V is For Vee Bottoms!

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The vee bottom boards masterfully ridden by Australian Bob McTavish in the mid '60s were groundbreaking designs that foresahadowed the shortboard revolution that would soon follow. To see the progression of the design, fast forward just a couple of years to Billy Hamilton, Mark Martinson, and Keith Paull at Hossegor and Biarritz in the late '60s flick "Waves of Change", and more recently to Ryan Burch on a "V bowls" design in the wonderful short "The Shakes".

Continuing this progression of the vee bottom design - but with some radical new elements and construction concepts - is high on my list with the launch of Qustom Product.

I got started down this path after spending many a day at Bird's Surf Shed last spring working on Bird's Cushman scooter. Of course every time I enter Bird's shrine to everlasting surf stoke I have to browse the insane collection of vintage boards on display, and there were two that I kept pulling out of the racks and staring at incessantly from every possible angle - a Challenger Micro Vee and a Surfboards Hawaii Model V.

  • 1967 Surfboards Hawaii V Bottom
    1967 Surfboards Hawaii V Bottom
  • Deep Vee and a Wide Tail
    Deep Vee and a Wide Tail
  • A Poison Dart
    A Poison Dart
  • I would love to know who drew this!
    I would love to know who drew this!
  • Ghost Rider!
    Ghost Rider!

    Bird and Isaac's favorite feature of this board is "Rock 'N' Roll Eddie", AKA "Ghost Rider"!

  • 1968 Challenger Micro Vee (8'6
    1968 Challenger Micro Vee (8'6")
  • Sexy!
    Sexy!

    That feather logo is toe up!

  • A well kept treasure for sure!
    A well kept treasure for sure!
  • Pacific Rail Lines
    Pacific Rail Lines
  • A work of art!
    A work of art!
  • La Jolla Shores session with Ferdie
    La Jolla Shores session with Ferdie

    Image by Ferdie Morales

  • Waiting Patiently by the Shore(s)
    Waiting Patiently by the Shore(s)

    Image by Ferdie Morales

  • See the Vee
    See the Vee

    Image by Ferdie Morales

One day Bird asked me if I wanted to borrow them, and that turned into a two month long love affair with these crazy boards and a lengthy writeup on iSurfedThere.com.

I had so much fun on those old boards that I decided that one of my first forays into surfboard building and design with Qustom Product will be to recreate these amazingly fast and difficult to ride boards with some modern design elements, with the goal of keeping all of the speed elements in place, but mixing in some of my own special tweaks to increase handling and stabliity.

Check out the full article here, and stay tuned for more!

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