Echo beach

The Echo beach movement from the early 80s around Newport beach California was the birthplace of a new wave surf scene which affected boards and fashion across the surfing world and launched companies like Quiksilver and Stussy to superstardom. Brightly coloured wetsuits, checks , dots and bright sprays on boards were the go, and the surfing by guys like Danny Kwock was just as eyecatching.

Above, Danny Kwock, McCoy team rider, 1980. Below, Quiksilver relaunched echo beach in the last couple of years.

Hot Buttered by Ratso Buchanan

5'10 Hot Buttered from around 1980 with an eye wateringly bright spray - the 80s in all its glory , from the collection of Martin from Discoverysurf. Its shaped by top New Zealand surfer shaper Ian ratso Buchanan , possibly shaped in Cornwall at Ocean Magic. Ratso has been a guest shaper a few times in Cornwall over the years , and this board uses a burford blank, which Nigel imported into the UK. It has a twin fin + 1 set up, quite common in the transitional years from twins to thrusters, and is in great condition with no fading on those colours !

Surf Scene 1981

Hot Buttered team rider Derek Hynd '81

Derek at Fistral, '81 Gul Alder pro am

Had a great surf last night down the local beach, warm water, no wind and head high waves till darkness. photo by shore surf.

Roger Cooper zippy sticks

7'2 early 70s single fin by Roger Cooper from Alex. This looks like a pretty early one with diamond tail and ply/glass fin, made at Roger's factory in South Wales. Roger grew up on the Isle of Wight and worked for a bit in the south west before settling in Wales and producing Zippy Sticks and now Roger Cooper boards.

Roger centre winning the south coast champs '69

Glassing for Tiki mid/late 70s

rides

Rod Sumpter and Windansea crew Makaha 1964 , photo Grannis.

Psychadelic hearse , Jersey.

North shore cruiser 1969, photo Brewer.

Larry B - to pipeline James

Richard Harvey at Braunton mid 70s.

Randy Rarick and stock, 80s.

Semmens and Daniels 1980 Stubbies.

nice !

John's ride Clarence

Vitamin Sea twinnie

Daren from Newquay has sent pics of his great condition Vit sea twin fin from around 1980 which he has surfed around Fistral over the last twenty years or more. It looks a fun shape, probably by Tad Ciastula and looks pretty contemporary compared to todays retro inspired surfboards. Love the clear fins.

Daren recently found this in his Dad's shed, made in the early 80s by John Adams of three SSS, and as Daren says, full of magnificent wetsuits and haircuts. I put the intro to this film on the blog a couple of months ago, including some comps at Fistral. Apparently it also has Nigel Semmens in a swimming pool showing how to duckdive !

From 1981. One of the boards on the rack behind Tad appears to be Alex's Vit Sea below.

Here's a John Adams clip from youtube, probably the first British how to surf film from the early 80s.

Great logos, great boards, Freedom surfboards of Jersey shaped by Steve Harewood around 1970.

projects

Obviously its better to pick up a board in great condition, but theres a lot to be said for finding an old banger covered in spray paint for under a tenner, and nursing it back to health and taking it back to the sea when it was heading for the landfill. I've picked up two such boards recently, which have needed surfboard archaeology, scraping back the layers of sray paint to see what it is, usually starting at the logo area on the deck. This singlefin above turned out to be a Windjammer, made in Braunton, but it was suspiciously heavy so I didn't strip it further ,just moved it on.

This one I think is worth the work, its an early / mid 70s Californian made Unity with a cool logo and pink tinted deck with white pinline. Its a bit of a beast at 7'6 x 20 1/2 but I'm keen on surfing it, would need a big day though.

The only other Unity I can find online is this one below from a surf auction, 7'8 stinger - a pretty stylish stick.

This board unfortunately is battered , a very flat home made single from the late 60s with saveable early Bilbo like fin, and for the logo they resined in a very large butterfly !

French board meet

Our friends in France are having a board meet / exchange in Guethary on Saturday, so if you're going on holiday down there or if you live in the area check it out !

Pottz

Martin Pottz Potter was definitely the most successful British born surfer of the 80s, and this is a great clip of him at his peak at the late 80s. He won the ASP event at Fistral in '84 and '87 and became world champ in 1989 earning record prizemoney. He was born in north east England but moved to South Africa when he was young and was a hot grom in Durban and one of the first to bust airs on a regular basis.

Bruce Palmer 70s singlefin

Atlantic Surfer 1978

Bruce at the Watergate bay open 1976 by Alex Williams

I haven't put on one of my own boards for a while so here's my Bruce Palmer singlefin from the mid 70s. Its quite a plain and unassuming board to look at but its beautifully shaped and is great to surf, with less volume than usual on the rails and tail , 6'8 x 20 1/4 x 2 1/2. Bruce was an Australian, and good friend of Kevin Cross. As he says about his days in Devon with Kevin -
''We were friends then as we are now but at that time we were very much in opposition with each other.My business Started in Lobb Field's Quanset Hut before moving to Knowle where I manufactured about 1000 boards that I sold throughout Europe also making some 150 Lightning Bolts under licence..I'd like to think that my business was real boards for real surfers ''
 He was British champ in 1975 and was one of many Aussie surfers who knocked around the south west in the 70s, adding much to the quality of our boards. He starred in the international surf flick Playgrounds in Paradise in 1976 surfing the Severn bore, and the resulting wave was the worlds longest ever recorded on film at the time. The film predictably showed the UK as only having comedy waves compared to the US and Oz, and Rod Sumpter was filmed surfing an enormous board called the Queen Mary in half foot slop.