Reading a Cold-Water Forecast Without the Apps
Star ratings are a summary of somebody else's opinion. Four raw numbers will tell you more, and they take about ninety seconds to read.
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Autumn Swell Season
Built for the days
everyone else sits out
Hand-shaped boards, four-season neoprene and the small hardware that decides whether a session happens. Chosen for cold water, grey light and long paddles.
- Shaping since
- 2009
- Boards a month
- 40
- Ships within
- 3 days
- Fit guarantee
- 30 days
The range
Five things between you and the water
Fresh off the racks
This month from the bay
Short runs, glassed to order and photographed the morning they came off the rack. When they are gone the next batch is four weeks out.
Bay 2 — Porthaven Cove
The workshop
One bay, one bench, forty boards a month
Every Tidewell board starts as a pencil line on a blank in the Porthaven bay. We shape to a rider, not to a size chart — then we glass it heavy enough to survive a winter of reef.
- 40
- Boards a month
- 16
- Years on the bench
- 92%
- Bio-resin content
- 1.2 km
- Bay to the water
Field notes
Ten degrees, grey light, nobody out
Our test window runs from October to March, because that is when equipment either works or lets you down. Everything on this site has been through a winter on the reef before it was allowed a product page.
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Notes from the water
How Long a 4/3 Actually Lasts
We cut open eleven returned wetsuits to find out what actually kills neoprene. It is almost never the surfing.
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Packing a Board for a Cold Coast
Nine hours on a ferry, a dark car park and a February gale. How to get two boards to the north coast without a…
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Swell notes, twice a month
Forecast reading, workshop updates and first access to short-run shapes. No noise, no discount spam.