I paddle with him often

Yes! Please pass on the message (from one of the windsurfers he had beers with in Geneva 30 years ago). Eagle pretty much nailed it. The M14 is wonderfully neutral and carvy but lacks speed in tamer conditions. A narrower faster more performance oriented downwind board for the fitter lighter paddler could find a market. They make for awesome all-round boards and there are plenty of lighter guys and girls who don't need the volume and width of current DW board offerings.

I'm almost ready to move to a 26' wide planing bottom race board. However I'm not particularly interested in racing and our festive conditions are wildy crosschopped so I wouldn't mind taking a tamer, more DW, version as long as its almost as quick. Speed matters.

Something that takes off on a plane quick, and holds it. Neutral, predictable and just carvable enough like Jimmy excels at making. Sleek nose a la M14 but much lower. Could be lower volume a la Rogue Rage for the lighter performance rider. 26.5” wide sounds just perfect. Only thing I’d add to Eagles wish list is a very slight V, or belly, under the nose for less slapping in upwind chop.

^^^ thanks for pics. They look nice. I like the nose and the nose belly. Everyone is waiting for someone to actually see or ride one.

Optimal width of a downwind board is best opened in another topic. I'm very curious about this.
http://www.standupzone.com/forum/index.php/topic,27309.0.html

Yugi, ask me anything you want about the new Bark 14 Downwinder. I've got one and plan to go out surfing on it here in a few minutes. Had so much fun on it in small surf yesterday I want to go again today.

Well, I'm not Yugi, but here goes:

How heavy is it?
Does it have a ledge handle?

Thanks!

Thanks Eagle. But the Surftech 2015 catalog doesn't say anything detailed about construction, as far as I can see. How is the pro-elite construction different now that Surftech is owned by Cobra?

Oh and in the video,,,,,  http://www.surftech.com/sup/bark-downwinder-0

That is not the 2015 Downwinder. Morgan is on a different board.

Area 10,

Yes it has the ledge handle. Weight is 28 lbs w/o the skeg. The construction is Pro Elite.

Here is the link http://www.surftech.com/technology

Surftech is not actually owned by the Cobra factory. They are both owned by an investment group. More info if you search Surftech's press releases.

Ok, so I should have been more careful with my words and said "now that Surftech and the factory where the boards are owned by the same people".

So it looks like Pro-Elite means half-carbon bottom and a high density foam sandwich in the standing area. Is that any different from how Pro-Elite boards were in the past? I'm just asking because DW boards tend to take more of a beating than flat water ones so it is useful perhaps if they are a little more robust.

I'm glad that Surftech have ditched the LiftSUP type handle that they had on the Lopez downwind boards. I assume the ledge handle is like you get on new Naish, Coreban etc boards? In other words you can curl your fingers right round inside? Handle design is a big deal when you are carrying a board in high winds.

It does look a lovely board. It's a shame we probably won't have any demo boards here in the UK.

Thanks Eagle. But those old videos show Joe Bark's custom factory, which is nothing to do with where the production boards are made - at the Cobra facility in Thailand.

And I can't test a new board because there are none here. The only ones in the UK right now will have been made at the factory before Surftech were bought out by the owners of Cobra. The question I am asking specifically refers to whether the methods of construction have changed following the Surftech change of owner.

The Bark boards are (at least in the UK) very significantly cheaper than eg. SIC. So I don't think it would necessarily be a fair comparison to put the SiC full carbon SCC construction up against a ProElite one. But although it looks like the Bark is a little heavier, 28lbs is still pretty good, as long as the board is solid. But at that weight you are competing with the Jimmy Lewis construction of the M14, which puts just about anything else to shame because it is I think full PVC sandwich. So I'm just wanting to know if anything has changed about the ProElite construction from last year - but it sounds like no-one here really knows. Usually when an investment company takes over a firm, the first thing they will do is look for cost savings. That is fine, as long as they are passed onto us, the customer. A construction that works fine for a raceboard like the Dominator might still for instance be pretty flexy when subjected to the infinitely greater forces of surfing bumps when downwinding. I think this is why the construction options that SIC give are cheap-but-heavy "tough-wood (sandwich) construction" or "light-but-expensive" full carbon options. There's a huge price difference between the two. It's about how to control flex, I think. Flex robs a board of a lot of speed downwind - just try downwinding an inflatable to see what I mean.

It will mow, but it really comes into it's own when the swell is big enough to turn on and traverse.