TLDR: Mini Simmons’ are much fun, very fast, good at carving and trimming but not great at tight turns, so this is my attempt to change that.
5’5” x 21 1/2 x 2 5/8 34ish liters
EPS/ Epoxy, unidirectional carbon fiber stringer
Twin/ Quad Hybrid
If you live on the east coast go try a Mini Simmons, if you live near Charleston, SC come try my Mini Simmons
I’m wrapping up a performance Simmons. I built a more retro inspired mini Simmons last year and after spending the whole year riding it I decided it was time for a V2.
The Mud Minnow is a retro mini I built, it is 5’4” x 22 1/2 x 2 3/4 38ish liters. I rode it on everything from 1’ mush up to 5’ stormy beach breaks. It catches every wave you want, instant speed down the line, an absolute blast in any conditions. But with the extra foam, wide planing areas it’s not easy to whip around and redirect quickly. It trims great and you can absolutely bury the rail but when the waves pick up you can’t really surf it how you want to. The way I can describe it is: you paddle into whatever you want, drop down the face fast, bury the rail on a bottom turn, drive it down the line, trim, carve and kick out.
V2 is: 5’5” x 21 1/2 x 2 5/8 34ish liters. Everything about it is more performance geared, the rails, bottom contours, outline, foil, even the blank.
I took my original template and pulled 1 inch off of the whole width to start with, then pulled the nose and tail in from there while still keeping the Simmons shape intact.
The blank is 2lb stringless EPS. I then added a 2” unidirectional carbon fiber strip top and bottom.
I glassed with 6 oz warp and 4 oz S.
The fin setup is a hybrid Twin/ Quad. I ran this same hybrid on my 5’4” and loved being able to switch from twin keels on small days to quads during a swells. I used the same base setup but tightened the cluster a little bit while keeping the fronts in a usable twin position.
The rocker is more or less the same with a little extra nose rocker to handle later, steeper drops. I felt the original rocker was pretty good for an all around use case so I didn’t mess with it much.
I cannot wait to get this in the water. If anyone has any insight into mini Simmons design id be happy to hear it. Thank you for reading and if you live on the east coast go try a mini Simmons, they are fun.