C4 / Boardworks Call it quits.....any info

[southwesterly]

Strange name. Only 4 of the 11 boards are under 9 foot.

[jd]

They refer to the boards as SUBs so Maybe double meaning?

Literature says its a subsidiary of C4. 

[PonoBill]

I just got a long email talking about what they are up to. apparently they wanted to build their own stuff. Not too surprising. Interesting to see that the C4 has expanded to 5, adding Archie Kalepa. I don't remember Bruce Raymond being part of the original four, but I could be wrong.

I don't quite get the "X-wing" paddle. Looks cool, but it seems to be fixing a problem that as far as I know doesn't exist. Shaft drag from "pulling the paddle through the water" doesn't really happen, and if it does, is it a problem? We're not flinging water behind us, we're planting our paddle and pulling ourselves to it. So shaft drag should be a good thing. Oh well. the new lineup of boards looks very cool. Look like they are getting very serious about inflatables.

[Six Feet and Glassy]

Allz I can think of re shaft drag is that the last few inches of shaft, just above the blade, goes forward through the water during the pull.  The "catch", or stationary point, is somewhere around the middle of the blade.  The part of the blade below the catch goes backwards during the pull, and the shaft/blade above the catch goes forward.  This is all assuming the ideal of a "planted" and non-slipping blade.  Still doesn't seem like much to drag (just a few inches of shaft underwater). 

That's the only thing I can figure as drag on the shaft.  Need more beer to lubricate the brain.   

It is a very good point that these are some uber-experienced watermen.  So maybe we're missing something.

[Strand Leper]

No kidding about the inflatables. More inflatables than Dudley Moore in "foul play"

[CMC]

Allz I can think of re shaft drag is that the last few inches of shaft, just above the blade, goes forward through the water during the pull.  The "catch", or stationary point, is somewhere around the middle of the blade.  The part of the blade below the catch goes backwards during the pull, and the shaft/blade above the catch goes forward.  This is all assuming the ideal of a "planted" and non-slipping blade.  Still doesn't seem like much to drag (just a few inches of shaft underwater). 

That's the only thing I can figure as drag on the shaft.  Need more beer to lubricate the brain.   

It is a very good point that these are some uber-experienced watermen.  So maybe we're missing something.

That's exactly what I worked out.  Like Pono said you'd think the drag would actually help the blade to be planted in the water via drag.

I am looking forward to seeing one to see what they are on about.

[PonoBill]

Blades slip, but not much. I've been studying the heck out of paddles with my homebrew instrumentation and underwater cameras. Biggest problems I've found are wobble, flutter of the blade tip, general blade vibration, catching air on the paddle face, and tracking. The blades that feel the worst do all those things badly, all blades do a little. I'm working on a long, very geeky article about it all for Ke Nalu. So far the measurements and video tell me that getting air off the paddle face is a big deal, wobble can be almost eliminated without losing too much catch, and vibration and flutter can be either almost eliminated or damped out. Turns out that wood paddles vibrate quite a bit on the blade (I glue two little piezoelectric vibration sensors to the back of the blade, and then also detect vibration in the shaft), but you never see it in the shaft. Must be damped out. But the price you pay for that damping is lots of weight and less strength. Better to eliminate or mitigate the source of the vibration I think.

There will soon be a few Ke Nalu paddles coming from all this messing around. It will be very interesting to see if people (other than the few who have tried my prototype) like the end result.

[SoCalSupper]

No kidding about the inflatables. More inflatables than Dudley Moore in "foul play"

nice old school reference Tim!-that scene flashed in my brain when i read your post!-classic.
i think Sub9 means fat guys like me will be standing 9" below water line on these!
I have a soft spot for C4-my first two boards after my gigantic 12-6 Becker were  the 10-6 and then the 10 BK Pro-great boards back in the day!

[bts]

Bs alert, wild ass guesses follow.

I would think board works production process would require considerable up front cost per model, and  the unit cost would go down significantly through time. The builder would be motivated to keep a model in production for as long as possible.

The designer, on the other hand, wants everyone on their latest and greatest shapes as quick as possible.

Some conflict seems inevitable.

[southwesterly]

I love the idea of inventing a solution to a problem we didn't even know existed.
How else would we know we needed to buy coffee filter tongs?
Thanks to the new X-wing, we can now say goodbye to paddle shaft drag.

[linter]

bruce raymond is onboard?  for various reasons, i'm not a huge fan of bk or tb but raymond (who was not part of the original group) is a terrific guy who can tell terrific stories about his crazy early days w/ quiksilver, as well as the time he was paid a couple hundred bucks to be the wipe-out stunt double at Sunset and Waimea for the surf flick Big Wednesday.  what a hilarious monster of a guy, and one heck of a SUPer!

[Strand Leper]

For you So Cal:  (in my best Dudley More):

"Oh, so you're into that too???"

Tim

[diesel]

Watching C4 as a company, while living on Oahu, has been interesting from a business standpoint.  They have to get props for being an innovator and pushing the sport forward in many areas.  They have sponsored SUP contests in hawaii.  We have to give them credit for the subvector shape which made a more performance type SUP be stable.

They made some mistakes, in my humble opinion by trying to keep thier prices so high when prices were already dropping to a reasonable level.  They kept trying to sell boards for close to $2k when, realistically, we shouldn't pay more than around $1k for a SUP.  They also, did not keep innovating as the boards got better and better.  They just stuck with the subvectors and BK batwing models.  They can still get back in the game and be a leader again but they have to make better shapes that can surf very high performance.  There is definitely so much more innovation in high performance SUP surfing. 

They should also sponsor some of these really good young guys that are ripping on the SUP world tour because they are the future of the sport.  Guys like Kai Lenny, Keahi Daboitz and Leco Salazar.  That is real surfing that gets you stoked when you watch it.  These three guys are the best I have seen.  They are ripping and they do it with style.

There is so much future for the sport and I am excited to see where the sport goes as more really good surfers start to surf high performance SUPs.

[Pray4surf808]

I have heard that PSH will be ending their deal with Boardworks in the next year or so as well.