cheers!!
will call them tommorow and see if they have them in stock!
will make fitting boxes much easier!
Hey Doc thanks for the unreal tips- you can never learn too much
Hi Doc -
Sorry to drift off topic but agreed.... great stuff. Ding repair is an easy way to earn some extra money. If you've been making boards for awhile, much of what you need is in the scrap pile. Not nearly as much at stake in ding repair as in making boards.
If I may, I'd like to add a key essential. The PRICE LIST. With material costs going up by the minute, don't sell yourself short.
I've seen a couple of examples, one of my favorites being a bashed up board hanging on the wall with every bit of damage (including missing fins) circled and priced for repair. Just a basic price chart will do. A bottom line minimum price is typically around 35.00. Hopefully the days of 10.00/ding are long gone. With acetone around 20/gallon, tape 5.00+/roll and sandpaper through the roof, you gotta make ends meet!
Here's a link to the Board Lady website with her 2007 price list. Keep in mind that she is an expert and can do nearly perfect color matching, vacuum bagging, etc. http://www.boardlady.com/priceschedule.htm
And another basic price list... again, a few years old but within reason.
https://swaylocks7stage.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/ding%20repair%20prices.doc
Hey, John,
I agree, a price list posted is a necessity. I'd suggest dry-erase markers, as otherwise it's a hassle when you have to change 'em. Materials are not gonna go down, nor is cost of living and so on. Like the cost of making a board, the cost of doing dings can involve a lot beyond the materials. More on that in a moment, after a digression.
Eva, the Board Lady - heeee, if I had been born female in Germany, and had my act a LOT more together, I guess I'd have had pretty much her life.Naval Architect/Marine Engineer, boatyard owner and more? That's what I wanted to do when I grew up. Indeed, I should also add that I'd have to be a good deal smarter than I am to accomplish what she's done.
Anyways, back to prices - in no particular order -
The lists you mention are definitely a little low for 'now'. Back a few years ago, I was basing my prices on clearing $50 per hour, after materials costs but not after
- Tools, tool repairs and tool replacements
- Electricity
- Sandpaper and polish.
- Oh, and a couple of hours a week for shop cleanup. My workshop is for woodworking and metalworking for a living. Fiberglass dust, resin dribbles and so forth need to be dealt with so that the whole thing gets messed up.
$50 an hour may seem like quite a lot, but if you're doing, say, a dozen $15 dings on several boards over two working hours, that's not unattainable. If you have several lined up and you are efficient, you can do it and better. But if you're doing one or two at a time for beer change, well.... that's something else again.
Charge extra for a 'go-to-the-head-of-the-line' fee. The jokers that want it immediately will always be there and if you don't have some procedure/system for 'em they will make your life miserable. And if you have to do a rush job, it may have to be done as a 'one-board-at-a-time' deal which otherwise would knock your hourly rate down to zilch. I'd suggest at least 50% extra.
Have a minimum charge of enough to keep the annoyances down. Your time dealing with customers has to be figured into the cost of doing business and you should be getting paid for that..
Schedule,oh, a couple of 'ding nights' a week. Less during slow seasons. Make sure your customers understand this, that you have a life too. Make sure your customers know things take time.
There are things that people do that make life difficult. In some cases, make doing a decent repair almost impossible. Some of them are
- Jamming a ding full of wax - idiocy to begin with, and it all has to be cleaned out or your repair won't stick. And it doesn't keep the water out.
- Dinging a board and not doing anything but letting it get thoroughly soaked. I mean, jeez, use a little tape fer cryin out loud.
- Solarez - it's miserable stuff, it has to be cleaned out to do a decent long-term fix that doesn't look like petrified snot.
For any of the above, I charge double, no arguments, if they don't like it they can most definitely go elsewhere.
There's also the ones who have made a stab at fixing something themselves and gave up when it became obvious they were in over their heads. The ones who tried to put in dowels, or stringer replacements, or used something like silicone caulking. Or, worst of all, decided that the way to do a repair was to start with major surgery with a saw or router. Those, well, no guarantees, no mister nice guy. If they want to go elsewhere, fine. Oh, and they ALWAYS think you overcharge, because they think they can do better work themselves....in their %$#@ dreams.
Don't be afraid to turn down repair work when it's a forlorn hope. Major delams, stuff like that, some things you can't win with, and unless it's well understood on all sides that this is only a stopgap fix and not a permanent solution, shine it on.
Buddy of mine found a board after a storm in Florida and shipped it back here at considerable expense, an old Weber that was totally flogged, chocolate brown, delammed just about everywhere, hard to find . . He brings it to my pal Willie to fix, and Willie dropped it off back at his house with a note: "Nice Weber. Do me a big favor and burn it. "
There are some boards that are badly built from the get-go. Local no-names, Stewarts, a few others, they are not nearly as well built as their owners may think, and if you fix one thing there's still a whole big list of other things that will go wrong soner or later and probably sooner. You can't stand behind your work on them either. Make sure the customers understand that.
Have 2" or 3" masking tape around, along with a Sharpie marker. Tag the boards with information, what dings you're supposed to do and what you're not supposed to fix. Owner name and contact info, date it came in and date it was promised and price quoted. . Do it when the board comes in, don't wait, memory is a problematic thing.
Don't be afraid to quote high and charge less if it's not as bad as you feared. Not least because sometimes it will be worse than you thought and you wind up eating time and materials. 'Cos if you quote a price, you can't go over it, ever.
You see signs in some small places, welding shops and machine shops, to the tune of "Labor rates: $50 an hour, $75 an hour if you watch, $150 an hour if you help" and similar. It's only half a joke, if somebody is there watching or being 'helpful' without your express invitation, it slows things down and things go wrong. Don't be shy, a simple 'F()ck Off' works.
Usually my prices go way down for kids starting out. But if they show up with Mommy, in some sort of Uber-Benz, with an attitude and a stack of credit cards, I have been known to charge double. Aggravation charge. Unless, of course, Mommy doesn't have an attitude, looks kinda hot and indeed appears to like ding repair guys. Things can get interesting.
Why 'at least $50 an hour'? Well now, I do have a life. And there's things I'd rather be doing than sanding resin. And there's other things I can do to make a few bucks in my 'spare time' that pay that well. So, if I am gonna be getting dusty and itchy and getting grief from those who were dumb enough to ding their boards in the first place, I want to get something back.
And, like WaveSniper who started this whole thing, that meant I could afford to fix boards for kids and working stiffs for little or nothing, invite some kids to learn how its done and maybe take over one day. You know, give something back.
That worked out very nicely.... I'm out of the business now and enjoying that just fine.
doc....
Hello Wave Sniper ,
Yes to everything Doc says. Great to have you back Doc! I love your stuff.....
...But....
My entire Swaylock's career has been financed on Ding Repair.....Low down dirty waste of time ding repair....
...Yes....I timed it one year...$8.00 an hour....
...well....all my peers sit in front of the boob tube and do nothing....and get paid nothing......
...I fix surf boards for next to nothing....Drink beer...Listen to Classic Rock ,Have fun...and then Take the money and buy materials...And then build awesome boards for me !!!
My current five board quiver was paid for with ding repair......Yes...Low down dirty waste of time ding repair..
Ohhh yeah...my router is a hand me down...not the best but free!
Stingray
Jeez...all I can say is you must have your life more squared away than I do....
Good for you!
doc...
Doc I have to say that was well written!
There is a lot of money in ding repair.
Break off a fin and it's a $45.oo repair job.
Prep five or six boards.
Mix your dough then patch.
Sand the group in the same process.
Do a 6 pack at a time (not beer) then a $100.00 an hour is a no brainer.
It's a matter of organization.
$50/hour is not enough. Sorry not to be pompous.
Fixing dings is more work than building a surfboard.
You should be paid!
Don't be afraid to turn down work to people who want the bro deal.
Even Pro's pay for ding repair they may get free boards but pay their own repairs.
They can always order a new board!
Surfding
$50 an hour may seem like quite a lot, but if you're doing, say, a dozen $15 dings on several boards over two working hours, that's not unattainable. If you have several lined up and you are efficient, you can do it and better. But if you're doing one or two at a time for beer change, well.... that's something else again.
$25.00 is the mimium regardless of the size. It's your time not the size of the ding! Otherwise don't fix dings and go get a job at McDonald's!
Surfding
Exactly!
The thing is, you got X amount of time in this life. How are you gonna spend it? Covered with itchy dust, smelling of resin, getting grief from some arrogant twit who thinks the world revolves around him and his cr@p surfboard which he wants fixed right that second-well, you need to be compensated for that.
Because there's things in life that are more fun, like surfing and a whole lot more. Which you could be doing instead of fixing dings. What's more, somebody else made that decision already, which is why you're fixing their board instead of them fixing their own.
And that's why you get paid for it. Enough to take the sting out of missing good days in the water because you promised to have boards done. Enough to pay for your tools and materials and your time. And yes, more than you'd make stocking shelves someplace.
Me, I'd just as soon not be living on ramen noodles and canned stew. I've done it and it wasn't fun for very long. It gets kinda tedious when they turn off the electricity. It gets old, wearing pants the wrong size 'cos that's all they had at the thrift shop. When it's 30 degrees outside...and 35 inside, because you can't afford heating oil, it kinda cuts down on the enjoyment factor.
Been there, done that. And after a while, living on the margins ceases to be entertaining.
The thing is, ding repair is fixing somebody else's toys. You're not curing cancer, teaching the poor, saving humanity, you're fixing somebody's play-toy so they can go out and play some more. They show up in their car that cost more than you made in four years, with their broken toy, and talk down to you because you make your living with your hands.
There's exceptions to this, of course. When I was a little surf rat, with very little money, there were those who helped me out and among other things taught me how to fix surfboards. And I feel kind of an obligation to pass it on. But those are the exception, not the majority. The rest of the time.... get the money....
doc...
Wow. Gold Doc. Thanks for the dose of reality, and thanks for passing it on.
Aaron
Hey, Aaron, que pasa? And thank you for your kind thoughts.
The thing is, surfing is play. Even though I came up during the extremely stoned and waaay ouuut there, maaan '70s, when we thought that surfing got us in contact with the essence of whatever deity we were into that week...well, reality bites us in the ass.
Remember, though, it's play. It's a helluva good time, when we make a move with or against a force of nature. When you make a wave, the section didn't eat ya, well, it feels good. Get tubed ( apologies for the archaeic terminology, but I'm no longer young) and that's a double neat thing.
But, again... I have done things like patching up people who were bleeding, skated a few bucks to those who were short on dough, given somebody some knowledge that might help them get by when times were hard. That's meaningful. Surfing...is a pleasure, when the waves are good and when ( thinking about that SoCal thread) it's not crowded and ugly. But, what meaning, true meaning, evolves from it?
It's a really good time, and when surfing with good friends who hoot when you got a good wave and did something really nice with it, that's better still.
But... it's ephemeral. Your track on the wave is gone in a coupla heartbeats. Kind of a metaphor for life itself.
So you have fun. Pass on what you can, in stoke and in knowledge ( what Sways is all about) and hope for the best.
Give all...it'll come back more than you thought it would....
doc....
Hi Balsa, have you used the router for longboard stringer routing for fin boxes? Thinking about getting one.
Kind regards Lapwing