I won the opportunity to order a Custom Sunova in a lucky door prize at Balmoral Paddlesurf. I received the board on Saturday and rode it for the first time on Monday. I was really lucky to get a couple of shots taken by @mrsspoy. Pretty stoked.
Nah Casso, just Dee Why beach. I did check the point that morning though. Have you been out there at all lately?
where's the speeed nose and outline ? Or does it only have the tail part ?
still can be a fantastic shape I think.
7"10x 25 1/8x 83.5 litres. I think the customised nose adds 7 inches extra length, so it is a standard 7"3 plus the modified nose. I find the square noses on slate style boards can catch in steep drops, so that's why I had it changed.
It's difficult to see, but in the first shot, the concave is quite unusual to what I am used to. In fact I have never noticed concave quite like it before. The curve is quite steep close to the rails and quite (very!) flat in the middle of the board. I'm not sure if this is a Burt classic curve or shape specific.
Can anyone illuminate me on the functionality/history of concaves like this?
There is no concave on my square nosed Speeeds.... but I like it on the pointy one!
My original 8'11 Hobie RAW had a very pronounce concave under the nose....
I felt like it gave lift and stabilized the nose as I weighed forward, while paddling into a wave.
It was one of my favorite features... it was fun to noseride as well.
I straightened and added a reference line to your picture.... from that distance and angle it is hard to see, but the line helps define it.
Thanks for ordering that.... looks like a good customization!
Those four concaves in the tail are wicked looking. I assume that is just to help the water flow faster, right? Anything else they do?
I have had fun getting the feeling for how those sharp channels affect the turns on my Speeed. The outer edge is so sharp and vertical, that the channels act like another set of side fins providing forward thrust through the turns. The length and depth of the channels remind me a lot of a Bonzer set up that I had back in the 70s. Those fins were only about an 1 ½" deep and 8" inches long, and they were placed at about the same position along the rail line. They are not the best for sliding the tail around. They want to trap the water flow and force it to accelerate off the tail rather than slipping sideways off the bottom. This forces the board to accelerate forward through the turn with great projection. Maybe a better alternative than bigger thrusters or an additional set of fins which would also create more drag. If you look for them, there were some great videos on this site of Bert Burger talking about the bottom shape of the Speeed model, and the role of these sharp edged channels.
For any skiers out there, the rails back by the channels are like having a super sharp edge on your skis with no base bevel; loves to carve and generate speed, but not as easy to slide around on. Bert balanced this by putting what I think of as a huge amount of bevel on the rails in the front third of the board, making the front very forgiving especially when dropping in with the lip, where the bevel keeps the rail from hanging up when it hits the base of the wave.
I have found that the channels really give control when floating down whitewater after a roundhouse or floater.... very manageable.