In the surf industry, amongst shapers, customers and retailers the new big thing the last few years became the VOLUME of a board. What the beeeep you gonna ask? VOLUME? Yes, volume! The volume is basically measured in LITERS and tells you how much water you would fit into your board if it was hollow. Now you know what VOLUME is.
Why is volume so important? Because it’s going to determine how (well or bad) a board will float you. A board (at least a custom board) is normally adapted to you size, weight and ability to shred. A lot of parameters are taken into account when buying a board or ordering a board to your shaper: Length, Width, Wide Point, Nose, Tail, Nose to Wide Point, Thickness & options such as deck contours, tail options etc. but the VOLUME parameter is never mentioned in the process. Same as a surfboard, or any craft that floats, a bodyboard has a volume and that volume will play a lot when you surf. Know what your min. and max. volume is will be (or should be) a priority very soon. It has helped a lot of surf-riders and pro-surfers to improve their board choice and understanding of shapes and dimensions to know about volumes. When buying a board if the volume of each stock board is indicated on the blister or paper wrap your board choice could be much easier and much better. It’s now the case for a lot of surfboard manufacturers and shapers and it might soon be the case for bodyboard shapers.
In the bodyboarding industry (appart from some brands but very few of them) the dimensions of the stock boards are not even mentioned on the board packaging or on the website you’re buying your boards from but it plays a lot for riders (pros or amateurs) and it’s crucial to know those dimensions. Shapers, if you read this you know it’s crucial.
Knowing your min. and max. volume will help you choose your board(s) for prone, DK, small waves, bigger waves, hollow waves etc. Having more volume will help in smaller conditions for example while having less volume will help for control in heavier waves. Playing with volumes (thickness and dimensions are what will make your volume increase or decrease) will be the next level in choosing the right board(s). Of course the different cores will also play since some are more or less buoyant (PE is less buoyant than PP for example) but given the same core knowing what exact volume your board is will definitely be useful when you choose a board.
We reckon knowing and indicating the volume of each board on its packaging and online specs will be the future of professional shaping and serious brands. We’ve warned you and you’ve read it on Spongercity.com first. Yewwww
From Wikipedia for the geeks: Volume is the quantity of three-dimensional space enclosed by some closed boundary, for example, the space that a substance (solid, liquid, gas, or plasma) or shape occupies or contains.[1] Volume is often quantified numerically using the SI derived unit, the cubic metre. The volume of a container is generally understood to be the capacity of the container, i. e. the amount of fluid (gas or liquid) that the container could hold, rather than the amount of space the container itself displaces.
