Fins Foiled

Have gone with Rich Pavel Speed Dialer fins for my board and have just finished foiling them from bamboo. I was fortunate enough to meet and have a quick chat with Rich at The Alley Fish Fry a few weeks back, stoked to meet the guy behind the design. The fins in the photo below are not yet attached. They will be attached during the glassing stage in a couple of weeks. Pretty soon Scott and I will actually be surfing these things!!




Also here is a look at the logo that I will put onto the board under the glass job.

fins are ready

I finished the third and fourth fin in bamboo and happy with the two tone effect. The two larger fins are red cedar. Hopefully they will all be strong enough to lay a carve into the face of the wave without snapping. I hope to get them glassed with 6 or 8 Ounce glass for extra strength. This will add thickness to them, but i dont want to sacrifice the strength. Almost ready to be sent off for glassing. Running my eyes over every edge of the board now to finish any imperfections.

rail shaping

updated shots of the rails starting to take shape

almost done!

Started sanding the rails this morning and it the fish is starting to reveal itself. Took the protective plastic off so i could admire it in all it its glory. Still got some finer sanding to complete the rails and then finish off the fins.

the tail taking shape

Made a start on the tail and its slowly starting to appear. The Journey in-wood is near its end. But got a lot of dust still to come...stay tuned

Rails are on!

So i finally got around to glueing the rails on. Have fallen a bit behind Duncan so needed to make a solid start on it over the weekend. So glued 4 strips to the tail and went with 3 strips for the rails. This will gve me aorund 21mm rails to work with. The router came in handy to trim off the excess pieces of cork (thanks Ben). Wont be ready for the Fish Fry on Sunday at Currumbin, but will head down to check out the various shapes to get some ideas for my next board.

portable shaping cradle

We came up with the idea of a portabe shaping cradle which could be clamped to any work bench. Duncs and i knocked it up with a bit of scrap and carpet underlay for padding. It will help in the shaping stage which i havent reached. Have the tail pieces glued on so far. Using 100% cork for the tail and rails