam up there for what we wanted this board to do. So we actually used the tail template of the Pinwheel model (longboard we did for Japan) for the new nose. In order to further eliminate foam in the nose of the board, we gave it a step. A nice heart-shaped step.



More foam for Mentawais… Glass Tiger collaboration EVO5 bonzer

This board is going to get a bit trippy when you next see it…

Here we have the EPS core shaped last week… yesterday Jason glassed it in 6oz epoxy on the bottom with 4 oz cut rails all in a pastel olive green… and it looks amazing with its angular rails ready and waiting for next weeks 1.5mm wood deck and some 3/8” parabolic oak rails… then it comes back for a 4 oz clear epoxy deck and rail wrap before it gets its FCS bonzers in an EVO5 set-up. So it is half Glass Tiger half epoxy Cleanline for Indo… The shape has a little more rocker than i normally put in to fit the curvy faces we hope to be surfing, and to help control all that speed. Only reservation I have is i don’t want to get hit by those oak rails!

6’7” x 20 1/4” x 2 5/8” finished shape

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FreakFish EVO6 bonzer goes tropo

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The new 6’5” x 21 1/4” x 2 5/8” EVO6 FreakFish for my trip to the Mentawais…

Can’t wait to get this into some fast hollow lefts on my backhand… should really suit Rags and Telescopes nicely.

The Riddler rides again…

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This ones off to Indo with me, so the good news is the original Riddler is up for sale… If interested give me a shout.

This one is exactly the same (which says it all really) except for a slightly thicker rail for the slightly heavier surfer (13 1/2 stone)… ME! It’s still the barrel focussed shortboard it was intended to be, together with a REVO5 bonzer fin set up and a gullwing McCoy rear fin. Pics of it in action at HTs (hopefully) coming from a boat in the Mentawais soon.

#9- 5'7'' Fish

There has been a 5'10'' fish blank sitting in my room for over 3 months just begging me to do something with it. Now with winter break in full swing I have finally had time to shape it. I was fortunate enough to get to shape it in the FOAM EZ shaping box. Its a great set up, there is literally every tool in there you need to correctly shape a surfboard. There is good lighting, the planer is hooked up to a vacuum for minimal foam dust, and even a small radio and c/d player to get your jam on. It got all the bells and whistles in it and its a convenient place to shape if you don't have an ideal set up at home like myself. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to shape a surfboard whether they are first timers or veteran shapers. Thanks Brad @ FOAM EZ for letting me use this great set up!

Because of the portable shaping bay this was the best surfboard I have ever shaped. Granted this is only my 9th one and I am not ashamed to say there is still probably some problems with it. Before using the FOAM EZ shaping box I would shape at home under insufficient lighting and making due with my limited tool resource. But now I can see after using the shaping box how much it helps to have proper lighting to see all of the lumps and imperfection in the blank when you are shaping. So it is for that reason that this surfboard has turned out better that the ones before.

I shaped a 5'7'' keel fin fish. 17" nose, 21 1/2'' wide, 16 3/4'' tail, and 2 5/8'' thick. I carried the thickness throughout the entire blank so it is a full shape and very buoyant. Which is what I intended because this is going to be my small wave board. After doing some research and looking up dimensions and outlines of other fishes my board is pretty standard, except for the tail. I came across a popular Australian shaper Daniel Thomson of Tomo Surfboards. He has studied the aerodynamics of fighter jets like the F-18 and has applied the same theories to surfboard design. This has allowed him to come up with some very interesting shapes and designs that seem to work very well. For fear that I will not explain his ideas correctly go to his website here tomosurfboards.com for more info. One particular aspect of his design that seemed to make sense was in his tail shapes. You can notice in the first picture the tail is not a traditional swallow tail. I turned the swallow design into two straight angles instead of a singl curve because Daniel Thomson's theory is that water flows faster off of straight edges and should therefore get a little more speed out of the board. I know that there is a lot more going on as far as foil and rocker goes in Daniel Thomson's shapes than what I did on this fish but I like his concept. I don't know if this tail shape will make a difference or not but the nice part about shaping your own board is giving this stuff a try because there is no lose if it doesn't work.

Next stage is fin placement and installation then onto glassing. I have decided to try my first resin tint on this board. So stay tuned for more updates on the process of my 5'7'' fish. This resin tint is either gonna make or brake the outcome of this board for me.
***All photos are courtesy of my friend Brian Kucera, check out his website briankucera.com**

-Daniel Thomson inspired tail



Post Op

Just had my cartilage trimmed in a little keyhole op this weekend… so my apologies to all followers that there will be a bit of  lag before posting resumes… which is pretty frustrating as i have 4 boards to shape, one set of Freak Fish fins to foil, a kelp tint and pinlines and a Hendrix ink-job to do… so until i get back in the flow of things here's the last board to be shaped before the op…

It is a 6’5” Cleanline Bonzer 5 for Mark at Glass Tiger

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“The Riddler” – 6’2” McCoy nugget inspired bonzer 5

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6’2 x 20 1/2” x 2 7/8” with “spitfire” Bonzer 5s and a 10” single fin box…

Name was inspired by the board itself being a bit of an enigma… McCoy inspired Nugget with my take on Geof’s  original loaded dome, but with my vortex channels under the front foot and bonzer 5 set up, with the spitfire profile. This is a pretty out-there board and i can’t wait to try it in some sucky stuff soon. It looks like it will fit into the pocket beautifully.

The big question is do i add the rear EVO6 plugs too… tempting but maybe a bit plugtastic? Any views.

Oscar Benedict’s 5’9” EVO6 bonzer

Bonzer Blunt Diamond crossed with a Hornet, and given a new EVO6 configuration using FCS rears for maximum flexibility and inter-changeability… all wrapped up in a very user friendly package with v through the nose, blending into a single concave, into 6 concaves set inside panel V through the fins…
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