swell period/swell direction

While surfing today this thread got me thinking so I also have a question. So today the swell was something like 2 feet@ 10 seconds. Now the bigger set waves seemed to be about 6-8 minutes apart. Is that a result of the swell period? My understanding is that the swell period is just the amount of time between waves at the bouy or wherever that information is being taken from. So is the time between bigger set waves a result of swell period? Or is it something entirely diffrent and caused by other conditions?

I like this thread is got me thinking

 

Swell period is just the time between individual waves. Not sets.

But there seems to be a tendancy for longer period swells (lets say 11-14 seconds on the east coast) to be much more "set" oriented than local windswells in the 7-9 second range.

Sets are referred to by oceanographers as "wave grouping" and is not well understood, so here is my stab at it:

Wave grouping occurs as swells travel long distances over open ocean. Longer period swells have traveled a much greater distance than locally generated windswell, and thus have more distance and time to form "wave groups" (sets). This really becomes noticable on the Pacific coast when surfing 15-18 second swell periods....not much at all going on for 5-10 minutes, then 5 (or more) waves come through that are several feet bigger and breaking 100 yards further outside than anything thats been coming through.

 

Cool thanks man. That makes sense to me.

 

You mean it's blue or red when the winds are forecasted to be good so it should be green? Iv noticed that too sometimes. Always got to look at the info and not the colors. Or better yet got to go give the waves a check anyway and see for yourself