Just wondering if i change my 6.5'' center fin to something bigger will my 9ft hokua be less tippy?. How will this change the performance of the board? I still have the standard side fins installed that the board came with, not the small quad ones.

cheers.

A bigger centre fin will def make it less tippy, but yeah as DJ said it will stiffen it up through the turns.
If you aint standing on the board when the waves come you won't get to do a turn so it's worth a try.

Sorry for the ambush, but I was thinking of turning my 11'6" Nalu (currently single fin) into a thruster...would it make any difference?

I've been surfing it (I'll call it that for clarity) on small waves & I was told that the 2 side fins would make a big improvement for turning, but don't want to alter its flatwater or dw ability.

My 2 Cents,

What I am suggestion has all be done on sub 9ft boards, mainly rounded square tails and lighter riders.

From the experimentation we have done your better off going to larger side fins like a MRTX this puts greater fin area at the outside of the board near the rails and greatly increases stability, think wing tips on a race car I guess. We have found this is far more effective than increasing the depth of the center fin. We also found the increased side fins allowed a decrease in the center fin size, often to the point where the ceterfin was shallower than the sides.

This fin set up allowed Kristi to ride a 8.0 x 25 inch board that was almost impossible to stand on without the larger sides in much rougher onshore conditions.

Play around and see what you like.

If you wish to improve the 11'4 I would suggest that you go to a 9 inch cut away fin. We used these and 7inch cutaways on the Laird 12'1s to great advantage and it made them really fun to surf in smaller waves. You still have the limitations of the board length and width however it does improve performance and fun.

Phill