Nice. I’m very excited to see your work, as I’ve been mulling a very similar home depot foam core project myself.
gordof: I don’t want to hijack a thread, but here are a couple of shots of the board I mentioned. I thought I posted the entire build here, but I guess I only posted it over at tree2sea.
swerfle: can you send me a link to your $12 ply build? i would really like to check that thing out
Foam will not hold the rocker curve in the nose of your board , the plywood will just bend it flat. Gorilla glue will not hold that curve even if you use a wood stringer. Gorilla glue is not good for much of anything except glueing foam or balsa wood and it doesn’t take impact well anyway. The only thing that is going to hold that rocker is epoxy glue. You got a problem with filling in the nose block . What your building is a lost cause. By all means check out swerfles building thread . Put your project on the back burner and learn more about wood board building , your wasting your time and materials on what you are trying to build now. Your money would be better spent buying a board kit from Tuck and doing your build with that so you can get a good understanding of the engineering of wood surfboards.
http://www.grainsurf.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=11 Heres a link that will get you to where you need to be. Not trying to be a prick or anything but I do think that the route your are takeing is just going to burn you out on wood board building !
i have to agree with Wood_ogre, abit of research goes a long way and after all that hard work you want a board that surfs and lasts a decent amount of time.
Good to see you having a crack though!!
heres my wooden mini sim
here’s a link, but note that although the plywood for the ribs, decking etc was only $12, I also had to buy wood for rails-$15? (and figure out how to cut it down), wood glue- $15… the real cost is in the glass/epoxy, which I thnk cost me around $100. Plus, I did all my sanding by hand and the cost of sandpaper is not insignificant either. I’m guessing around $200 total.
If you poke around tree to sea, you will find a little of everything and plenty of guys who have experimneted much more than I.
http://www.grainsurf.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=2902&start=0
First, there are plenty of guys on this website whose wood-working skills put me to shame. when they have a wood-working question, they pretty much defer to wood ogre. ignore his advice at your own risk.
That said, I’m not sure about the plywood flattening the foam in an unhelpful way in your design. Plywood is terrible at compound curves. It will straigten out, and foam will not stop it. BUT, those 2x4’s might. (Depends how much of them are left once you shape them).
I haven’t spent a ton of time around mini-simmons shapes, but from what I’ve seen, they are (1) pretty flat, and (2) the nose has high rails and belly.
Is it possible that this is basically the effect you’d get with a piece of plywood trying to flatten out, but being resisted by a couple of 2x4’s along the rails?
if the deck were be basically flat from side to side (admittedly, thats a huge “IF”, I’m not sure how that would work, but it seems like what you are planning), you could get some curvature into the plywood along the nose to tail axis. as the plywood flattend out, it MIGHT? remain more curved along the 2x4 rails and flatten out a bit thorugh the centerline, leaving you with high rails and a bit of belly? It sounds difficult to control, and I’m sure there are better ways to accomplish this, but if someone else wants to try it, I’d love to see the result.
(on the other hand this would create a compound curve, so its not very
likely to be very pronounced. another possibility is that the plywood
would straighten itself by lifting off the foam in the middle of the
curve, so you’d have to find a very solid adhesive to attach it to the
rails: Titebond II or III I’ve always gone with III, but I read that in practice, the only difference is the color and $).
swerfle, A lot of first timers on trees to sea have done good boards because they did a lot of home work first . When my step son came to live with me at age of fifteen he wanted to learn to make things out of wood like I do . I made the mistake of trying to starting out with the basics so he could learn the skills needed . He knew beter than me and wanted to do complex things but didn’t have the basics down so he couldn’t do it and it burned him out real fast so descided he didn’t like woodworking . Now at 28 years old he wishes he had learned the skills needed to do wood working. I have always believed that it is better to learn from other woodworkers successes and failures and then try to take that information to the next level . My concern with seann is that he dosen’t have the basics yet (you dont use up drill bits, you sharpen them) he will burn out on the first project and never want to build again ! The internet is an aprenticeship, you can learn almost anything you want there if you do your home work and you don’t have to spend years in a real aprentice program to learn. I have given my advise to seann now it is up to him to do with it whatever he wants. So I am done with this thread and wont bother him any more.
I’ve begun work on my nose block. The block will be a “six pack” of 2x4s 2 feet long laminated together. I intend to cut the nose outline into the block (step 3), then the inner outline (step 4) so it is essentially a 1 inch wide nose cap, then the rocker, just as I did the 2x6’s for rails (step 7).
In order to attach the finished nose block, I intend to cut a notch into the nose block and the nose end of hte 2x6’s and glue a piece of 2x4 into the notch to join both pieces. I’m sure there’s a name for that process but I don’t know it. Other than that mechanism, it’s just going to be the hull and deck pieces glued sandwiching the nose block that keep it in place.
I’m glad we can get back to my project, and out of some fantasy land where I am attempting to pursue a career in woodworking and asked for an “apprenticeship” on the internet which I believe was spelled out very clearly to the contrary in my first post.
I’ve abandoned my nose block of 2x4’s. My connection to tools to shape the block has vanished and so i am altering my plan.
I’ve glued the last 18" of the “stringer” I ditched a few weeks ago to the nose to hold the rocker. Attached to this, I will have two slats of 1/4" ply glued to the hull and the rails. This will obviously leave a substantial portion of the nose of my board unsupported, which is cool with me and may produce some interesting ride characteristics, who knows!?!
Seann is trying to sneek out the back door ?
Went out to lunch and never came back ! .Finish what you start !
Lots of progress but no time to update the thread (like anyone still reads it). Tail block in place, nose is taking shape slowly, and the nose rocker is rockin.
Project totals thus far: marine plywood: $57 redwood 2x6: free clamps: $24 sandpaper: $3 1 qt defthane polyurethane gloss: $17 titebond II: $8
TOTAL: $109
Glueing newspaper to the floor of your garage: priceless.
Spending any more isn’t in the plan, but we’ll see how it goes.
Someone is always lurking cool to see your pushing ahead.
i’m still watching/waiting. moar pics!
progress: got the top down. also glued the nose cap but I don’t have pictures of that quite yet. Finally looks more like a surfcraft than a coffin. screwed the deck into the rails with glue on the deck. looks damn good if I do say so myself. Thanks to anyone who finds this somehow and cares to say hello.
YES!!! show us more in the light! looks like fun so far.
You would get a high five from me if you paddled this into the lineup.
