We often get requests like this, so give people the courage to try something out," says Timm-Daniel Köppke from Maui Ultra Fins in response to our enquiry about suitable fins and tips for a conversion. Experience in surf tests regularly shows that thrusters turn significantly better and surf more controllable waves on the same board than with a large single fin.
That sparked the idea: Surely something must work with old boards? Josh Welz and Johannes Rützel had already tried this before us. Both old hands on the board. Josh Welz, former surf editor-in-chief, had the conversion to Fuerte professionally done by Helmut Wirtz at Magma Custom Boards. His board now has a proper surf fin set with a 7-inch fin at the rear and two asymmetrical thruster fins, slightly angled, in FCS-I boxes.
This would also be the cheapest box system for DIYers with a huge selection of surf fins. Two round plugs (around 5 euros each) are laminated into the board for each fin, and the round cut-outs can be easily made with a hole saw. Suitable, symmetrical windsurf side fins in FCS include the X-Tri from Maui Ultra Fins. For FCS, Timm-Daniel advises a maximum of 10 or 11.5 mm fins and JP shaper Gnigler does not ascribe the same load capacity to the fins as Mini-Tuttle or Slotbox.
Johannes Rützel, former tester for the Windsurfing Yearbook, cut into the laminate of his Goya himself. "I shortened US boxes, filled them and then laminated them in." For our conversion, we chose what is probably the best box with the largest selection of windsurf fins - two fine carbon slot boxes from Flikka (35 euros each) in a cuboid hard foam block. Very solid and easy to install. A guideline for all those who prefer to place the order: At the "Carbon Clinic", boxes cost 19 euros each and installation costs another 100 per box.
You can find a detailed do-it-yourself workshop in the PDF available in the download area below.
Stephan Gölnitz, deputy editor-in-chief of SURF, explains how it works in 16 steps.
Downloads:
Stephan Gölnitz
Deputy Editor in Chief surf
