Trying to Keep Up - 24 September

On this first day of Fall, I opted to skip another day of playing in the water in favor of trying to knock out some things that need to get done.  First was sanding down the ding repair on the 5'6" prone foil board - all done and back in the board sock.

Next was trimming the excess foam from the adjusted template on the 4'10" blank.  Easy Peasy.

And I kept looking at the foil across the board length - I figured a few minutes with the planer and I'd feel less tension.  Done!

I'm going to try and keep the volume in the center of the board and take more from the lower rail - lots of shapers are trimming the lower rail away so the board doesn't "stick" to the water if you touch down while riding.  Not sure if it really works, but might as well try.  I think paddling power won't suffer if I keep the board thick in the centerline area at the stern and gradually thinning out to the nose.  So in reality, this is not far from the finished volume (even though I just started foiling the back - I'll vacuum bag a sheet of divynicell to the top deck where my front foot will hit (because I hate pressure dings) and encase the board in carbon fiber for stiffness.  I'll keep the tail nice and fat so it picks up the push from waves when I'm paddling for them.  

This should be a fun build.  I'm not going to shape the 4'6" blank yet - I'll see if the design elements are worth the effort over the standard flat boards (like the 5'6" and 5'2") before committing that blank.