Ride Report – design flaws

Forty One Two - MkII 031Been riding the Forty One Two – MkII for a few weeks now, and with the latest run of swell I’ve had a variety of waves to get a ‘feel’ for the board.

So, let’s recap, this boards has all it’s bottom contours straight from the AKU design and machine cut.

I went with a single concave, with double inside, and as you can see from the pic here, the double runs a fair way up the board … it’s not just through the fins, and with that, I feel this is the key element that impacts how this board handles.

It get’s up a goes …

BUT, it has this  tendency to be unsettled when I weight the front foot. FWIW, I am not a goofy …

It ‘feels’ like it “rocks” on the double, and when I look at it, there is a slight ‘keel’ under my front foot … which is what I think I  feel … when it’s got some speed, and I’m surfing off the tail, I can not feel that ‘rocking’ … it’s only when at a lower speed and driving a bottom turn from the front foot, or even just getting set as the wave starts, as I get to my feet and get into the wave … basically, anytime weigh is more front foot.

There is also a lack of “drive” at lower speed, mainly in smaller waves … it feels like the water flow across the bottom of the board is being ‘broken up’ by the double too far up the board, and so the water flow is not hitting the fins as “smoothly” as possible?

Now, the funny thing is that this subtly keel, was totally visible in the AKU design in the 3d render … and when the board was cut, I was tempted to take it out, but I did not want to flatten the rocker too much, nor take out too much volume. I really must learn to go with the feel and intuition.

So, long story short version the board works. It floats, turns, and can be “surfed” … it’s not a keeper, but it’s part of the evolution.

The next one, the mkIII will have slightly lower volumed rails in the med section … tail and nose are fine, just needs a tweak through the mid section, and I’ll take out the ‘double concave’ through the mid section too … volume should come out about the same then …

Oh, yeah, fwiw, the next one will NOT be a ‘lite’ blank … having done all the others from lite blanks, I really do not like the feel … too light in better waves and a bit less “stiff’ so the flex is different. Will be interesting to see how the MkIII in a standard blank goes, with a quality outsourced glassing job.

I’ll keep you posted.

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