Multi Year Fin Experiment on "no Toe"(straight) Fins

Ha ha, "one should be wary of simplistic explanations". I'm a bit weary of complicated explanations, just try a JP if you need to know the effect of "No Toe" fins. Pick one with a shape similar to whatever board you ride, and try it side by side in the surf. Your comparison won't be as exact as the comparisons on all the other boards I've tried with both toe and no toe set ups, but it will give you a better idea than listening to over complicated mathematical explanations written on a forum. It'll be faster, and yes it will turn, and turn very well....like a JP. It'll help turn a dog of a board into something fun. It will make boards more fun in anything but very good, juicy waves. I love them until I'm on waves bigger than head and a half, then I switch back to toe in.
So, if you're a Crumudgeon who would rather spend time trying to figure out why things can't be more fun, don't try this experiment, grumble on, and pitch whatever idea or company you're affiliated with, or wish you were affiliated with. Quote some more stuff about apples when we're talking about oranges.
Oh, if you are going to try these fins, make your own set, or what have you; try a small center fin...the Kelly Slater concept works well here. These fins are basically AM2's pivoted with no toe, so a 4.5" center seems to work well in a performance shape. I have a 4.37" center in my "fish" shaped sup. Large center fins add drag you don't need when you're trying to make a board go fast.
have fun out there, or do math....whatever.

Colas,
We all know you've been stumping for/are in cahoots with Quobba, that's just great, but they do not have the instant speed/grunt of a no toe set up. The science behind Quobba seems to be taken from an old paper written about the hydrodynamic differences between removable fins and glass on fins. In short, glass on fins had the least turbulence at their base because of that smooth, rounded transition from fin to board. The ,abrupt, 90 degree angle between fin and board made by all other situations creates turbulence where the fin meets the board. The problem with trying to recreate that is that Futures and FCS2 rotate into the board and that makes having that extra material /"flange"at the base of the fin an impossibility in any base except old school FCS.
Quobba seemingly just moved that up hoping for the best, but what that does is just move the turbulence further up the fin, that's why many people report that the fins feel directionless. That directionless feeling is all the turbulence/whitewater around the fin and it's inability to bite.
Quobba had a good idea, but they should have released it only as FCS, and just so it simply rounded to the board. I suppose that would be hard to market, "get that old school glass on feel", but it actually would be a better product.
"No Toe" fins aren't a new or original idea. It's part of what made the traditional "Fish" surfboard fast, and it's why JP's are fast, and aren't the best choice for huge waves. No big science here, but I guess I could make a set with flanges on the bottom.........

What hope does the average sup surfer have? And I have to wonder how many shapers understand all these issues.

I am an engineer and I am not sure what to do with this info.

I have ordered the Riptide fins, and I own Quobba, C-drive, the clear fins from Sunova, and plenty of colorful fins. I go out in big and small conditions. I have a bunch of boards, but who knows about the cant and toe on those boards. And to top it off, my Placid has five FCS fin boxes, and the front fin box has two positions - with no tips from Sunova on where to place the fins for different surf conditions.

I would love to see a table of fin sizes, flexibility (stiff vs flexi), positions (fore-aft), configurations (thruster, quad, twin, single, etc.), versus conditions (big or small) and rider weight-to-volume ratio (if that is important).

Even a basic guide would help...

(But it would be nice if these discussions were a little more civil... It seems to me that everyone is trying to find the best solution.)

Give it a go BigHugg, that's how I started with this, little, fun project.(Pictures below) I was a US JP team rider, and the same distributor had Imagine boards. As such I ended up with a shed full of both. I liked the Imagine boards, but they were a bit slow on some of the lesser waves, and some of the, fast down the line, close out's we find on the Outer Banks. The JP's could go fast enough to beat the lip, the Imagine's had me crushed on a number of them.
I wasn't sure about the experiment, so I put a set of Pro Boxes in at the board's original toe in angle, but if you know Pro-Box at all, you realize that there is a plastic insert that holds the fin and allows you to pick different cant angles. I figured I could make my own inner insert at a "no toe" angle. I did this, crudely at first, and it worked. The Imagine took off and was much faster. It became my favorite board for a lot of conditions, and I could switch it back to "toe in" if I needed to.
Eventually I had my friend make me an aluminum, Futures base, mold (pictured), and I sourced some descent epoxy and started making the futures based versions for myself and friends. It's a little bit of work to do, but anyone can make a set of these. Think of it as turning the fins 1/4 outward. After all the boards and measuring, it seems that most manufacturers/shapers put the fin boxes in with 1/4 of toe in. There are a few boards I've come across with 3/8"s, and one or two with 1/2"!!!, but most are 1/4".
You can make a mold out of just about anything. Just measure a 3/4" base futures fin base and cob it up. The jig to hold the fin at the right angle will take a little more math and time, and grinding the existing futures based fins is a bit of a light touch and mess, but it's pretty simple. Coat your mold in petroleum jelly before pouring you epoxy into it. Make sure the freshly ground fin base is clean of debris and petroleum jelly.(I like to brush epoxy onto the fin before putting it in the mold to ensure it doesn't touch the sides and get jellied) Then, tape the fin to your jig, and let it sit for the right amount of time and at the right temp for your particular epoxy.
After you de-mold your fins you'll have to cut the notches in both ends, I use a Dremmel....again, light touch.
I've molded FCS, but with mixed results. The tabs are already pretty small, when you offset them it has to be done perfectly, or they'll break. I have a few long lasting sets, but more have failed. If I want FCS now, I just cut tabs in the RipTide Fins, they are much, much stronger than any of the homemade jobs I've done.
Making the homemade jobs is fun if you're into these kinds of hobby's, but it can be a wash if you put a lot of time and energy into it and then they break. I decided to produce the fins in Asia so that me and my friends would have them, it was getting to be a lot to make them for everyone. I made the smallest batch the manufacturer would allow, and priced them so that the project would pay for itself and allow another run of different fins. The amount I have invested is that of a moderately priced new board, so it's not a huge, or painful project. If I make more it will, likely, be what we want to play with, and unwisely, not what the market wants.(the market wants rear quads). But..who knows, it's not a big concern, just a hobby.
Below are some pics of fin molds, jigs, and board box experiments on the one Imagine. I've put boxes in a number of boards for use as twins, twin box locations are a bit different than thruster box positions.

BigHugg,
Twin fins seem to work best a little inside and behind the common thruster placement. I've observed what good shapers have done and tried to apply what I've seen when putting boxes in boards. Though twin fins ordinarily, have a slightly different box position, you can put them in the thruster boxes and they are still fast and really fun. Some boards work better than others depending on the thruster box positions.
I have a "no toe" MR Twin set that I am getting ready to produce. Hopefully I will have sets of them in stock by June. I've been using them in long board sup's and a couple of "fish" style sups, and it is really fun. They are, of course, faster than thruster, or quad "no toe" set ups. I, often, use them without a trailer in fat waves, or small waves. I really love them in the performance long boards, and I seem to always run them in those boards now.

Bazzaf,
It's just a hobby after all, not really trouble if you enjoy it. However, to address your question of adjustable fins/boxes, it's already been done. Google :4 way Fin System, or maybe 4wfs fins. They sell adjustable fin boxes that you can have installed in your board, neat system too. The last time I looked they had a small variety of fins available for their system, so you are a bit limited as to what you can run, and you would have to put different boxes in your board, of course.
I didn't want to convert a quiver of boards that come and go to new boxes, hence the Riptide solution; you get to remove the toe without cutting into your board, cheap and easy, and the board remains stock.