Looking to boost light and onshore conditions for my Quad

[manuel]

I've been riding my Starboard Quad (82L/58.5cm) since May and while the grip is decent when conditions are side-on with milder chop, it lacks a little support when it's more on, choppy and gusty. I'm still running the stock Drake fins 11cm forward and 13cm back. I tried different positions but I need more lift. On the wave face, it's fine, can't complain, it's to improve speed, to cross the reef, have greater productivity, head faster upwind and leverage my 5.0-5.3 sails. I could use more volume but it becomes unconfortable in chop or in the air, so I thought above trying different fins.

K4's with Flexies or Stubbies out back in 14cm and 10cm (or 8cm) Ezzy in the front with 1 degree of toe. Cost around $125.
Or Black Project's MiniEpic and Thrusters in 14.5cm and 9cm, cerca $150.

I'll see about trying some fins locally.
Does this make sense according to what I want to achieve? MFC's or MUF's are quite pricey.
Will it truly improve performance or should I try to manage with what I have?

EDIT: Ok after much testing, I am now on 16+11. The 16 are quite far forward (had to grind down the base to set farther forward), they are where I used them as twins. The 11's are maybe 1cm off of the front?

Now I have good drive, I can push strong and get support in light winds (for lulls, bad onshore chop/swell, early planing, etc). It's not skatey but I can still break the fins loose, the grip is tremendous on a wave though, feels very safe going down a choppy wave and I can use so much force at the top turn it feels great.

Top speed isn't that bad at all, definitely not slow the plus side is that I have great control. I got a bit more lift, the nose rarely hits the chop and I can expose the windward rail more easily to maintain the plane.

On a gusty 4.5 day, but not overpowered, I didn't find it particularly stiff, it was fine. Because of side-on conditions when not a wave, we are either going upwind or doing a downwind run right before a jump so having strong fins (or a faster board) helps a bit.

[capetonian]

I swopped the MFC 16 cm rear fins that came standard on my 95 L quad for 15.5 cm Black Project Epic fins and I am very happy with the result. The board has the same get up and go / early planing as before but feels much smoother on the wave. Based on my experience I think that going from 13 cm Drakes to 14.5 cm Epics should improve planing and upwind.

[xander.arch]

Hey Manuel, I've got a bunch of K4s I'm selling in the component section of the classifieds. You may like a few of these options. I'll let go of the whole lot for $100. This would get you:

Two 12cm ezzy assyms fronts (3 degree toe in) slot box - never used
One 15 cm stubby rear slot or us box.
Two 8cm Ezzy assyms (2 degree toe in) slot box.
Two 14cm stubbies slot box.
Two 14cm flexies slot box - these have been sanded to fix scratches and dings.

[manuel]

I had read that multi-fins were very sensitive to adjustments, well I can only confirm this. So far 1cm increments have made big changes through mast foot position, footstraps and fins position on my Quad.

After researching my onshore issues, I hadn't (re)-tuned fins position since tuning mast track and straps positions.

They were set in the middle so I moved them apart 2 or 3 cms, I believe they are 1cm away each from being fully apart which corresponds to two fingers apart when trying to place fingers between the front and rear fins (saw this somewhere too). Wow did it make a difference! Tracking was improved (ex: easier to put straps on in chop), the jibes feel more secure (less bounce), the board is less darty but can still be turned sharply if needed.

Then on a wave it felt like it had a secure grip with a strong connection on the wave, safer bottom turn and strong positive top turn with a greater spin out resistance. Basically fins closer together ressembled more a Twin.

Sailing along it lost some odd partial spin out I was getting and has more friendly tracking. It is as if the turbulence created by the fins being too close had disappeared.

Honestly I was shocked to notice so much difference. It still doesn't scream upwind but this was improved a little.

[dllee]

Bigger fins back, smaller fins forwards for lighter winds.

[manuel]

[dllee]

Lighter winds, you need more resistance sideways, so bigger fins back give more resistance to sideways push from wind and your back foot.
Obviously, a bigger fin setup is the call, but you already HAVE you stock set of fins.
Farther back the fins, the more sidways resistance you get, since you backfoot is farther away, causing less leverage.
Nothing new there, tri fins, and quads, were used in surfboards in the early '70's.

[manuel]

Well yesterday we had a pretty consistent 16-21 knot wind in side to side-on conditions, overhead to mast-high. I'm 67-68kgs.

Basically with the stock 11+13 I wasn't able to plane. Earlier I was out on my old 77L freewave board fitted with a custom 19cm (cut down and slimmed out old freestyle/wave 22cm fin) and I was planing quite often, I'd say 80% of the time with solid speeds. This let me escape sections without having to climb them, let me head back upwind fast to catch at least twice to three times as many waves. But the wave riding feel is underwhelming and quite stiff compared to the Quad Being 82L and 2.5cm wider than my freewave, it floats better and climbs white water pretty much by itself, stays composed in the waves.

When on the freewave when I lose sail pressure I still keep up my speed so when the wind picks back up I accelerate, while on the quad it feels like it pushes lots of water and lacks lift. With the 77L I pumped twice and got a plane, with the Quad I need to pump numerous times to maybe possibly plane, this is heading fully downwind with light feet and 32" lines using a Banzai 5.0 looking for a downhill etc.

I was able to get a hold of 16.5cm and 15.5cm + 8cm MUF fins as well as 16cm + 8cm MFC ProFlex Fins.
I wasn't convinced by either the 15.5+8 or 16+8 combos, it felt like it didn't fit the nature of the board, the board did ride higher up on the water but lacked bite from the front part of the board on a wave.

Then I tried the stock 11s + 15.5 MUF's. This felt like the MUF's didn't match the stock feel, not enough flex and spin out too suddenly.

Finally I tried the MFC 16s + 11s and this gave me tons of grip, good lift (felt like the board was lighter) but is too stiff on a wave (slow rail-to-rail), also the board doesn't feel lively on the water (tracks dead straight) and made it hard to adjust trim to slalom around sections but the MFC's matched the stock fins very well in terms of carve and spray.

So... I was thinking about trimming down my MFC 16 (reduce length and width) to use with the stock 11's until I get something that gives me good lift but isn't too stiff.
The reason why this is important is that we get lots of 15-20 knots days and side-on conditions, I feel like my sail is pulling tons but doesn't translate into board speed. Or am I being in denial and do I need a proper side-on board such as a Kode Wave, Triwave, Pocket Wave, Single Thruster or possibly use a Tabou DaCurve or JP Quadster as a Tri fin setup?

I've had my Quad for a year now. I really enjoy it on a wave no doubt but the more onshore the lighter the more I struggle.

[capetonian]

Have you ever tried your quad as a twin?

[manuel]

Think it's far from 16+8?