Wave Crest Hawaii #4.

I'm pleased to be able to share with you my 5'8" rounded pin tail Australia made twin fin. Wave Crest Hawaii was George Downing's shop and label in Honolulu in the mid 70s before it became just Downing Hawaii. Wave Crest Hawaii was made under licence in Brookvale.

The highlight of the board is its unusual deep blue geometric spray.

My favourite feature is the brightly coloured laminate fins.

The board is remarkably similar to a board sold by Von Weirdo early last year.

Natural Progression twin fin fish.

I'm pleased to share with you my 6'4" US made Natural Progression twin fin fish from 1981.

It was shaped by Dean Edwards, who began shaping in the late ‘60’s with Wilken before moving to Natural Progression in Malibu. For the last 25 years he has been based on the Big Island of Hawai’i.

The board has a beautiful triple stringer, made up of 3 separate foam panels with a pair of very nice fluted flyers.

I do admire the 70's modernist design decal. It reminds me a lot of the 70's Harley Davidson logo when they were owned by 10 pin bowling company AMF.

Full of volume under the chest.

Single fly with very wide swallow tail.

This board was a custom order for a Vietnam vet who was a member of the 'Seabees' and carries a hand cut stencil of the Seabees insignia.

A Seabee is a member of the United States Naval Construction Forces. The word "Seabee" comes from initials "CB", which in turn comes from the term "Construction Battalion". The Seabees have a history of building bases, roadway and airstrips, and accomplishing construction projects in a wide variety of military theaters dating back to World War II.

This is the first vintage board I've ever seen with the dimensions written out in metric rather than imperial format. I've often thought it strange that surfboards are still measured in feet and inches, especially in Australia where we have been cleverly and effectively using the metric system since 1966.

I find it stranger still the the US is still so dedicated to using the imperial system of measurements. A foot was originally set as a standard of measure based on the length of the King of England's actual smelly old foot.

One would think the first thing the American's would change after going to all the trouble of winning a war of independence would be to stop using the King of England's body part in their everyday life.

As a side note, its interesting that even the English don't use this complicated and out dated system of measurement.

It seems old Dean Edward's was ahead of his time.

The board is very simple and flat through the bottom with only a slight fee in the tail.

Interesting twin fin template that I have found to be unique to southern California.

Dean Edward name was strangely familiar to me. Then I realised I actually have another board shaped by him in the 1987 for someone called 'Aussie Dingo Boy!'

MR bat tail Part 2.

Apparently they were called 'Star tails' at the time!!

Here's a nice pic of big Simon modelling some tight shorts, just for fun.

MR bat tail

I was pretty stoked to see Mark Richards share a pic of the bat tail MR twin fin from my collection.

Even more exciting was to see that pic inspired him to shape a new one!

That is exactly the reason why I collect old boards and share the pics on this blog - to inspire us all to revisit and reevaluate the designs from surfings past.

Bat tails are all the rage for quads now days. The area removed and little corners add some bite and help give the boards without a rear fin in the middle a little extra drive.  I had an interesting conversation with a friend this week talking about these 'new' bat tails. He didn't believe I already had one in my collection and he'd even been surfing with him on it 10 years ago.

Energy thrusters

There is no more collectible board from the innovation period of surfboard design than an early 80's Energy thruster.

They were a popular board at the time and many were made and they are not too hard to find. 

But some are more collectible than others. So, firstly, what your looking for is the first incarnation of the Energy logo. The block type not the script as on the boards above.

The '3 fin thruster' circular decal designed by Peter Stanton is a must. Better still is a hand drawn version, of which I only know of 2 in existence.

A simple color fade deck spray is more collectible than an all over decorative spray because there is a higher chance it was sprayed by Simon Anderson's brother, which to me, makes it more authentic.

You need the Hugh Mc Leod designed burning sun triangle logo.

If you find one with 3 of these decals it means it was a team board.

Although Scott Beggs and Frank Latta were fine shapers you really want one 'designed and shaped' by the big man Simon anderson.

This is harder to find from this period as Simon was travelling and competing and his output of boards from the first generation of the Energy thruster was quite restricted.

Whale Bay, Raglan

Wave Crest Hawaii stinger #2 & #3.

It seems it never rains it only pours, after posting images of the Wave Crest Hawaii from Pennsylvania recently 2 more stingers have crossed my path. This swallow tail and the pin tail twin fin are both Australian made versions of the species, shaped by Doug Bell who also made boards in OZ for Lightning Bolt and Channel Islands.

Junk auction

I saw this guy at a local junk shop auction in inner city Sydney recently mixed in with old lamps and broken washing machines.

6'6" Hot Stuff channel bottom shaped by Neal Purchase Snr.

70's Custom Lightning Bolt - 'Rocking Fish'

 Here's a mystery. 

Who, in the 70's would have ordered a custom Lightning Bolt single fin gun with a air brush spray design of a cigar smoking, cocktail drinking, trucker cap wearing base guitar playing fish?

Who wouldn't?!