Outer islands flex tails
Way, way back Mitchell even dropped concaves into first gen shortboards.
Think 1969.
69 may be a little amiss....Mitchell was 14 and still going to school when there wasn't any waves.
Glenn Ritchie did most of the early shaping of Outers,Mitchell was the young test pilot.That's when the deep single concaves first emerged in Gows boatshed on Pitt water at the back of Palm beach.71/2.Later when Nana Glen production was happening is when M.Rae began production shaping.
He he I was thinking about 1969 ...and how old is this Rae bloke now.
Well that's what he told me!
Here we go: "we were riding 1" deep concaves with hard edges in 1969...revolutionary designs."
So maybe he didn't shape them. I was asking him about his late 70s / early 80s concaves - boards that he shaped - and he said the above quote.
Check the concave in these suckers:
And this one is a flextail. Said he rode it in the 1980 OM Bali Pro.
....it might take a couple of waves to get the feel.
That concave is full on, not what you see much of these days
I seem to remember Mitchell Rae hanging around Peter Clarke's Brookvale factory where Ritchie worked around '69. He was a pretty well known grom around the NB from an early age
Yes BB,PCs north side spawned outer island....Mitchell was a competitive surfer in his under 18 days.Had some notable victories which included finishing in front of another young un from Newy who shared the same initials.
UDO,born early 1955...turned 61 early this year.
What's people's thoughts on the outer island fins?
Switchblades....
As far as the history of Outers goes,GR,was still shaping at Peter Clarke's Brookvale factory in October 1970,the month the first Tracks issue came out.I'm doubting that the concaves were done prior to this as Glenn is on the Bitsa page with his latest creation.He describes it as dead FLAT all the way through and designed for Lennox.
My first recollection of Outers was on the Bitsa page in 1971or 2?,there was a photo of a very concaved rail to rail bottom.
My version.
Torsion Drive Flex tail.
http://i346.photobucket.com/albums/p402/barrysnyderdesigns/Torsion%20Dri...
Another one, blowin.
http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/coffs-harbour/surfing/outer-island-flex-t...
Cheers Lostdoggy .
Bit on the thin side for mine , though.
Blowin - 6'10 x 18 3/4 x 2 5/8 Outer island flextail
Gumtree Mudgeeraba Gold Coast
Udo - sounds perfect for me.
But I'm 5000 kms away from it and boarding a plane in a few hours.
Cheers anyway cobber.
Where you heading to buddy ?
If I'm lucky - which I haven't been in the last 24 hours - I'll be heading to Bali.
If I'm not lucky I'll be heading towards a life force depleting encounter with more retardulent airport officials and the heart break of another cancelled flight .
This will in turn lead to either a week on the freezing South or South West coast of WA - sans wetsuit or adequate cold weather clothing - or a week camped on the peripheries of Shark Bay - sans fishing rod.
Either would be fun, I guess.
But I NEED warm water barrels.
Thanks again for the heads up mate.
Kintamani is belching again.
I've faced greater adversity than an over active geological pressure release point in the last day.
I've seen the devil himself.
In this instance he appeared as the smug representative of a globe straddling American company that has utter contempt for any poor sap that happens to stand between themselves and a stray dollar or two.
And I was cast asunder and thrown into the abyss of airport chaos and flight uncertainty.
Fear not.
Today is a fresh start.....and I get to do it all again.
Someone just got a steal...Ebay - bidding just ended on a real nice top cond Bushrat flextail -
$ 400
Mitchell mentioning a “semi retirement”
Gonna leave a sizable hole in the shaping world. No-one's really doing what Mitchell does.
I couldn't give away a bushrat twin fish 18mths ago. I think the lucky punter got it for 250 from memory
Yeah Mitchell's boards are masterpieces, my old man had a matching pair of 6.9 and 7.4, beautiful boards.
Wish I saw that being advertised...
Yeah, looking at some your others over time, Stu, it would've slotted into the quiver nicely
Double carbon fiber stringer, wood nose and tail blocks and those swivel fins Jed uses with beautiful wood fins
You're just teasing me now.
Anybody ridden one ? They look interesting. I've never ridden any kind of flex tail , but I'm specifically referring to the foam and glass numbers with the two stringers that converge in the nose from mid board and that have no stringer in the tail as opposed to the all glass tails.