Messages

1

General Discussion / Re: Favorite 'water oriented' web cam.... post it.

« on: July 30, 2021, 03:41:49 AM »

@ TallDude

A little offtopic, but I couldn't resist when I saw the picture you posted.

The Econoline looks nice, but what REALLY caught my eye was the Lockheed P-38 Lightning aircraft parked in the hangar behind the van.

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: July 24, 2021, 12:01:02 PM »

@ surfcowboy

I did make one mistake in my last post and it concerns this quote below:

"Then place the fin in the fin box and slide the back of the fin at the 6" line to where it met the edge of the rail."

What I should have said was not to place the fin in the fin box, but lay it flat on the board where the fin fits into the fin box and then slide the fin, while it is still laying flat on the board, until the 6" horizontal line at the back of the 9" fin meets the edge of the board's rail. I did the same thing with the 9 1/2" fin.

BTW, the reason why I chose the Flying Diamonds fin designs is because CJ Nelson who designed his Parallax surfboard and had it shaped by Ryan Engle, wanted a fin that went well with the Parallax. If I'm not mistaken, CJ designed his own fins for his boards. I'm not sure, but I think CJ Nelson is either a part owner or sole owner of the Flying Diamonds fin company.

I know some people like a looser board feeling and some of them use the Parallax fin which is a lot looser fin and CJ's fastest fin than the Involvement fin in their Parallax boards whereas I wanted more drive in my Parallax board and this is why I chose the Involvement fin.

The CJ Nelson designs of his fins are at the link below.

https://flyingdiamondsca.com/fin-collections/cj-nelson-fins/

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: July 24, 2021, 07:27:08 AM »

Sometimes the smallest detail makes the biggest difference. Continuing on.

I was told when I visited Surfside, before I got all my cork pieces to make my Parallax waxless, to visit a local surfer/shaper who owns a surf shop in Surfside, Texas and where he also has a CNC machine to make his customized boards.

When I visited him and let him look at the pictures of my 9.0 (9") Involvement fin installed in my Parallax, he told me concerning single fin surfboards, I was correct in thinking I should have one-third of the fin hanging over the edge of the rail.

But he told me when I installed the fin, I "eye balled" it and this is how I got my 1 1/2" distance from the front of the fin to the front of the long fin box. He told me, from looking at the pictures of my installed fin, my Parallax did not have one third of the fin overhanging the rail. I had "much less" than one third. This would make my Parallax very loose since there wasn't one third of the fin over the rail.

He told the first time I would try to turn my board left or right, the fin where I had it placed would would turn the board so tightly and combined with the very fast speed the Parallax generates by design, I would be thrown off the board because of the speed in the tight turn. He gave me detailed instructions.

He told me to get a ruler and measure where the fin would come out the fin box into thirds. In this case by laying the fin flat and where it would come out of the fin box and go straight up 6" and put a dot at the front of the fin, do the same thing with the back of the fin and also in the middle of the fin. Then draw a horizontal line (in pencil) through all three dots.

Then place the fin in the fin box and slide the back of the fin at the 6" line to where it met the edge of the rail. Then tighten the fin down since this would really give me 3" of the fin overhanging the rail instead of "eye balling it". I followed his instructions and found the 9.0 (9") fin had 3" of fin overhanging the rail.

Then I measured with a ruler, the front of the fin where it was tightened down to the front of the fin box and the distance was 3 3/16". A very big change from 1 1/2" from where I had "eye balled" it.

I did the same thing with my 9.5 (9 1/2") Involvement fin. But dividing a 9 1/2" fin into thirds, I had to improvise. The ruler I have is divided (english measurements, not metric) in one inch (1") segments by sixteenths of an inch, eighths of an inch, quarter of an inch and one half inch.

So 9 1/2" inches divided into thirds is 3 3/16" + 3 3/16" + 3 3/16" equals 9 9/16", but 9 8/16" is 9 1/2" so I would be off by 1/16". So I measured the fin, like I did with my first 9" fin and placed the dots at the front, back and middle of fin set at 6 5/16". So when the back of the fin met the horizontal line where it met the rail, this left me 3 3/16" of the fin overhanging the rail. In essence, one third of the fin overhanging the rail.

I then measured this distance; with a ruler and found where the 9.5 fin was tightened down in the fin box, to the front of the fin box, the distance was 2 1/2". This is a very good and detailed way to get a good starting point to place a fin in a single fin prone longboard if one wants to have one third of the fin overhanging the rail.

He also told me whatever Involvement fin (9.0 or 9.5) I had installed in my board, depending on the wave conditions I actually had at that time instead of what was "forecasted" to always take the second fin with me as a backup along a ruler and flat head screw driver and I would not run into any problems fin wise.





 

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: July 24, 2021, 05:45:31 AM »

@ Dontsink

I'm not a nose rider and the Parallax is not specifically designed to be a nose rider. You can nose ride the Parallax, but the waves have plenty of juice in them to nose ride it. I'm more of a glider where I get out just in front of the wave, surf the board towards the beach and ride it until the wave loses it momentum and falls apart.

The Parallax is a niche board which is inbetween a high performance longboard and a nose rider board so it can be trimmed (turned) from standing in the middle of the board. This fits with my style of surfing a prone surfboard.

One thing about the Parallax, if the waves starts to lose it's form and to the right or left of you if a wave starts to form (when I ride disorganized waves with my sup), the Parallax is a very fast board and it is designed with plenty of speed to catch any wave/section that forms to the right or left of you if the wave you're presently riding peters out.

As for VersaTraction, it is slippery and that is what many surfers who have tried it have said. This is why I didn't go with VersaTraction. I looked at the clear RSPro hexagonal pieces which are not made out of cork, but there are drawbacks to that as well. The main drawback, it can rub the bottom of your feet raw if you slide you feet on it while surfing a wave.

The other drawback was when paddling prone to head on out to where the waves are breaking, if you are surfing bare chested, it will rub your nipples raw. This is why I went with the cork material since it doesn't do that with the bottom of your feet and if you're surfing bare chested. But I always surf with a long sleeve t-shirt which cancels out the raw nipples problem.

I always surf with a long sleeve t-shirt for another reason and that is so I don't have to wear lots of sunscreen to avoid skin cancer. The hat I wear has a long bill so it shields my face and nose from the sun. The hat also has flaps on the sides and back of it to protect the sides of my neck and the back of my neck from the sun also.

Now I am also going to make another post because I measured the 9" Involvement fin placement wrong which was pointed out to me by the guy who owns a surf shop, who also designs and shapes his surfboards and who also has a CNC machine in his shop, in Surfside, Texas. I also bought another Flying Diamonds fin, a 9.5 (9.5") Involvement fin (on his advice) which I now have and it is installed on my Parallax.

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: July 23, 2021, 11:42:21 AM »

Now that I have all the extra pieces I needed to finish my cork grip waxless job for my 9'3" Parallax surfboard, it is time for pictures.

Then I'll just take my Parallax down to Surfside, Texas for a little in depth surfing and see how the grip is on my bare feet and hope it works.

And if it does work without rubbing the undersides of my bare feet raw, a surfing report will be in order for the Parallax to see how well the board (and me) surfs together.

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: July 10, 2021, 08:17:00 AM »

I have my Flying Diamonds "Involvement" 9.5 installed on my 9'3" Parallax longboard. Now for the wax situation.

I ordered from North Shore (in Hood River, Oregon) two sets of their cork Front Deck Grip 2 so that gives me 8 separate pieces. But instead of the cork Hexa Tail, I went with the cork Front Deck Grip Hexa which gives me 12 full hexagons and 3 half hexagons.

The reason I went with the Front Deck Grip Hexa is because my leash hole on the Parallax is 8" from the tail end of the board. Since the boar is 111" in length, the half way point of the board, which is where the sweet spot is on this board, is at 55 1/2". This length is where the back of both of my hands would rest (where my hand connects to my wrist) on the board for me to do my popups to put me into a surfing stance.

If I would have went with the Hexa Tail, the kickpad would have put me 8" too far forward on the board when I'm laying prone paddling the longboard causing the nose of the board to sink and would also give me trouble when doing a popup.

To make my point; below is a short video, best watched in HD and in full screen, where (about half way through the video) there is a guy on a longboard with a tail kickpad and the tail kickpad is not the way to go. I think he must have come from surfing shortboards since he is pumping the board while trying to shred a wave.

The video is below and it is at my favorite Surfside, TX place. BTW, the best time to surf Surfside is when the wind is coming from the south or southwest and the waves are coming from the southeast. The actual surfing is shot from a drone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOAqTxzAM2Y

When I'm going to Surfside, I always check the conditions at the site below.

https://www.windfinder.com/weatherforecast/surfside_beach_freeport

Below is a picture of the items North Shore sent me which I got Friday afternoon. I've just got to install them on the board.

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Random / Re: New ads or malware for me?

« on: July 08, 2021, 07:52:40 PM »

I use an adblocker with my browser because some sites are so over ridden with ads, the page (or pages) come to an almost stand still making the browser almost unworkable.

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Random / Re: New ads or malware for me?

« on: July 08, 2021, 07:27:22 PM »

When I click on a topic I don't see any ads covering or over laying the topic.

I'm using 64 bit linux Pale Moon 29.2.1 as my browser of choice running in 64 bit Linux Mint 20.2 (Uma) in the Xfce desktop environment. I just installed Mint 20.2 on this hard drive this evening since 20.2 was publicly released today.

I've also got linux uBlock Origin 1.16.4.29 installed which is my adblocker of choice for my linux Pale Moon browser.

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SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: June 29, 2021, 09:12:40 AM »

I thought I would give a little update.

I have outfitted my 9'3" Parallax with a Flying Diamonds 9.0 fin. But I decided to purchase another FD fin in a 9.5 size in Volan Green color. Hawaiian South Shore did not have the 9.5 size in stock. Bummer!

Then I visited FireWire and they did have two FD's Involvement 9.5 fins in stock in Volan Green color so I bought one. As I type this post, the 9.5 fin is in transit via USPS and the tracking number I have says the fin will be delivered to me this upcoming Thursday, July 1st.

If there is one thing that bugs me about prone surfing, it is the use of wax. Wax gives a good grip with bare feet because it is kind of sticky and does not chafe skin.

But in the hot Texas climate I live in where the summer months temperatures of July and August are between 95-106 degrees F, wax melts and since it is sticky, it gets all over anything (board bags, board socks, etc) the wax comes into contact with. It really makes a mess to remove.

So I want to go "waxless'. There are waxless materials available for prone surfboards which give good enough grip, but these materials chafe bare skin with constant rubbing against.

The companies that have these materials are Versa Traction, XM Surf More Clear Grip, GryptaLite and RS Pro. But all of these materials; contrary to website claims which says they do not chafe skin, from the actual users of these materials, these materials do chafe skin.

But RS Pro also makes another material which supposedly does not chafe skin and which is made from "cork". And from reading the reviews of this cork material, it looks like it does not chafe bare skin. This material is 1 (one) millimeter in thickness too.

RS Pro is headquartered in Barcelona, Spain. Another bummer! So I went looking on the internet to see if there was a RS Pro USA distributor/company and they do. The company is North Shore Inc and it is located in Hood River, Oregon. (PonoBill territory). I've been looking at two pieces of this cork material (Front Deck Grip 2 & Hexa Tail) and they are at the links below.

https://www.northshoreinc.com/store/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=558&idcategory=226

https://www.northshoreinc.com/store/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=537&idcategory=226

BTW, on these two links, look at the Details and Specs for each of these items.

I will call North Shore and see if I can get a "live person" at the company to speak with and ask them (and I hope I get an honest answer) if the cork material will or will not chafe bare skin from rubbing against it.

10

SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: June 21, 2021, 10:50:57 AM »

Now for the last picture. It will be showing the placement for the Involvement 9.0 fin. Fin placement is crucial for a single fin longboard. Placing the fin too far back  of the fin box and the board will track straight, but it will be harder to turn the board. In other words, too "tracky".

Placing the fin all the way to to the top/front of the fin box will make the board too loose. In other words, on a turn, depending on how tight the turn is, the back end of the board will "skid out".

The proper placement for the fin is to have one third of the fin above the the rail when the fin is placed, not attached to the board, laying down on the opening of the fin box. On this photo, this is 1 1/2" (1.5") inches from the front of the fin box (going towards the nose). BTW, the hole at the back of the fin box is the "leash hole" to attach a leash from the board to the back leg of the rider. Just hope this picture shows as well.

11

SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: June 21, 2021, 10:41:24 AM »

Another update.

My wife returned home from her trip with her iPad. Now for some pictures. Since this site does not allow Previews for pictures, I'm going to put two pictures in this post, make another post and add the third picture.

The first photo is of my 9'3" Parallax surfing longboard with the Flying Diamonds "Involvement 9.0" fin.The second photo is a more close up view of the Involvement fin. Just hope this works.

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General Discussion / Re: Thoughts on this Gerry Lopez Surftech?

« on: June 20, 2021, 05:35:36 AM »

My "One World" is similar in specs at 11'1" x 30" x 4.5" @ 173 liters to the Big Darling. I run my One World with a 4 fin quad set up instead of a 2 + 1 or a 3 fin thruster. The 4 fin quad setup makes my board loose and also makes it faster than with a 2 + 1 or a 3 fin thruster.

I would imagine the Big Darling might act the same with a quad fin setup.

13

SUP General / Re: Surfboards (Longboards)

« on: June 18, 2021, 12:19:46 PM »

A little update.

Got an email from REAL on June 11th telling me my Parallax arrived at REAL Watersports last Friday, June 11th in pristine condition. The only glich, REAL ships on Thursdays which for that week was Thursday, June 10th. I missed the shipping date of that week by one day. Also in the email, REAL told me they would ship my board to me on Thursday, June 17th.

But "Lady Luck" decided to intervene on my behalf.

I received another email from REAL on Tuesday, June15th informing me of my tracking number for the board. Since the board was going to be shipped on Thursday, June 17th, I didn't click on the tracking number since the board wasn't going to be shipped until Thursday.

My wife left me to go see her immediate family (sister, nieces, grand niece) near Austin, Tx early Thursday morning, June 17th and when she left, I decided to get on my computer and click on the tracking number. When I was about to click on the tracking number, a FED EX truck pulled into my driveway.

I figured it was a package for my wife. When I went outside to greet the driver, he was pulling out a l-o-n-g rectangular shipping carton. The carton was for...........ME! It was my Parallax.

I looked over the shipping carton and it was in pristine condition. Odd thing about the shipping carton, it had a label on it which said, "IAH" which stands for "Intercontinental Airport Houston" so my board came by air cargo on one of those FED EX cargo jets. The label said it was scheduled for delivery on June 18th. On the same label was also printed "Express Saver".

Inside the shipping carton was my Parallax also in pristine condition. I was ecstatic. So I figured my board was shipped on Tuesday, June 15th and this is why I got it so fast.

I called REAL via phone and thanked Ramsey, Randall and Zack who I dealt with at REAL to thank all of them. I think getting a personal phone call to thank each one of them is better than emailing each of them to show my appreciation. Just the way I am.

Now for the "fly in the ointment". I don't own a smartphone. Just an old fashioned eleven year old clam shell flip style cell phone. I also don't own a tablet. My wife on the other hand, owns both. Alas, I can't take any pictures until she arrives home because she took her smartphone and iPad with her. She will return on Monday, June 21st near dark.

Now my next door neighbor, who I help out down at his computer repair shop, owns a smartphone and a tablet. I thought about bugging him to take a few pictures for me with his smartphone and/or tablet and send the pictures to me via email, but I thought better of it.

So I hope to take some pictures of my Parallax next Tuesday, June 22nd and eventually post them to this topic thread.

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Random / Re: Cover songs.

« on: June 15, 2021, 11:04:06 AM »

I know this topic thread is for Cover Songs, but I'm going to throw a curve ball into this topic thread. This video below will be for a "cover dance".

And this kid's moonwalk is the best I've ever seen for anyone to impersonate Michael Jackson's signature dance move.

Brett Nichols (cover dance of Michael Jackson) - "Billie Jean"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9VBgCC2D0A

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Random / Re: Cover songs.

« on: June 12, 2021, 07:43:06 AM »

My cover song for today is by a local group known as Reina del Cid doing an Alison Krause song.

This live cover song is country western, but without the twang. Great song for me when I'm driving down to the upper Texas coast in the dark of morning for a little surfing. Good lyrics in this song too.

Reina del Cid (Alison Krauss cover) - "The Lucky One".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gkrkjt86ow