Custom Brian Caldwell 10 ft Stand Up Paddle Surfboard Video
Doug Lock talks about the Brian Caldwell 10′ stand up paddle surfboard and shows us around its shape and explains its dimensions. He says that the board is good at riding four to five foot waves, and mentions the new concept on its nose shape called the bottleneck concave. The all-around shape of the board helps it perform well as a long board for nose-riding and short board for tail-riding. Interesting.
This board is pretty light even though it’s hand-shaped, as you’ll see on the video.
(click thumbnail to launch video)
Jeff: It’s Doug’s custom board. Let Doug explain the design on this.
Doug: Well this is Brian’s new creation and it’s hand-shaped EPS foam.
Evan Leong: How heavy is this thing?
Doug: Right around maybe 20 pounds around there — pretty light.
Evan Leong: Oh so even though it’s hand-shaped it’s pretty light then?
Doug: Fairly light, yes. It has got – with the blend of materials, it has got a blend of… the layup is different from any other lay up that I can’t say. It’s top secret.
Evan Leong: Kind of cool, this pad thing, huh?
Doug: Yeah, the stop pad. Basically what it is is our stop pad that we get manufactured, basically we just get the deck pad, trace it out, cut out all the pad, put the stop pad. That way you know where you’re foot is.
Evan Leong: So what’s going on with this tail?
Doug: Well, the wing swallow. Theoretically you want to be a short board when you’re riding the tail, and you want to perform more as long board when you’re up on the nose. And I’ll explain that a little bit once we flip the board over.
Evan Leong: So this will make it – on the tail it turns faster.
Doug: Turns faster, more responsive; it can handle bigger waves so the tail is pulled in. But it’s really stable. The board tracks really nice, it tracks really straight and the fin set up…
Evan Leong: How long is this thing again?
Doug: 10 feet.
Evan Leong: 10 feet, ok.
Doug: So if I flip it over. I’ll try to show you this interesting bottom…
Evan Leong: When you guys make these customs, do you always make a certain design or you guys make it where it’s always design changes per person kind of thing? I mean if you want to surf, do you recommend this kind of tail set up and this shape for people who want to surf.
Doug: This seems to be, to me, the most – the free-est surfing as far as… it looks like a lot of fins; it looks kind of staggered because there’s a lot of fin going on. But with this four-fin set up and this keel in the middle, this keel makes all the difference.
Evan Leong: It just keeps it straight or what?
Doug: To keep the tracking straight but also at the same time it gives it bite. So the board has that, since it’s so wide, you need this center fin to keep it tracking.
Evan: It looks like not too much V on this board either, yeah?
Doug: Just mostly back, slight here, but major on the end here.
Evan: Oh so behind the fins.
Doug: Behind the fin, right.
Evan: Interesting.
Doug: It’s mostly flat in here but as you can see this chime, right here there’s a slight chime that rolls off from the edge here.
Evan: What does it mean chime? Seems like a little bit of a ridge almost.
Doug: Right. It’s a ridge that comes down before the rail.
Evan: I don’t know if you can see that. Kind of right here.
Doug: Right there, right. And if you look down the board you can actually see the outline from the chime. This is where you’re riding on a lot of times when you’re planing but when you’re sitting in the water, this is all in the water for stability. When you’re up planing, this is the surface that is actually…
Evan: What width is this board?
Doug: 28”.
Evan: Is it tippy?
Doug: Not at all, it’s very stable. There’s a lot of hip back in the tail so this gives you a lot of stability as well.
Evan: Can a big guy ride this?
Doug: Sure. But this board is only 3 and ¾ thick and you might even try to go a little bit thinner like 3 and ½ inches thick.
Evan: And this is the board that you’re riding?
Doug: Yes. And this is an interesting nose that I’m going to show you. This is Brian’s latest creation here. It’s called a bottleneck concave. I don’t know if you can see it here. But what it is, it comes from this point here and what it does is it flairs, it comes in and flairs out like this. And all this does is (_____), which gives the water some where to shoot out from and spill. So when you’re up on the nose, this board really performance like the long board where you can do nose riding but when you step back on to the tail, it turns like a short board. That’s why this transition here, from this bottleneck, it fades out right about here and starts coming back flat; a very neutral area right here where the front foot is and then it starts going back to the V where your back foot is. Basically, you’re stop is right at the beginning of this keel thing right here, and that gives it its drive. But these four fins also give it its maneuverability.
Evan: And then these are the things that Jeff had shown us?
Doug: Yes. There’s different set ups that you can do. We found this one was probably the most stable, had the most drive. The smaller fins were good but you need a larger center. But for this set up right here in particularly this are the biggest quads that we have…
Evan: You need the center fin even if it’s just small waves like under head high kind of waves?
Doug: You not necessarily don’t need them but I like it just for the additional drive.
Evan: So it doesn’t affect like – you kind of turn it, it doesn’t make it turn slow or anything?
Doug: No, not at all. In fact, it gives it a really nice feel, nice flow. You can drive off your front foot or your back foot and it doesn’t seem to bog. No matter where you are on the board it doesn’t seem to bog down.
Evan: There’s kind of concave.
Doug: Yeah.
Evan: Interesting.
Doug: Bottleneck concave. I’ve never heard of it before and he said I got an experiment. That’s what it is all about right now, right?
Evan: Kind of cool. Got a lot of angles going on in this thing huh?
Doug: Uh huh, uh huh.
Evan: So the rail is tucked rail too? I mean it tucks in underneath.
Doug: Basically what he did was he took this chime and he just basically rounded it; so he just softened it. He took another chime, the one that is in the store there – the orange board. This was originally a chime and what he does is he just softened everything up, just rolled everything in. He actually made it more up here like more of a 50/50 rail. It’s more of a traditional long board style – going up over here and then right about this edge, he starts to get his edge more subtle then he starts to get sharper. Finally right before the fins, it’s all edge all the way back to the tail it’s sharp. Also up here it give it its neutral feel, it doesn’t feel like it’s going to bite. It doesn’t have any hang-ups.
Evan: So you can ride this in big surf and small surf?
Doug: No, I ride this probably up to maybe 4 or 5 feet point scale max.
Evan: So like head and a half or something like that?
Doug: Head and a half, yeah. And it’s fine, there’s not skiddiness or anything. It’s just a solid-feeling board.
Evan: So that’s pretty much for most, I mean 90 percent of the time, right, wave condition?
Doug: Yeah, and this nose makes, I swear this nose makes a huge difference. It’s just a new concept that actually works. When I first saw it I was kind of scratching my head going, I don’t know about this thing.
Evan: Just got to try right.
Doug: Got to try right. Everything’s so new with this sport that everything is groundbreaking no matter which way you turn. You blink and it has changed; there’s a new concept. This is our theory.
Evan: What are the other boards that you have in your car? Are they the same thing as this one? The ones in the bags?
Doug: No, not really. Actually there really different from this. Well, there’s one that is kind of similar but it does not have the bottleneck concave. It just has a standard single barrel.
Custom Brian Caldwell 10 ft Stand Up Paddle Surfboard [7:41m]: Download
Custom Brian Caldwell 10 ft Stand Up Paddle Surfboard [7:43m]: Download
[..YouTube..] The board weighs 25lbs.
[..YouTube..] (using a bathroom scale and minus my own weight as I was holding it)
[..YouTube..] I finally got to try the board. It’s super SWEET !!!!! It’s pretty stable. Not tippy at all. I could paddle a turn easy on the flat water. I could paddle at good cruising speed with little effort. But best of all, the board handled great on the waves!! It does have that small board feeling when you’re on the sweet spot. The nose riding qualities are superb. Very smooth… Love it Brah. Thanks Doug, this is a Merry Christmas!
Aloha, from some amphibious critter