Mini Bat Pinched Rails

Ok, let’s get the basics out of the way first of all:

5.8 x 2.5

This one has pinched rails, that means that the rails are pinched toward the center of the rail-line (also know as rail apex) as opposed to curving down towards the waterline.

What is a pinched rail?

A 50/50 pinched rail board works best in a good clean face reef or point break type wave, some people also call them egg rails.

I wasn’t sure how they would work on a Mini but I wanted to try it.

Little Al from Santa Cruz gives us some great advice about pinched rails:

“You have to remember that the rail starts way back towards the center of the board, and the knifer the rail the closer to the center of the board the contour starts. a hard rail in the tail tends to be faster when surfing towards the tail. A hard rail in the tail tends to be faster when surfing towards the tail. For a long time I did not know why I did not like the hard rail in the tail boards. With a hard rail in the tail and a flat area in the tail the board would not stall in fact it woud speed up.”

He continues,

“If you surf a floatier board at a reef/point break you get in early and have the time to stall and let the wave build up. If you surf a board without all that float and surf a beach break you need to get moving as soon as possible so a hard rail flat tail board is going to work best for you.”

Well, I like a board with both those characteristics so this one got pinched rails up front and hard rails in back.

I have yet to ride it at a reef, but at the beach-break it was a little sluggish.

I really like the lines on this one, I pulled the tail in a bit more than usual and the end result is less drag on the turns.

I made the tail with a mini bat wing.

My idea is that the water needs an exit point, a focal exit point, and the bat wing provides the water’s energy to escape.

Peace.