Imax1 said..
Interesting……..
Id love a go.

There are certainly lots of creative and excellent shapers in Australia

Peter Nitschke has experimented with channel step boards since the 80's. I've sailed a few of them and owned a couple for several years from formula down to speed. You may find them used in Qld . Slightly different to Bruce's

I tested the board in the 2nd last photo and owned the board in the last photo.. Peter also built me a super short slalom board around 220x70 with channel step that I asked him to do.

Super photo. Great to know this stuff was done before. I wonder why the design didn't keep going?

Ostracism was created to stop people becoming tyrants? Maybe this board style has always been a tyrant.

John340 said..

Gestalt said..
As humans we tend to ostracise things that are different.

Or the innovation did not prove to be an advantage in competition

Yep. And that was my experience with step hulls and they didn’t turn particularly well either. The one I have is fun to run for something different but it’s not faster or smoother than my current boards. Well done for having a crack at revisiting an old idea

There should be info on the boards here.
I’d not made a website before but got a little possessed and popped this out.
jimswindsurfing.com/pages/mckee-project

Speaking specifically about peters boards.. Not everything is built for competition. Some things are an exploration of alternative ideas.. testing the limits..steps forward come from trialling new ideas.. but do not assume that elements of peters channel step board didn’t make their way into commercial boards.

for me personally i think the idea works well. Especially on wider bigger volume boards.. i wasn’t the biggest fan on smaller speed boards but others will disagree. i’ve not had any issues turning the boards i owned and found the accentuated v on them made them very smooth in chop..the step also has a similar effect as cutouts in that the reduced planning area effects lift so when fully lit the boards sits well in the water.

the 2 downsides for me were the boards are slower to plane and if the v is not done properly the fin can spinout. Bruces boards have s much longer area behind the step so probably are less prone to fin cavitation.

I really enjoyed watching your video Tom. Good music. Budgie looks like a wicked spot. And good history lesson. I bet they truck up wind.