This changes everything.
Or pretty much everything. Like the minds of those detractors who said this couldn’t be done. Some of you said that this was something that mankind had no right to dabble in. You laughed and called me a fool. You said that man should not play god. But now, I have crossed that boundary. After years in the lab and in the water, I give you……
…..bamboo stained with tempera paint using only implements available in my garage. And a misting spray bottle my wife doesn't know I took from under the sink. I call it colored bamboo. You will call it a breakthrough.
Let me be the first to say that I didn’t discover bamboo. Nor did I figure out how to turn those irregular hollow tubes into smooth flat sheets that look like furniture. I don’t know how that is done. But I did develop a very cheap way to stain bamboo using tempera paint. Tempera paint, you will remember is used somehow in Japanese restaurants to fry shrimp. Here I have used it to fill a massive void in the knowledge base of what some will call “bamboo science”, or BS for short.
I know you have doubts. You are saying “Wow, this is some serious BS, Greg. The true test of your work will be its performance in waves of consequence”. That is why I have set up the sticky above that allows you to donate money via PayPal to send me to Australia for 3 months so that I can really give this technology a chance to be tested. And test it I will. I’ll test it every day that it is over 3 feet with offshore winds. I’ll test every primary color in which tempera paint can be found. I’ll test until my stomach bleeds with rashes, until my arms are noodles, until I have been shacked in every pitching wave I can find. And faithfully, I will report back everything I can remember about my experiences and all the BS I come across. I will write some of it down.
Please give generously. There is no cure for garage surfboard building: gregsBSproject@gmail.com
*No Swaylockians were abused in the development of this new technique. Gary, I am sorry if this little spoof is stupid. You are still the man. I meant no disrespect.
**And Rusty, I know things about bamboo, besides color. No spoofing. PM me. I'm in SD in a few weeks.
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[Layout the bamboo panels, use a razor knife and straight edge to cut 1-inch strips, lay them out on paper, dilute the tempera paint with water so it will just stain and not completely cover the bamboo grain, let it dry. Don't use red. It just looks pink if you do. Of course, the strips curled up after drying so I re-wet with a mist of water and coiled them up and let them dry again. Then tape the strips on to the main bamboo panel (like you would if building balsa skins), on the OUTSIDE of the bamboo, use your template to mark and cut the outline shape with sicssors, and bag them on. Be brave and bag both sides in the same pull. The colored strips came out pretty crisp on the lines in spite of how the fuzzy pics show. I will glass this weekend and post some more pic's next week. With sicssors, the cut lines are so even that you really don't need a pinline to hide the edge. You can clean up the edges with a little sanding if you wobble on the cut. But, it just looks better with a pinline, so I will use some automotive pinline tape. Right now it weighs 2 pounds and 1 oz. It is 5-11 and I used 1.5 pound foam from Ken at Segway. Love his foam.]
