My latest thoughts have been to build a mini-ish simmons as an alternative to my longboard which I use but dont really enjoy. This board is to be designed for marginal conditions when its very small, waist high and below.
My question is about 1lb foam and deck skins etc. I have got some free sheets of 1lb eps and i have a few sheets of thin timber which is fractionally thinner than 1/16. The timber is essentially a thin sliced veneer of unknown timber.
I intend to surround the blank with a perimeter of 5mm steam bent beech (because i had some and it bends steam well) Then i will use more timber for the rails so the board will not need a centre stringer.
Will I get away with glueing the timber skin direct to the blank and then using 6oz epoxy hand lay up over the whole lot? If not will 2oz under the skin and 60z over be enough to stop the deck denting? For reference I am large at 6’5 and 220lbs
The deck skin will be attached as a patch, i.e. not wrapping the rails and will most likely be sand covered rather than vac bagged.
Lastly the foam will be encased in timber so its safe to use poly resin in theory but I assume poly resin is not really compatible with timber skins?
If it were me I’d use a standard weight or lightweight PU core, which will better support your shell and which will localize the water damage if/when your glass job springs a leak. I’d use a lightweight non-woven veil under the wood to get a better bond with the foam. I’ve used vinylester over wood veneer a few times and I never had a problem with it so i would guess polyester would also work, although I’d never do it because VE is stronger and more flexible than PE. I have no reason to ever use PE for anything other than a finish coat over VE lam+fill.
I’ve used 1.5# EPS with veneers and heavy fiberglass reinforcement in the impact areas, but have read numerous comments in the past about 1# EPS cores in compsands going to mush under heavy use. The difference in weight between 1# vs 2# foam in a 50 liter board is only going to amount to 1.75#, which shouldn’t be a deal breaker for someone of your stature.
Besides, the mini-sim designs can arguably use a little heft.
A wood deck patch over PU with VE or epoxy glassing is a killer combo in terms of durability.
Thanks for your thoughts. I have this foam for free anyway and so wanted to see if I could make something useful from it. I have the wood for the rails and skins around my workshop so all i need to buy is resin and glass.
Really interested to hear about polyester or vinylester resin suitability for use with timber skins.
As i say, my experience with esters over wood was with VE, not PE. i know the fin guys do PE over wood so they’d know more about that.
What I did was cheater coats directly onto the wood, sanding into it to fair it out prior to glassing. That worked fine, but I think the wood species is a factor with some being better with glassing that others.
if you would skip the glass under veneer, you dont get the sandwich structure that is allways sveral times stronger. gues you dont need to save 20 minutes of work and a bit of weight.
as the veneer is thin, I would consider standing area patch, another 2oz or to be sure 6oz at 45 degrees. with 6 oz over all it should be then nicely strong.
Greg Loerh had us laying a layer of fg on the core side of the veneer then wetting the cloth and veneer out at the same time and using the cloth to adhere the veneer to the core. No extra time or effort required. It adds very little weight to the board. The cloth adds a little more protection to the veneer from water damage migrating from any leaks through the open-cell foam. .
Brilliant guys/gals for your thoughts. Especially kookie with your experience of 4/4/4 on 1.5lb not being enough. Food for thought.
I am a big lump and not the most graceful so would rather err on the side of a good strong deck. I’ll maybe save the 1/16 stuff for the bottom and use 6/oz -3mm timber-6oz on the Deck
1/16" wood with 4oz glass under and over will make a strong skin. I vac bag so that tends to make a nice strong composite as it squeezes out excess resin. I don’t know if sand or weight will do the same.
I am making a board from slices of 1lb EPS and I’ve only used 2 layers of 8 oz glass on the deck. Not sure how well it will hold up, but I don’t plan on adding the wood skin. The last one I did like this has a 1/16" balsa skin.
How is the rocker being made? Is it through shaping, or a rocker bed? If you shape the rocker in the foam, you need something to hold that shape when you add the skins. We use a rocker bed with stringerless foam. You could add the wood rails first then add the skins and that should hold the rocker. Use a foaming PU glue to attach the rails and you’ll be able to sand them easier than if you use an epoxy.
Best to use an epoxy resin for the skins and all the glassing. I’ve done epoxy lams then tried PU as a final coat. Any pinholes will allow resin to get through and it will melt the foam. Usually a vac bagged skin with glass under the wood not have pin holes to the foam.
Hot wired the blank so I don’t have a rocker bed but the rocker is so small it will be was to make something. I have just glued on the 4mm beech perimeter stringer so that should hold most of the rocker.
Great to hear Tha 6oz 1/16 6oz will be enough. That was my main question as I don’t want to go to the trouble and cost of epoxy glassing to find out it just craters the deck after 1 surf.
Here is the progress so far. Foil and rocker hotwired and perimeter stringer glued on. Need to decide on bottom shape now. I’m thinking belly with chine rails and a single concave right through and out the tail.
Gdaddy, you mentioned vacuum bagging the inner glass cloth on and the skin at the same time. Did the skin get treated at all? A cheater coat of anything? Does it soak up a lot of resin, I assume some extra resin was allowed? I am assembling a vac bag setup so keen to give this a go soon. Thanks.
you do need to be mindful to not use too much vacuum on the lighter density EPS foams because if you get over 8PSI you can collapse the foam.
we tend to overthink it and look for problems that aren’t there. I would say it’s easier to get a clean veneer install than it is to get a clean conventional. I never once had a problem with veneer installs going wrong. You just need to think through your process and use your head.
Bottom skin on with 2oz under. I wet out the 2oz on the underside of the skin so ended up using about an extra 15% of resin than 1:1. Bagged it, after a few practise efforts and it went really well. Even after heavy sanding the cheap ply cover sheet is very firm. Next up the deck.
Have the rails bent and ready to glue on so the deck skin is the next piece of the puzzle. I am considering using 2mm cork but was after some advise as i have searched a lot in the archives and found some good info but nothing definitive.
I am thinking 6oz under and cork deck patch bagged on together then do 6oz hand lam over the outside. Will this be stong enough to stop deck denting on 1lb foam?
I could do a 1/16 wood deck skin but with the solid wood rails and very thin 1/16 ply bottom skin i thought the cork might help the flex.
If you’re good at glassing and you’re careful not to burn through when you glass you could consider doing 4oz over and under, and just reinforce the deckpatch and finpatch areas that take the most impact. Personally, I prefer hiding the reinforcement under the wood. I also prefer to seal the wood with a cheater coat and fair it out prior to glassing over it, although a lot of the veneer and compsand guys don’t do that. .
Hi gdaddy - Way back when Greg Loehr demonstrated at one of the Cerritos College programs I attended, he glassed the ‘inside’ of the veneer panels (top and bottom)), waited for a cure (during lunch break), trimmed them with scissors to a template (used the nose end of the template for both ends of the panels - great demo of the french curve approach), applied more epoxy to panels and blank, then vacuumed. I think that video was recorded at the same session.
Yeah, I remember that at the time. Later he came back and revised his process to simply lay some cloth against the core side of the veneer, wet the cloth and veneer out at the same time and bag them both onto the core. Similar effect but even less resin. I’ve done it both ways and haven’t had any problems either way. Now I’ve been using non-woven veil instead of cloth in order to get the extra adhesion without as much stiffness, and I just use cloth when I want the reinforcement.
Huie was using net and bagging wood to PU cores. I’ve done veneers to PU and that’s become my favorite combo.
For anyone reading about veneer now and thinking of getting something different…
I tried 1mm oak veneer with shrinkwrap and water bags. Didn’t work, to my surprise. Some gaps under the veneer. It’s the inflexibility on a compound curve.
Will have to try it with a vacuum one day with smaller strips of veneer. Maybe that would work better and easier than making the skins separately
