I was going to say the same thing…
I went from printer to completed full-length masonite template in less than an hour today. 9 sheets of US Letter paper.
Why drive your car, pay money, if you can do it yourself AND recycle paper that way. Print it on a couple of A4’s, tape it together, maybe 15 min. Just check your printer settings so that it divides the PDF over multiple pages.
Using the hollow template maker it’s a no brainer for me!
…Haavard, will be good if it have the option to print all the curve or a full spin template not by sheets…
anyway, I can add to what MD and Tblank wrote is that you do not need to have a template for every board you ll shape; you can blend curves, draw lines and develop an eye for the natural curves intended; that way, you learn a lot about planshapes.
Exactly what Reverb just said is the reason to do your own templates. Learning and "blending curves". I've seen a top name north shore shaper do an outline by bending a Hawaiian Sling to get his curve.
I know. I have bought a large HP plotter, just need to set it up and test it. Just need some spare time. That said, i don’t think it will save much time or be significantly more accurate. Anyone who have tried to lay down a layer of fiberglass cloth on a tacky, saturated blank/cloth know how hard it is to get it down wrinkle free. Same thing applies to some extent when laying down a big sheet of paper on template material dusted with spray glue.
Please do!
Very old thread Vido. Haavard has not posted in a long time.
Drew Baggett (drewtang), of Inspired surfboards said he lays up a sheet of FG cloth on a smooth flat surface covered with a releasing surface (releasing agent, taped down polyethylene sheet, etc.). Marks his template outline on it and cuts with scissors (I will assume right at the tack free stage).
My new approach will be to take printed (or hand-drawn) paper/card stock/heavy weight poster cardboard templates and either lam a layer of 2-oz FG cloth over the paper/card stock or just coat the card stock/poster cardboard with a layer of epoxy resin. Then cut the template outline with scissors right at the tack-free stage.
For things like this, I built a glass table from 2 pieces of sliding-door glass, 4 saw horses, PE foam pipe insulation and 2 pieces of 1/2” X 24” X 30” Baltic birch plywood to keep the glass sheets from bending (BB plywood keeps glass flat). I also add a sheet of 1/8” thick cork underlayment between the sliding-door glass pieces to improve impact absorption/dispersal.
The dust chute on my Skil is .5mm/.020" blotter paper, soaked in epoxy and covered w/ 2oz cloth.
Bill, you will have to explain the table setup to me a little more, I am not understanding it completely. Are you working between or on top of the glass? What does the PET pipe insulation do?
My last template was on 8.5 x 11" (A4-ish) printed papers, taped together on a working glass patio door of the house, with clear packing tape applied to the edges then cut to shape. I want to say I heard that idea once in a conversation with @stoneburner . It’s not the same as something more durable but is quick and easy. If one is careful, it is more than adequate to get an outline onto a blank with a soft 6B pencil carefully chasing the edge.
Jim,
I work on top of the glass.
I set up 4 sawhorses.
I put split Polethylene foam pipe insulation (local hardware store issue) on the top (edge) of the saw horses.
I place one piece of 0.5” X 24” X 30” BB plywood over each pair of PE foam padded sawhorses.
I place one piece of sliding-door glass over the BB plywood on each pair of sawhorses.
I place a sheet of 1/8” cork underlayment over the first piece of sliding door glass (cork trimmed to fit precisely over 1st door-glass piece).
I place the 2nd piece of door-glass (carefully centered) over the 1/8” sheet of trimmed cork underlayment. (You could use thicker cork underlayment for a little better impact absorption/dispersal).
I use the top of the 2nd piece of sliding-door glass as my smooth/flat working surface.
For laminating FG sheets or card stock/poster board on the table top, apply releasing agent or PE sheet taped tight (etc.) on top piece of table glass.
(I can add a piece of properly surfaced glass over the material(s) on the table working surface to get a nice flat surface on both sides of the FG or other materials being used/saturated with resin.)
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Yeah, i knew it was a shot in the dark, ive been fighting with printing a template out of AkuShaper, and found this thread about how people were making boards in akushaper then printing in board cad. Harvard was talking about making a video of making a spin template from it, which would have been cool.
The folks from AkuShaper were quite responsive to me and told me they are working on some new functionality around printing, maybe we can get them to make some spin template functionality.
BTW I use the inexpensive folding plastic saw horses (selection based on the estimated max load I anticipate having).
Glass is heavier than you might think, but so far well below saw horse ratings.
Forgot to mention, I have been playing with my stash of blotter paper, saturating it with epoxy, on and off for the last 9 years.
Very high potential for making composite components/parts — alone or with FG, CF, etc. skins/layers.
For sure, the paper acts much like chopped strand mat without the itchiness and fraying.
@vido do you have access to BoardCAD? The spin template routine there is pretty good. Otherwise you can output an outline DXF from BoardCAD and make the spin template in other CAD software.
I have heard similar news about upgrades to Aku, it will be neat to see what they come up with. Nick is good to work with and posts here from time to time.
I downloaded the exe, but I’m on a mac. Not sure i really want to go through standing up windows to get that working.
Understood. I run it off an old PC and use a flash drive to move files back and forth from my ‘regular’ computer.
I keep an old PC for running some old DOS programs.
I keep it air-gapped. Files are only exported from it via CD — no imported files or jump drives allowed.