Here's what I have come up with for my first surf SUP. Shaping might turn out different but it will be a learning experience.
I've gone a little retro but without a swallow tail so I can bring the tail width in enough.

Approx 8'6" x 29.5" x 4.2"

The thinking behind it...

- Wider through the nose with a solid concave for nose riding and some extra speed
- Narrower into the tail with lots of V to keep it really loose under the back foot
- Diamond tail cos I like it
- Gradual rocker into the nose (approx 40mm more than my Oxbow). No sharp kick to maintain paddle speed into waves.
- Reasonably flat through the middle (don't know why, just turned out that way)
- Reasonable tail lift similar to my Oxbow but this will have slightly more lift over shorter length for better top to bottom performance

Am I on the right track here? Any tips would be great!

8 fins like a shark! They are fast as!

Na not sure yet, thinking real small future side fins and a box centre so I can play around with sizes. I will probably start with a 6" centre fin and go from there.

I reckon you're on the right track, 8'6 isn't that short a board, I would think about 10cm of nose rocker and 6-8cm of tail rocker. I measured the nose and tail rocker off my starboard 8'5 as this is a sweet board. I have been making a few boards around the 7'6 - 7'10 mark and been using this amount of rocker, seems to work well. I dont think you need to use a timber laminate, if you're using high density EPS and you laminate it with 2 x 6oz glass this will be plenty strong enough, you could put a 4 oz patch over standing area if you're worried. It's handy if you've got a board that you like to copy rail shape etc. First board might be a bit rough but they get better as you go.

Cam Gillies said...

I reckon you're on the right track, 8'6 isn't that short a board, I would think about 10cm of nose rocker and 6-8cm of tail rocker. I measured the nose and tail rocker off my starboard 8'5 as this is a sweet board. I have been making a few boards around the 7'6 - 7'10 mark and been using this amount of rocker, seems to work well. I dont think you need to use a timber laminate, if you're using high density EPS and you laminate it with 2 x 6oz glass this will be plenty strong enough, you could put a 4 oz patch over standing area if you're worried. It's handy if you've got a board that you like to copy rail shape etc. First board might be a bit rough but they get better as you go.

Thanks Cam, I haven't measured the rocker heights but I would think they are going to be pretty close to what you said. Maybe slightly
more nose rocker. I will be looking at the PSH rail shapes and also Cam's Surf Shapes that seem to be pretty stable. A divinicell patch is
an option for strength but probably not for this board.

Yeah,bnaccas My 8'3 has 120 mil of nose rocker and it could have done with more. I can't see any down side to using extreme nose kick for say the front 200 mil of the board. On fins, I'm not experienced enough, but I've been using a 8" single fin but changed to a big 10" fin ,wow, I think I understand the "drive" feeling that others talk about. Do we need more than 1 fin?LSD posted an excellent "how to" a while ago, and I'm not sure of how you're going to build ,and at the risk of teaching my grandmother how to suck eggs , I think I've got a modification to LSD's method that I recon is better. Use 2 sheets instead of 1. If you want a thickness of 4.5 inches use a 2 plus 3 . Then set the rocker by glueing the sheets together. The advantage as I see it is you can weight the top sheet down in the middle of the board to create a more complex rocker .I did one board as a single sheet and found the rocker tended to be a bit too uniform like a big banana The down sides? Don't get any epoxy out to the edge of the board when you glue the sheets , stay 6 inches inside the outline. Make sure your table is level and you sheets are level on the table(avoid twisting). I don't know if you've built boards before , its pretty easy and great fun and from your posts I think your an experienced surfer so you'll be better able to understand the qualities you want in your board....... let the fibreglass itching begin.

That looks great Brendon. Who's cutting the blank for you?

If you don't mind ,whats your weight

Goatman, bending it in will be cheaper and if done right you should get a perfect rocker line. However I don't trust myself in these early days. It will cost me $100 more for the blank but in the scheme of things this is nothing. I want to save on time and also minimise errors and not having to worry about the rocker will make things a lot easier for me.

How do you get 'a perfect rocker line' without a template? Sorry to bang on about this but the bending thing intrigues me.

Bnaccas said...

goatman said...


How do you get 'a perfect rocker line' without a template? Sorry to bang on about this but the bending thing intrigues me.

Ive been laying a straight edge on blank, pull the ends down and move your stands back or forward depending on where you need more/less rocker, get the ruler out and start measuring at different points, stand back and have a look, then hope for the best, who says the rocker line has to be perfect, doesn't mean you have rocker right if its cut from a template, the board can still feel crap, i agree it makes it easier to adjust but how many boards are you making the one size?

Cam Gillies said...
Ive been laying a straight edge on blank, pull the ends down and move your stands back or forward depending on where you need more/less rocker, get the ruler out and start measuring at different points, stand back and have a look, then hope for the best, who says the rocker line has to be perfect, doesn't mean you have rocker right if its cut from a template, the board can still feel crap, i agree it makes it easier to adjust but how many boards are you making the one size?

I disagree Cam, but each to their own. I made high performance goatboats for 20 years and a 5 or 10 mm difference change in rocker made a very different feeling board. Once we got it right we would keep em within 1mm+/- in the mid to tail area. Admittedly on a SUP you can move your weight around a lot more to compensate.

To me it would be worth shelving out a few more bucks (for a thicker piece of foam) to save time and to get exactly the shape I had in mind. Anyway, as I said each to their own.

By the way, that shape looks very very nice Bnaccas. Round nose looks good to boot!

Bnaccas said...



Am I on the right track here? Any tips would be great!

Nice looking shape only suggestion I would make is that being a 'surf' shape you might want to thin out the foil under the back foot. Will make it easier to sink a rail when bottom turning.

Forgot to mention that the shape if 107mm thick at the mid point - about 4 1/4". I'm guessing but I would think that shaping the blank would take off about 10 litres of volume.

hilly said...
Nice looking shape only suggestion I would make is that being a 'surf' shape you might want to thin out the foil under the back foot. Will make it easier to sink a rail when bottom turning.

Yeah I was thinking about that. I like the rocker so I will probably thin it out from the top down. By the looks of Jonathan's drawings I could loose some litres. I might try get another 1/4 inch into the width and loose an inch or 2 in length with a thinner profile.

I'll post the updates tonight or tomorrow.

Jonathan, thanks for putting it into your program. I'm guessing it will loose around 14 litres after doing rails top & bottom, concaves etc from what we worked out the other day.

I wanna make my own board too - looks like great fun, making tools, playing with 3d programs, getting the blanks, dreaming up shapes.

shape the bottom curve first and finsh the bottom first as its the most important part and the rocker is so important to how a board goes if the rocker is out the board will go crap no matter how good you do all the rest! I would personaly never bend the rocker into the board that is just crazy talk maybe if you had a templete you are lying on the board as you do it to check that the rocker is true. i am talking from experience as ive shaped over way to many boards to count around 40 a week for a long time, also take your time when shaping as remember you can always take foam off but you cant add it and when finshing be aware that the glass will thicken up the board so if the board looks and feels perfect be aware once glassed the rail will thicken up only slightly but sometimes enough to have a negative effect

119 litres is going to be tight at 84 kg's i reckon, but the wider nose will help you stability wise
cheers