I'm doing a board restoration of a board made in the early 70s and I was wondering, what OZ glass was used back to glass boards? I want to make this restoration perfect and do it with the same OZ cloth used then.
Thanks!
The boards I glassed in the 70’s were almost always one layer of 8 oz. glass top and bottom. The weave was either “twist” weave or “flat” weave. Flat was harder to work with for lapping contours and timing was pretty critical as to when the resin was kicking when lapping very thin, sharp tail rails… you usually had one chance to get it right with the flat weave, or you were kinda screwed.
Nearly all the glass I worked with was Volan finish and I taped off all the laps. No freelaps. Lots of foam stains, tints, pigments, and resin pinlines. The first guy I ever heard of doing sprays was “Artist John” (Bredon?) for Bahne and Rainbow Surfboards. Others followed quickly.
I think the first time I ever saw silane finish was on a Dick Brewer “Semi Speed Shape” Hobie in one of their shops in Santa Cruz. I remember flipping out on “how white” the board looked. It had triple 1/4" balsa stringers 6" apart with black glue ups and the new removable (bolt thru deck) fin system. It was very light for the time… about '66" of '67. I bought the board for $158.08. It weighed 23 lbs. Everyone else I knew had boards weighing 28 to 32 lbs. . One guy told me “this thing is a flyaway, it just won’t work”.
Awesome, I'll have to call up the shop where I get my supplies at to see if they have it, if not would you think that I could get what i need at a marine supply store instead? Anyways, I was sanding down dings and stress cracks and it was taking forever to get down to the cloth, not like modern boards where you get down to the cloth in 5 seconds. Ha thats nuts, I'm really drawn to the older boards, I'll scan craiglist for old boards for cheap, that's how I got my 9'6 early 60s popout, thing's a monster, its about 4 inches thick and weighs like 30 something pounds, got it for 50 bucks. Same price as my board I'm fixing up right now, it's a 6'8 roundtail singlefin. Beautiful board.
Go for it. In the meantime look up the Bruce Fowler 8 ft. Owl thread for some inspiration and history.
That's pretty neat Bruce, I'm actually looking to buy an old beat up Jim Phillips board that needs it's tail rebuilt for 20 bucks, I told him about it and he was stoked, I'm looking to get another board in better condition he did in the 70s, It's pretty cool to get in touch with the shaper of an old board one picked up to restore. My board is the same exact color set up as the 8ft owl! red rails and bottom, yelllow deck, pretty weird huh? anyways I did a ton of sanding today, cut out a nasty delam, The delamed area had tons of stress cracks on it so I figured the best bet was to start fresh. The tail and a part of the rail opened up so i need to completely build up the tail and part of the rail. The guy I bought it off of had it since the 70s and did all the repairs himself. sun cure and duct tape. anyways this should be a good restoration project, I'm really stoked on this board, and just thinking about getting this board perfect again is making me antsy to work on it.
Howzit superfan, I believe we were using 71/2 oz glass back then since that was what the box said. Aloha,Kokua
awesome, thanks! I'll probably go with 8oz since I didn't see any at the marine supply store near me. The shop I get my glass and resin at is about an hour's drive and I'm without a car for a few days so if I must, I'll go local.
Hey super!
You didn’t say where you were at, but just
about every supplier in th US should carry the
correct cloth for your resto. You want 7.5 oz volan.
Everybody tends to call it 8 oz, but it’s really 7.5 oz.
It is what all the Cali glass shops use for old school
lb glass work. In the mid 60’s a lot of the boards were
glassed with 10 oz. boat cloth as that was what we
could get at boat yards. A 10 oz deck & bottom with
a knee patch would really add up the weight!!
Anyway, foam-ez has volan as does fiberglass supply
up north. Hope this helps!
Awesome!, thanks! There's a marine supply that has the "8 oz" cloth I need, I'm in RI, And I found out the board is shaped in Cape Cod so It's shaped for our kind of waves. anyways I'm not too sure if this is the right stuff I need.
http://www.newportnautical.com/Fiberglass-Cloth-8oz-38-x1yd-p/266.htm
should I go with this or order online? This store is local by the way.
Kokua & Surfteach are right… I used 7.5 oz. but everyoe just called it 8 oz.
Even today people round off stuff like 4 and 6 oz. which might be more like 3.7 and 5.6…
You will learn a lot from the projects you are doing. A lot of us started out by repairing and then restoring.
Have fun…
$12.99 for one yard is steep! You might want to check some other sources like Thayercraft.com or Surf Source to save $$$ on your projects. Personally I wouldn’t pay $13 for one yard of cloth plus shipping too.
[quote="$1"]
Kokua & Surfteach are right.......... I used 7.5 oz. but everyoe just called it 8 oz.
Even today people round off stuff like 4 and 6 oz. which might be more like 3.7 and 5.6..
You will learn a lot from the projects you are doing. A lot of us started out by repairing and then restoring.
Have fun.......
$12.99 for one yard is steep! You might want to check some other sources like Thayercraft.com or Surf Source to save $$$ on your projects. Personally I wouldn't pay $13 for one yard of cloth plus shipping too.
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Right on, I'd only go there if I really needed some. I only go to the shop where I get my resin and cloth when I need more resin, To save on gas