hellfire SURFKITE 5.6

[-Brian]

The answer to your question is there's no perfect fin for every person and a it's really personal preference. There's a lot involved with surf conditions, rider size/weight, rider ability, how you weight your feet, trix or traditional surfing, even things like fresh vs. salt water or salt content will affect boyancy and how your board/fins will feel. Personally I like to try a lot of fin models and then make a buying decision. In the states you can do this with programs like the Surfboard Warehouses Finatic program http://www.thesurfboardwarehouse.com...cription.aspx/

But not sure if something like that exists overseas. The other option is your local surf shop may have a Futures fin tree/Test Ride Center http://www.futuresfins.com/fin-tree.php and in some cases they will let you take out a set of fins to test drive.

The one thing that I've found is the Techflex technology seems to hold up better with the added punishment of kiting. I've gone through several honeycomb sets that tend to eventually split down the middle. The standard plastic's do fine as a starting point/all around or backup set. Or you may just like the way they feel the best. But generally speaking you'll find the composite fins like the techflex's have a lot of benefit in terms of weight and performance.

Hope this helps and don't be afraid to experiment and share your own personal findings here.

-Brian

[SurfHenk]

Thank you Brian for the friendly help.

I am not aware of a shop that carries the so called "fin tree".
In fact I know of no shop that caries any Futures fins in my area.
Online information therefore is my only source of information.

Your experience with respect to the stronger Techflex fins versus honeycomb is well noted and will save me from having to finance this knowledge myself.

And I will certainly get back here after having built up some personal experience with the board and fins...

[-Brian]

No problem surfhenk. Be sure and post your findings and good luck!

[Paolo]

I just got my 5'6" in the mail the other day. There was very little wind to try the board out but I've been experimenting on lightwind boards all week, pulling the fins off twin tips to allow some versatility in my tacks. Our station was reading 10-13 mph. I didn't have any wax but I decided to go ahead and try my 15m kite with the Hellfire without the fins. The Cabrinha S-Quad with fins just felt too slow in the water so I wanted to see if finless helped. It definitely worked. The front section of the board got up on plane super fast and I didn't really feel any need for fins with the double concave. The board seemed to want to turn onto the rail. Probably not the most useful knowledge but if you don't have a light wind board, consider messing around without the fins (in a bay or sound of course). Super fun to learn shove-its this way too.

Paolo