The first Tris

 This historic board is the very first surfboard to have the Tris logo. From when this board was made, in late 69 / early 70 Tris has gone on to become one of our best loved board makes . The board was made by friends Tris Cokes and Johnny Manetta for local surfer Mike Hendy . They got the stringerless blank from Alan MacBride ; Johnny shaped the top half, Tris the bottom half and they met in the middle ! The board is a mild s deck, around 7'3 long and has a beautiful deep red tint on the underside, with artistic flourishes by Johnny making it a striking looking board. The deck has a light green tint on the deck patch, and an attempt at a tie dye pattern made by rolling the cloth and adding pigment . Tie dye was all the rage with the hippies at Porthtowan in those days , and the board was made at a small hut near where the lifesaving club is today.
The logo is hand drawn on toilet paper says Johnny , and has Mike Hendy's initials on it.
The board was made at a point where the evolution of board design was driving along at a fast rate , and boards were getting shorter, wider and thicker , and the twin fin design would soon take off as a design to be tried, but later rejected for slim and longer singlefins which became the standard surfboard design through the mid 70s.

 Johnny still owns and runs Tris surf shop in Porthtowan - and a few years ago a guy came in saying ' ive got a tris in my loft ' ; Johnny couldn't believe his eyes when he saw this first Tris coming round the corner. After he restored it for the owner it was kindly donated back to him to keep at the shop as part of the history of Porthtowan surfing.

 Johnny Manetta and Tris Cokes in the early days of Tris surfboards , around 1970/71 with a Tris twin fin.

Photos of Tris Cokes, courtesy of Johnny Manetta

Porthtowan crew in the early 70s. Johnny 3rd from left , Tris 3rd from right .

Thanks to Johnny and Ryan for the info and photos

Style never goes out of fashion. Tom Curren age 50 showing his class

Bilbo 8'10 and The last of the malibus by Tony Cope

Heres a beautiful Bilbo 8'10 owned by Alex, made by Chris Jones. Its wafer thin on the rails and tail and shows cutting edge lightweight design from a very nice era of boards . These boards are very rideable, I was on one last night although mine isnt so thin on the rails. This board has a nicely foiled fin and a good rider of the day would have been able to carve some beautiful turns on this board as well as noseride. It uses one of the older style Bilbo logos and has the CJ monogram at the tail . A cool board.
Tony talks about this era of boards below -

The last of the Malibus
by Tony Cope 

After Nat Young won the `66 Worlds in San Diego,  AUS and the US went their own ways. Undeterred by Nat`s sharp turns & trims in the pocket which gave him the win even before the final round, the US ignored his thin & narrow-railed board and made yet more nose riders. To get that concave scoop below the nose you need a thick board, thinning it out isn`t an option.

This Oz 1967 shot of the Bells final has in it the genesis of the coming short board revolution : Nat`s thin board with a long, narrow and raked fin, and Midget`s board already less than 9` long.

below - Nat's hiding behind his board, but the long narrow fin is showing clearly. Midget's on the rhs with his sub 9 ft longboard.

Fortunately for GB we could see the way progress was going, imported Oz mags and visiting surfers and beachguards gave us the full story. Apart from photos  I hadn`t actually seen one these boards, but set about making one in the Groves-Davies shed. It was shaped out of a huge block of industrial polystyrene & glassed with epoxy, as normal resin melts styrene, essential information from Bob G. and Bill D.!  I was not aware of quite what I`d done until Bill Bailey saw it on my car roof when Bill Davies and I were collecting  some polyurethane blanks at Bilbo.  I paid Doug Wilson in the Pargolla works and found them going over it when I got back to the car. Bailey said Bilbo were starting  to go down the same ` thin and light` road .

below - Riding the board at Kimmeridge. The thin rails, especially in the nose, show up quite well. (Home made wetsuit stuck together with Evostick and with yellow rubber tape reinforcing seams looking quite tidy too !)

Fast forwarding  47 years to last weekend (!) : Alex Williams arrived for coffee with a Bilbo on his car, and to my surprise it was one of those boards made in late `67 or early `68, just before GB went short-board crazy. This one`s  8 foot 10.5 ins. long by 23.5 ins. wide. The nose and tail are super-thin and quite sharp-railed, the middle`s a lot thicker but maintains narrow oval rails by having quite a bit of curve width-ways across both deck and bottom. The fin has a 10 ins. base then tapers rapidly to became long and narrow – you can see the Greenough influence clearly.

When you ride these boards there some surprises . The thin nose cuts into the wave face rather than riding over it so you need to keep weight back a bit to keep it up, otherwise it catches. The thin tail cutting into the wave is an advantage if it`s wide : if it`s narrow the board will  `track` in a line and be hard to turn. The general lightness of my thin board was a revelation, so easy to ride and so responsive . 

below - My own ZIP logo board is tucked under my arm , showing the wide and thin tail , and long narrow fin. On the rhs is Tim Heyland, who wanted to buy it . A year later he joined Dave Aldrich - Smith's Tiki surfboards and is still there today .
bottom - Trying the thin mal out in '67. It turned like a shortboard as long as you kept the nose up. So a year later we all copied Australia, cut another foot out of the centre section, then there was nothing sticking out to catch in the wave face. (photo John Durrant again).

Craig Baird ( SurfWorld museum, Oz ) looked at my photos online last year and wrote “ way to go Tony “ or something  and it was the only time I`ve ever felt that maybe, a long time ago and just for a nano-second , I was near the cutting edge of board development !

Thanks Alex, for the great photos of the Bilbo, and John Durrant for the 1967 black and white shots.

Thanks to Tony as ever for his memories, photos and insights

Ok Im a sucker for aerial perspectives (its what I deal with a lot in my paintings) so heres some great drone footage of a classic Puerto Escondido swell

Windjammer singlefin early 80s

 This is a great condition singlefin by Windjammer , from around '83  and made in Braunton ,North Devon . It could be inspired by the needle nose Lazor Zaps which Cheyne Horan made famous at the time, although his boards were often alot wider at the tail . The Windjammer has had a lot of time spent on the pinlining and airbrushing and is a real work of art. The tailpad is from later in the 80s. Dims are 5'8 x 20 1/2 x 2 3/4 .

 Windjammer was run by Clive Lewis and Alan Brookes (ex Tiki and Chapter) . It ran from the mid 70s till the mid/late 80s ? By the start of the 80s they were only making a few custom boards , but produced alot of popouts and windsurfers .

1985 ad from Tube News

Roger Land singlefin from Treyarnon bay

This is Graham's board which has important links to Tigger Newling and Treyarnon bay. It was shaped around 1970 / 71.
Graham says - ' 6'10 x 21.5 x 3.5 Treyarnon Bay surfboard shaped by Roger Land. Im sure that you all know as well as I do that Roger taught / informed Tig's shaping abilities and ideas and then returned to NZ , not only as one of the NZ surf pioneers but also created a hugely successful one class racing yacht series as well I believe. I go it along with a lovely Bilbo 8'6 singlefin from a guy in Oxford about 20 years ago.
It still surfs and will be going to France with me this year. I wonder if there is a Tigger logo under the 'resin splodge' on the nose but I am not going to find. Love the little Kiwi drawn into the Treyarnon bay logo. Hope you like it '

I haven't seen one of these boards by Roger Land before but the shape is the classic s deck , rounded nose and small fin which is so similar to Tig shapes from this 70/71 era . So if you have a Tig which isnt signed Tigger then it will be by Roger Land. Tigger says about that year - 

'' The next summer I was busy enough to employ staff: Shaper Roger Land and Laminator Terry Lysaght were both very experienced kiwi board builders who somehow put up with a very green 18 year old boss. One afternoon we posed for our first publicity shot. It was inspired by Pink Floyd's Ummagumma album cover (designed by Hypgnosis). The one where all the band's gear is laid out on a runway. We emptied the greenhouse and laid all the tools and templates out on the lawn along with some boards and a pair of trousers which were so encrusted with resin that they stood up by themselves . The three of us standing there covered in dust - a true start-up cottage industry.''

Tig publicity photo 1970 , Tig in middle with Roger Land and Terry Lysaght

Tig down rail s deck from the same era

Ju singlefin by Paul Jury

 Here's a nice Ju singlefin shaped by Paul Jury at Bude . We have featured a small number of Ju's on the blog but this looks like one of the cleanest ! Early 70s diamond tail with that classic font which looks very folky , and the humming bird is a nice little feature . Unfotunately I dont have photos of the underside.

''Paul "Ju" Jury of Bude. Later became General Surfboards. Also shaped with Willis Bros. Hawaii and Pipedreams Australia amongst others. Had a couple of cool surfshops in Bude. He sadly died whilst surfing big Majestics in the Phillipines'' - Barry David

 Ju's Surf shop in Bude , photo taken in the early 80s , and below Ju with classic Bude surf bus ! Photos c/o Barry David.