I have a board that I bought from a guy to fix up. It was in really bad shape but now has lots of life left. The board is completely solid except a large delamination area on the top deck (where your front foot goes). I know I should fix it right but I dont have the right tools, supplies, or time to do this. I was wordering if I could just cut it open and pour resin inside until if fills up? Would this work? Is there an easier way? Do I NEED to fix it at all? I am open to any and all posiblities…
Uhmmmm - I would fix it, as delams spread like a nasty rash, y'know? And there's a lot of different 'right ways' to fix 'em.
The best way would probably be surgery involving inlaying some denser foam where it's delammed- typically the foam gets squashed where it gets repeated impacts and it needs redoing to both rebuild the thickness and to make a tougher deck...'cos it wasn't tough enough the first time, y'know?
But that's a lot of work, vaccum bagging and routing and so on, specialised gear and jigs and all, not worth it for the average board.
If you're just setting this one up as a user/beater, pouring in resin will work, though it'll be heavy and it's not a perfect, forever type fix.. You need to make sure the resin gets to all the little crevices and corners and when you do it up it's best to use something like some very thin plywood to hold the deck to the right shape, otherwise it can bulge and have concaves you don't want. Fill with a very slow batch of resin, ideally with a little filler in it, so the stuff is a little lighter and stronger - call it about the same consistency as yogurt, no thicker.
You want it with the very minimum of catalyst both to give more time to work with it plus the thicker layer will heat up more as it goes off, which makes it go off faster, which makes it go off hotter, which makes it go off even faster - the slower and cooler it hardens, the better. .
For using the thin ply, you want to bend it around the deck - straps like roof rack straps are good for that. Use wax paper between the ply and straps and the deck, or else they get kinda permanemt, y'know? Then a nice deck patch over the repair, which can be used to take out the last bumps and hollows after sanding and filling.
Sounds like you are very time poor, if you want a quick fix drill small holes into the delam then get a syringe and squirt your resin mix in (I would also make sure to add some milled fibres so the resin doesnt crack)then put some weight on it while it dries.
This will look not the best but its the quickest, and can sand it down as its solid with the milled fibres. just as long as you are not too worried of the look of the deck (hopefully the wax will cover it!)
Thanks for the help guys. i dont care one bit how it looks, the wax will cover it up and i am also painting it i will try kensurf’s way because it was close to my original plan! hope it works
i will try kensurf’s way because it was close to my original plan! hope it works