To make a long story short, I dropped in left but they guy thought I was going right, so he paddled left. Genuine accident, I’m not mad. I hit eject and tried to kick the board over the wave so it didn’t hit him, but the wave kinda dredged out in the shallow part out and threw me and the board over anyway. I didn’t even realize our boards hit until like two waves later, when I noticed I apparently contacted a fin and suffered damage. I was probably in the water for 20 minutes after this, then I saw and got out. This is why I heard no “clunk” noise, I guess. Anyway, pictures
It did cause some glass to delam, which I removed. I’ll clean the area up and fill/glass over it. Probably with qcell/resin slurry. I’ve gotten that mixture to be pretty light and airy in the past. I’m not to worried about fixing it although advice is always welcome.
As the title implies, there’s not a lot of water around? I was pretty persuasive with the heat gun/vacuum and I saw no bubbles whatsoever. This is an EPS blank from greenlight with a high density stringer, 6oz glass on the bottom, epoxy (obviously). The foam is bright white and not spongy at all. The board doesn’t feel massively heavier and it doesn’t seem that water migrated all over the nose. Did I get really lucky? Did the puncturing compress the foam to be too dense to absorb much? Do these blanks have good water resistance? I just can’t believe how dry it is and I’m worried the water is somewhere in there.
Either way, it’s open now and it’ll be sitting to dry for a while. I’ll ghetto rig my shop vac to pull a vacuum in the area and hopefully evaporate anything in there. This is a good board so I want to make sure it’s all good.
You might want to wash the foam with some fresh water. I believe it was Ambrose that suggests doing this as the salt crystals can cause delamination of your ding repair.
I was thinking about adding isopropanol, as pure as i can get, to have a similar effect to that stuff you put in your ear when there’s water in there. But I probably won’t.
So there was a small puddle under it this morning, but nowhere near the amount of water I thought would be in there. A bit of vacuum treatment in the sun should do the trick.
Do you have a vent hole? If not you might have to add a vent. The water won’t come out very well unless air goes in somewhere else. You can drill a hole and patch it later. Don’t vacuum too hard, especially without another hole for the air to go in. Put the damage low and the air hole high, vac at 5 lbs or less for several days and it should get pretty dry.
Unfortunately, I have some experience with holes in EPS blanks. It’s not hard to get the water out if you don’t need to surf that board right away. Just take your time.
Get a small piece of plastic sheet about 1 foot square. Place a small piece of paper towel or a small rag over the ding. Make sure the plastic is larger than the towel, and tape it to the board over the towel. You can use a shop vac or other vac and make a hole large enough to insert the vac attachment. Run the vac for a minute or two and then see if the towel is wet, if it is, you’ll need to do this until the towel is dry.
I bought vacuum sealed bags that you use to store clothes and other dry goods online real cheap. I just wanted the pump and the part of the bag that the pump attaches to. You can cut one of those and make a repair jig. I did this with just cutting a hole in a small plastic sheet and taping the vac inside the bag. I’d run it a minute or so, then stop, then go again. Do that several times, then open it and check.
I read that the board lady would use low pressure and let it go for days. She also made a small hole on the opposite end off the board, like the nose or tail depending on where the damage is. This was usually badly damaged boards, you may not need to do much.
Ha that’s exactly what I was thinking, with the storage bag valves and paper towels. I’ve done that in the past, just with a really ghetto valve I’ve made up but the same paper towel method. If I had a pump I’d do what the board lady does and let it sit under mild vacuum with a vent hole for a few days. Don’t need to surf this anytime soon anyway. The waves have finally gone away, sort of, but September here in NJ was insane. Plus it’s getting dark earlier and earlier so the after work sessions are starting to not be possible.
