MyPaipoBoards Forums

Hi everyone, I just stumbled upon this forum in the last few days so am really excited to see some great paipo enthusiast contributing.

I have been on a varied surfing journey riding a wide variety of craft, in more recent times I have been focusing my energy on bodysurfing and construction of handplanes about a year ago I made what I call a mini paipo which is somewhere between a hand plane and a paipo. After having an absolute blast I have since made a few more and varying the dimensions a little. The two shown in the photo are prototypes one is 24" long and the other 20" and both are around 15 1/2" wide with hard edges and deep double concaves. I will post a couple more photos when I get a chance.
If there are any Paipo enthusiast here located on or close to the Gold Coast (Australia) reach out as I know a couple of folk who would be keen to catch up for a session.

cheers
Mercury

Greetings Mercury!
nice looking boards I'd like to see the bottoms.

HI Kage

the photo at the bottom is from one of the more recent ones I have built, I am also in the middle of completing a channel bottom.

Awesome Mercury Mini's.... would like to see them in some epic surf sessions...
Keep up the good work..... mahalo

Here is the view created on one of the prototypes recently, the sand through first point at Noosa has been phenomenal
and looking back for riding position, as I mentioned in my first post these boards are somewhere between "riding" a board and bodysurfing with a handplane

Gday Mercury,

I live in Brisbane and usually surf south of the border but with the exception of a few brief windows, haven't made it down that way much in the last couple of years. I grew up on the Gold Coast but rarely surf there. I've been rediscovering the Sunshine Coast and am heading up there for a few days on Sunday.

Global Ernie who occasionally posts here is making a shorter paipo, I just can't recall the length offhand. One photo was about the length of two duckfeet fins.

I'm happy to catch up for a surf but usually steer clear of crowds.

Send me a pm or my email is above the BOAC poster on this site: http://home.brisnet.com.au/~bgreen/bgpage/

Bob

Dang. That is a lot of channels. And a lot of craftsmanship I suspect. Could you say anything about how you arrived at this particular design? Riding characteristics, previous shapes, stuff like that?

Nice kickboards !
I like these little planks, simple but efficient.
I usually ride plywood kickboards but yours seem more evolved.

@bgreen: it would be good to catch up at some stage I sometimes hook up with a bunch of bodysurfers at Narrowneck and we usually find a peak or two to share, a couple of them also ride bellybaord/paipos. They are a group known as Goldiesliders on instagram and have fortnightly meet ups.

@Kage: I based these designs on the handplanes I have been making for the past few years, basically pretty paralell rails and deep concaves and hard edges. The prototypes dimensions were scaled up to fit my arm length, so I could ride with a hand on the nose but I have found the two hands on the deck to be better position for me. The channel bottom idea is more or less the same as a concaves but may have a bit more edge hold on the channels (I cant wait to try it out).

I have been messing about with some other concepts and sizes as well and will post on those as they develop. If you are on instagram and interested you can find me at @hg_mercurysurf

(disclaimer: I am not a commercial operation though I do make small numbers of customs for people who are keen and can wait for extended lead times as I do this in my very limited spare time).

This is a photo of the deck of the channel bottom board with a fresh filler coat from the weekend:

Gday M,

I had a fun bank to myself up the sunny coast this morning. I used to go to the spit a bit about 10-12 years but crowds just took the fun out of it.

I'll look at instagram when i get home in a day or so. I need to find my password, its not something iI ook at much.

I dropped in to my parents place over the weekend and grabbed a couple of photos of a Paulownia paipo I made my mum about 9 years ago. I got the blank from Geoff Moase (RIP) of Dovetail surfboards (an absolutely elite craftsman) and shaped and it up, i refurbished it a bit a couple of years ago with a bit of sanding and re-oiling.

I finally got some time to finish off the latest three mini paipos One Channel bottom for me 25" x 15 1/2"
A custom for a keen fringe (surfmatt, bodysurf, paipo) surfer 24"x15 1/2" and a spare that is up for grabs 20" x 15 1/5"

It will be interesting to hear what difference the bottoms make on this style of board, especially given your riding position isn't on the board as such.

This is another one I have been working on with some small Bonzer runners added, this one is EPS and Epoxy with a flax deck and some carbon
with a couple of handplanes I was also glassing

Wow, Nice boards

I was fortunate enough to go and try out the surflake facility in Central Queensland recently and rode my original orange mini paipo it was a great experience and really proved the design concept works well

So how was it swimming into them? Looks to be a peaky wave.

Of all the wave machine's around, that one looks the most fun to me.
Looks like you took full advantage.

HI Bob, It was just like catching a normal wave really, the marshals gave a bit of advice on where to sit in relation to the plunger.

here are a couple more I have been working on

The yellow and red mini paipo has a narrower tail and bevelled/chined bottom rails, the checker and flame board is a prize for an upcoming bodysurfing contest (the decal artwork is by Allan Wrath not me).