Part of a learning curve that continues to this day...
6'5'' x 20'' x 2.25'', flat deck, tuck edge all the way on full rails. Almost flat bottom with slight double concave leading into fins.
1 lb eps, with 1/8'' stringer (I don't remember what kind of wood), hand-lam by Dave "Davo" Dedrick; 5 oz plain-weave carbon with 4 oz e-glass over. Carbon sandwich fins, too. Painted white to keep from exploding in Florida sun.
5 lbs 2 oz when brand new, but it's been broken twice (and cracked on one of the repairs after). Darn, that carbon is brittle.
The last thing I learned (today) was that you need to look closely at the names on your emails, I sent a customer an answer to a question that someone with a very similar looking name had sent. I was sitting in my truck outside my shaping room, so I'm using glare on the screen as an excuse....
It rode well, it was light enough to be very tossable, and the lack of panel stiffness on the 1 lb foam meant the bottom absorbed chatter. Of course that also meant that the deck caved in every time I rode it, but the foam memory would push the wells back out if you let it sit for a day or two. Boards were just going thin at the time, and it probably had a little more flex than the 2.75'' thick PUs we'd all been riding. But carbon wasn't the panacea we thought it might be, the broken boards and shattered rail dings made that obvious. Those boards made me want to learn more about composites, though. That was probably my biggest benefit.
obproud, the fillet is big at front and rear of fins, for two reasons: 1) feeble attempt at more drive from longer fin base, and 2) I wanted to keep the damn things on the board, I had broken off some glass-ons before.
thanks very much for posting this , Mike ! [and thank YOU, 'Wouter, for bringing up the photos , too! you know i LIKE piccies hahaha .... true , though !]
it's very timely , as 'moonfish' Shannon and i were talking about carbon today [he's just bought some]
he is doing eps and wood veneer and was tossing around the idea of a carbon bottom . the ?6'6 ? roundtail he is currently working on has carbon around the plug area , i'm looking forward to seeing it , and , of course making some carbon fins for him [it will be a quad]
i rode a set of [blue-tinted] carbon twinnys , with matching mini 'hockey fin' rear ones , in his walden 'CD4' this morning ....fun fun FUN .... i can hardly wait for dawno patrolo tomorro yo ho ho
this is cool, im glad of the timing for your post.
as chip mentioned earlier im building a 6'4 round tail, wide point back its 21 wide and 2 3/4. the core is just under 1 pound (16kg/m3) eps. glass schd so far has been: deck 4oz then 1.5mm balsa skin then 6+4 over that. bottom is 7oz carbon full rail wrap with im thinkin a 6oz over that. what do you think? im a big guy so id rather go overboard on glass then have not enough. i'll post some picks tonight of it so far.
I wasn't the only one here in Brevard County trying lots of stuff in the mid to late 80s. Greg Loehr was dialing in the epoxy formulas, and we were playing with different EPS weights. Greg and I glassed Clark ultralights with his resin, XPS came (and went), and veneers were even vac'd onto a few boards by Ed Townes. Dave Dedrick did the carbon glassing. GL made one sailboard-inspired d-cell over EPS for Hartley, I think he told Randy French about it, haha.
A lot of us were sailboarding then also, and the cored-skin stuff developed there. Kirk Brasington got immersed in that, then started thinking there had to be a better way, because the cored-skin build in surfboards was sooo stiff. In 92 he and brother Eric started bagging single skins.
It was an adventurous time and gave all of us that were there a good perspective on tech that keeps getting recycled as ''new''.
That is a personal board, rocker and dims (12''-20''-15''), about normal for the times. Boards went thin in the late 80s, then the width decreased and rocker increased in early 90s.
LOL on the fins, I know what you're thinking. No I don't have any left..... Carbon sandwich fins are very stiff, maybe too stiff. FCS used to make several fins in a similar construction, and that was the feedback on them too.
Stringers are so 20th century. If you put an actual skin instead of tissue paper on the outside, they're not needed.
Given that, your lam schedule sounds reasonable, maybe a little overbuilt but you say you want it strong. It will be pretty with the carbon against the balsa, but you'd better vent it (if you don't want to paint white like I did). Sounds like you guys get the same kind of brutal solar treatment we get here in Florida. Even with a vent, you're going to want to keep sun off the bottom.
Yeah, well over built is good cos i weigh 108kg, all muscle tho! haha. yeah it will be painted due to a screw up with putting the carbon on, if any one has used 3m super 77 they will know what i mean. half the board looks great but the nose area was ruined cosmetically when i had to pull it up after gettin a big crease in the cloth. but i have learnt some awesome tricks with this build so im super gratefull for that believe it or not. let me take a couple of pick and chuck em up.
