I want to make a fish with hardly any rocker. But the u.s. blanks all have to much rocker built in with not enough foam to shave the rocker out. My fishcuit is my favorite board and it hardly has any rocker. I don't know the other exact details i want to change but i know i want to keep the rocker similiar or even less for that gliding/planing over weak sections. My question is should i get a 7'9 or bigger blank and cut it down to 5'8? How is this usually done?
If you want to shape a 5'8" just get a 6'2A and take the length off the nose which will cut off a lot of the nose rocker, but be careful a board too flat is not the best idea. If you really like the rocker of your fiscuit make a rocker template and use that as a guide for cutting in the bottom rocker of the blank.
I've made two boards that were pretty flat rockered - a 5'5" fish and a 5'8" mini simmons. They both have around 2 3/4" nose rocker and my impression is that any less rocker would just be too flat...the boards are fast but the nose can get hung up on texture or just dropping into a moderately steep wave. I agree with Matt...the US Blanks 6'2"A blank would make a flat rockered 5'8" if you eliminate the 6" from the nose
A rocker template is a good idea... I don't know how good you are with the planer, but keep in mind that if you cut length off just the nose, you've shifted your whole rocker and foil profile forward. You'll get an elongated tail rocker, and you're probably going to have to make some adjustments. Not trying to get too caught up in the minutia of it, just sayin'... If you're not so good with the planer, and you have a few extra bucks, it's better to buy a longer blank and take the board out of the middle, lining up the rocker apexes and adding any flip/kick at the ends if you have to. Adding rocker is always easier than flattening rocker or trying to move your apex fore or aft. Look at the catalog, look at the rocker numbers on some different blanks, and see which one fits your desired rocker best. Keep in mind that deck rocker is important too, as you'll be taking a lot of thickness off the bottom if you go with a significantly longer blank. Does your bottom rocker match up with your deck rocker to give you the foil you're looking for? Don't let all of this confuse you. Just shape it and have fun. You won't be taking it out in DOH surf, so the design is not all that critical. All boards ride waves.
LBCrew is spot on! The 6'2A is a great fish and egg blank with a low entry rocker built into the blank, If you want to really get a low to flat entry rocker try the 7'9H Really flat rocker, a lot of people use these for simmon's inspired shapes. Hope this helps!
or you can have someone with a usblanks account order you a blank with no rocker. they will glue one up.
The flater the better. Use it in slopey mushy lines and you'll kill it. If and when it gets dumpy and puchy go with plan B. Most the time it's mushy so I can see you using it a lot. The best board for mush with little rocker IMO is the 7s superfish's. Yeah there made in T-land but they're fun for the mush we get most the time...
This would be my first board although i have slowly been building an area for me to enjoy it and get it right. Hopefully with this space i can expierement with all kinds of shapes for years. The mini simmons im definintly going to have to build.
