Sub 7ft SunFish SUP

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supthecreek said..
I love the idea of "surface area" as a spec.... I agree, volume is simply a "float" number....
when you combine length, volume AND surface area, you can get a REAL gauge of stability...

Nicely said!!!!!

You will find that a lot of Mature shapers use surface area as part of there design creed. Most probably keep this as trade secret. It really is one of the essential fine tuning elements.
I have been using surface area from the annlog days of pencil and paper and a non digital calculator. I used to draw everything up full size and take measurements and the calculate/guestimate volume. Surface area is one of the components used to calculate volume. As long as you used the same formulae every time your calcs were relative to your designs, but not necessarily to others.

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boardbumps said..
So come on Kami, do some maths for us, and lets see what your outline % are

You can see on the master scale on the right side width dimensions of my 6'4" 29,25" the blue board shown on my avatar
, i'm too lazy to schedule percentage numbers



.

Looks great, BB. What thicknesses are you working with? There's a lot of foam there for a 6'8", as my minion in 7'8"x28 1/4" and 4 1/4" and 110L.
cheers

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Tang said..
Looks great, BB. What thicknesses are you working with? There's a lot of foam there for a 6'8", as my minion in 7'8"x28 1/4" and 4 1/4" and 110L.
cheers

Only 115mm thick, 4.5". I really try hard not to go over that thickness.

How wide is the nose tip and tail pod on the minion?

ugly as but cant wait to try it

Looks awesome as usual.

This is my first post so be gentle. My names Matt, i'm 45, 88 kgs, 176cm. Have been SUPing for about 3 1/2 years. I have now ridden the SunFish 3 times - all in very average conditions totaling about 5 hours. First is that it is extremely stable to paddle which also makes it very easy to pop over white water without getting thrown off. The waves I have surfed have all been 2 ft or smaller and always with howling southerlies. Choppy waves are not a problem.It paddles well onto waves and accelerates quickly as the wave picks you up. Does late take offs well, easiest board I have ridden in regard to predictability when taking off late with white water. Easiest way to describe how it surfs is to say it is a fish and should be ridden like a fish. Loves long fast walls, top to bottom surfing where it fly's. Top turns are a treat being able to go vertical or snap it round. Bottom turns are more technical in that you just can't drop straight down and crank it like a small tailed performance board. Power needs to be fed in from your front foot to get the best bottom turns, then it powers off the bottom as shown by Rod in the video after he moved the fins forward. The board can be easily over powered by the rider which results in the board going too vertical and stalling, stalling at the bottom of a wave or a 270 instead of a cutback. It has put a smile on my face every time even though the surf I was in, to be blunt, was crap. I still can't believe I have been so easily riding a board only 6'10" in such rough conditions and having so much fun.

still looked like manly playing parra,the roosters and dragons marvel superheros strips were good

My first post on this great site,So go gently on me please

Ive followed this with massive interest.Youve done a great job boardbumps.

Im not long into SUPing but as i gradually progress ill be aiming at this kind of board( the first one you made).It handles well on the water,doesnt sink and rides well and so easy to transport.

Im based in Chile,theres no shortage of swell here.

Ill be talking to my shaper soon to see if he can shape something similar.

And hallo to all the SUPers on the site

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JonesySUP said..
Sick looking board and great Vid mate...... did you get any inspiration from Tully's Tunnel rat?

To be honest I have never seen a tunnel rat.
I've been watching and accasionally commenting on Colas and his Gong boards ever since he started posting to SeaBreeze.
I'm not really a regular on here.

The SunFish project took most of this year to get going because I had to save up large chunks of leftover EPS and glue them up to make a blank for this 6'10 Proto.
I was toying with one of my earlier planshapes, the 6'6 that Annie rides and fish shapes, and just getting comfortable with the planshape elements.

The fish shape one because it allows a straighter plan curve thru the tail section.

The planshape was originally a 4'11" fish that I made for Derek Hynd, before he started on his free friction boards, which I now make in Aus for him.

Anyway I scaled up the fish to 6'10"and added a bit of nose area in front of wide point to increase the stability and surface area to 1.383m2. I usually like between 1.4 and 1.5m2.
The rocker is from surfboards that I was making from 10 years ago before SUP, very flat rocker that is now commonly used but wasn't back then.

It is remarkable how stable this board is.
We were out yesterday arvo at a small beach break with a light onshore SE wind, lumpy conditions and having no problems at all balancing. We were swapping boards between the new Mutant and the sunfish, the sunfish one for stability, the Mutant for wave catching, about even for riding so far.

The boards then were the same as Annies 6'6"x 25"x 75 ltr board she is now using as an SUP. You can see a picture of this board in my post " 8'4 to 6'6 classic SUP pintails for surfing". I was actually riding this board as a prone board before Annie took it from me and rode it SUP style. That got me really envious and along with Colas and his Sub7ft Gongs.

I was still mucking around thinking yes this one then no. It was really hard to break away from tradition, untill I saw that short vid that Colas put up with him riding his new SimSup.

The next day I put together my blank. Worked overtime to get it on the water for the new swell that was arriving and here we are now.

The number one comment I get is, Wow how good are these boards going to be for travelling, thats after the usual ragging about kneeboards Kiteboards.
If your passing thru come and have a paddle. 0448 116 774

That's pretty amazing Rod , props to you for pushing the boundaries mate and you are so right about the traveling with a Sup. This one is a game changer , so sick of lugging big boards through airports. Look forward to the video

Just a general thanks
for all the compliments

I finally got someone to take more video yesterday arvo. It was a nice surf so hopefully there will be some good waves of the 6'8 MUTANT in action.
Have not had time to check it out yet.
So here is a pic of a side by side comparison of the SunFish and MUTANT

another win for aussie custom shapers I reckon,the flex tails make them even more interesting

rod is working on a mutant for annie at 5'10"x25"ishx3"ish around 60 ltrs.should be interesting