In the past, whenever we started working on an idea for a new 4GF model, I've resisted talking about it in Surfmatters early on, because, 9 times out of 10, the idea doesn't work out. And even if the concept shows promise -- like the Tracker Roundtail two summers ago -- it takes 6 months or more to sort out the details. So I've waited until a new mat was finished before unleashing it on the ever growing, ever voracious mat surfing world.
The great thing about designing air mats is we're always dealing with straight lines and concrete measurements. I can build a new version of a mat I rode yesterday, make it 1/8" thicker, and do it with almost perfect accuracy. And, I can have it out in the water tomorrow. Building surfboards generates so many variations in shaping and glassing that it's rare for any two boards to come out the same. And then there's the high cost and turn around time of making new boards, even if you own a shop. Surf mats, then, really lend themselves to a methodical developmental process.
The downside of mat design is that all the variations and fine tuning aren't visible to the eye. I've built nearly 3000 mats by hand over the past 25 plus years, but even I can't look at a mat and determine how it will ride just by its appearance. Mats are a lot like shoes. A small variation (like the difference between a size 9 1/2 and a size 10 shoe) makes all the difference in the world when you wear them, but you can't look at them on-line, or even in the shoe store, and judge them. You have to put them on. The same applies to a mat...you have to ride it to really know what it's capable of.
The single biggest thing I spend time on, when answering emails, is trying to convince board surfers they aren't qualified to make judgement of what a given mat model will ride like based on its appearance or dimensions. The variation in dimensions between two extreme mats (like a 4GF Standard compared to a 4GF XL) is minimal compared to the numbers that two widely contrasting surfboards might generate. If I published the dimensions of a Standard and an XL, it would seem implausible to most surfers that there would be any noticeable difference between how the two mats surfed. But anyone who's ridden both a Standard and an XL knows they are profoundly different.
So with all that in mind, I thought it might be interesting to document the progress of a new 4GF prototype mat from day-one.
I've been thinking about how great both the Standard and the 5GF are when it comes to hanging into walls, but also how much better every other design is when it comes to gliding and skimming. Obviously, we're all looking for the holy grail...a mat that combines both aspects.
I've made so many variations of so many mats, that sometimes I think there isn't much more earth to till. What I haven't spent much time working on is a mat with a tapered outline shape. In the past, I've resisted fooling around with mats that weren't straight and square for a litany of reasons.
One reason is aesthetic. Square mats are pretty much our history. And the emergence of the body board in the 70's, with it's tapered outline, presented an appearance paradigm that mat surfers didn't like.
There's no doubt that this outline works...but nothing like a surf mat. So it's an aesthetic strike-out, in my view.
A second reason I've stuck with conventional square mats is that a square mat reduces the number of design variables to sort through. Once you start to add curves and tapers, another, almost impenetrable jungle of design and testing presents itself.
The third, and most important, reason is that square mats really do work. In the late 40's, Bob Simmons' research into planing hulls led him to determined that wide tailed, parallel outlined boards were more efficient than pulled-in curvy ones. Of course, Simmons' boards weren't very maneuverable, but they absolutely flew in a straight line. Untouchable speed, even by today's standards.
(That's about a parallel as you can get!)
So, a conventional surf mat with its straight/parallel outline has a significant amount of data, and history, to back up its obviously high level of performance. Of course, the original surf mats were square out of manufacturing practicality. But, they worked back then, and they work now.
Manly Beach, 1930's
That said, the idea of a mat that isn't perfectly square goes back to the mid-1930's. One the earliest known photographs of a surf raft shows a mat with a tapered outline.
George made a tapered mat back in the 80's, but we didn't have much of a design backlog to rely on, and the squares ones were working well, so that first one got wet a few times, then set aside. Last night, in a flu-induced delirium, I decided to give the tapered outline mat idea another shot.
What I wanted to try was taking two proven design quantities -- the Fatty (my favorite small wave mat) and the 5GF (the best big wave mat, IMO) -- and literally combine them. The prototype I built this afternoon has the wide-ish nose of a Fatty, tapering down to the narrow tail of a 5GF.
My hope is the narrower tail will hold in, while the wider nose will give it more planing. I've kept the outline straight, rather than curving the outline inward at the tail, because outline curve has never worked for me in the past. It usually slips out.
Fatty...............Tapered Prototype.............5GF
I have to wait for some waves, and for my flu to subside, before I can try it out. I'll keep everyone posted.
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