Following up on the Steampunk Hotcurl build, here are the finished pictures. There won't be anymore as the board was sold on commission, unless some clever person manages to get some of the board in action, that is. Overall the hotcurl took about six months to complete, although there was a month or two of planning and design which really should be added to that, but that sort of thing is hard to blog as pictures tend to be theoretical and possibly uninteresting at that stage.
The design stage for these unique boards is of high intensity as it requires deep thought. Even though I have built this type before, some new innovations were added in as I refined the design from its predecessor: the nose was pulled in; the front single fin became a gull wing and the curve going into the tail was smoothed so that it virtually starts just behind the nose,
The vent was sourced in Australia, being smaller than the hand operated vents I usually use, and the leashplug was custom built by an engineer who specialises in hotrods (cars).
There is a bit of a buzz about hotcurl designs following Roger Hall's experimental approach, and some guys at Surfer have started raving about the way the tail moves under the water rather than on the surface. Yeah but I have been talking about
displacement tails since 2008 , when I named the feature in an effort to explain the unique performance these boards offer. I realised that the feature needed a better name while
the 13 footer went on tour.. Before then, I was aware that 'sinker tail' was not a very sexy name and I just referred to them as extreme pintails, which I started building in 1998.
Very interesting blog and I wonder if you ever thought to share or store your pictures and ideas on some kind of electronic data room ?
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