hello there
i’m new here
i’m from sardinia,italy,and my english is not perfect,therefore please sorry
i stared shaping one year ago,maybe a little bit more,i’ve done 15 board,here the last 3,nut fpr these 3 i’ve done only the shape
here you can take a look
and if interested i can add some others photoes,like rails,bottom,ecc
thanks
all 3 is xps stringerless,i will put a carbon stringer on the deck,or is a good idea to put it also in the bottom?
Welcome to swayz! I’m a little confused ? What do your mean you will put a carbon stringer in the deck? I have zero experience with xps foam. I use only pu foam bcuz I wanted a reliable user friendly blank - with a good old fashioned spruce stringer! Correct me if I’m wrong, but are you saying your gonna cut open the blank and stuff in a black stringer of a carbon fiber material?
the bottom is better as generally most breakage issues will start on the bottom. bottom will reduce flex… Top isnt going to do much.
Yeah. Down the bottom. Chic- good to hear from Sardinia. I have seen some great photos of surf in you area. Looks great. Nice looking little boards. Post some pics when they are glassed. Don’t sweat your English. It’s better than reverb’s. Shapeaholic------ I think he is talking about Carbon fiber tape lammed down the center. Right acqua???
Mcding - ty for the! I geuss he will get it now… as for xps, eps etc…I’m getting a little lost. Starting w eps foam I have seen it and it looks like regular STYROFOAM you get with a camping ice box. I’m hoping it’s a strong r version tho…xps must be newest bcuz I never heard of it…pu is what I grew up with-but I’m fifty!
Most of my boards are stringer less. I use rail channels. Carbon is strong until it snaps. The modulus is so much higher than regular glass that it seems not to be a good complimentary match.
It sounds like the newer blanks aren’t very good then…fyi I have hit lip once kinda late on pu foam and all I got was stress marks in glass. My board didnt snap in two… hell, every board was pu foam with a wooden stringer… after yrs of hard surfing I have not ever broke a board yet. So I’m thinking crappy cheAp glassing is the prob - not the pu foam. That said, I went to surf shop and they stock mostly eps and pu foam. All have stringers! Do yourself a favor and use a blank with STRINGERS! Lol. I wouldn’t want a stringerless as I prefer pu bcuz it’s light enough, durable, and it is not too difficult to work on.and I’ve always known Surfboard’s with a stringer - so why bother with something you have to add parts to???
The first time I saw a foam surfboard, was a shaped blank that one of the Windansea ‘‘regulars’’, (Dave Wren) got from Hobie in the fall of 1958. The foam was exactly like the large cell expanded Styrofoam seen in florist shops. My belief, at the time, was that it was the same product, and it may well have been. The board was finish shaped, and had been coated/sealed with epoxy, to protect the foam from the ‘‘normal’’ poly glassing of the day. The board had a 3/4th inch RW stringer. All surfboard glassing, at that time was done with one resin. Polyester finishing resin. Lam resin did not come into use until very late 1959 or early1960. The PU foam from WALKER, and CLARK, allowed the direct application of poly resin to the foam, without the necessity of a sealing coat. The first use of lam resin I was exposed to, was in 1960, when I shaped for Velzy. That was also when I got my intro into shaping foam. Everything prior was balsa.
Bill
Shape201------- Hanging around this site you will see that there is a dedicated group of high tech scientists here on Sways that are devoted to the cutting edge. EPS, XPS, Dow Blue, Compsand, etc. etc. Glassed with everything from wesson oil instead of resin and toilet paper for cloth. The first blank I shaped was a Dave Sweet. I walked right into Dave’s shop on Pico(I think), was waited on by the man himself and walked out with a blank and the materials to do my third board. The first two were longboard hack downs. I do Poly primarily, but have taken the hint and been doing EPS/Epopxy as well for the past couple of years. The serious truth is that EPS/Epoxy make up less than %25 of all boards manufactured it the U.S. The other cutting edge Construction grade foams amount to less than %1 Industry-wide/ World-wide… If your are a Poly man get used to being called names around this site by people that have never set foot in a pro glass shop.
Thanks for the info - gentlemen…
I don’t give a crap about what anyone thinks about what I prefer. That said, I’ve always wanted to try epoxy resin over pu foam.
But seriously I have never had any major, or even a mediocre prob with it…the flex is super! Don’t any of you luv the feel a hint of flex as you are surfing? I’ve been noticing it, and honest I love that feel!?
Jot this down in your memory banks:go and surf a good old pu foam board next time you’re out surfing. And really surf without really thinking…let nature dictate what ur going to do on a wave…you’re in for a surprise! Youll surf gazillian times better! and as you do that - youll hear chatter, you feel board flexing, and youll be having fun w out a concern. Lol
That quote reminded me of how I described the ride of the chambered balsa fish that I built back in 2007 – except in reverse. It took a while to get used to riding that board, but I surfed it as my main board for an entire summer. One day I decided to go back and ride one of my old PU boards, and was stuck by how noisey it was. There was so much chatter from the water slapping against the bottom. Wooden boards just absorb that energy and turn it into something more like a drum beat. I really like the sound of a chambered wooden board. Note that nowadays I mostly ride my foam boads (EPS and PU), but every now and then I pull out the woodie just to hear that sound.
thanks everybody,for the welcome and for the tips,specially for you McDing,yeah,here there are some good spots,but there’s not consistency,but it’s ok 
so,xps is quite similar to eps,but there is some pro and con, xps is extruded polistyrene,eps is expanded,xps in not with little bubble of material,is water resisten,and is harder,someone says that has not goog flex,but for my feet is ok,the bigger advantage is that here a PU foam cost me about 80 euro,or more,instead a panel of xps cost me 17 euro,and i could make a long with it,for thePU foam you do the work with power planer ay 100%,instead with xps you can use a hot wire to do a 70% of the work,so the process is not so long how it seems,the major handicap with xps is that it tends to delaminate,but i think that you already know all these thing i’m talking about it
many people here says the REAL boards are made in pu blank,and the all rest is not good materials,but for small wave board ,and very short lenght I think it’s ok,but i would to know your opinio gentlemen
so i’ll use a acrylic paint to do the grafic,just some stripes,and then i’ll put the carbon tape on the bottom,then i don’t know if use 100% epoxy resin,or use it only for laminating and hot coat e glossing with silmar bb,i’ve tryed the last time this mix but the result on 3 boards was good only for 1,so i’ve got some doubt,many shaper here told me that i have to use the same resin for lamination and hot coat/glossing ,what’s your opinion gentlemen ?
Swied- I got to locate a gentleman I sold a ‘experimental’ home built board to… what I did to the board was: I noticed my blank had a good
Flip n nose so I let it be. Then I remembered my exp surf n thru choppy crap waves - so I thought of an idea! I sanded w block a slight v in nose down approx 15" 's from the tip there. I also rolled the spine out… Apparently the gentleman I sold it to rode it well in evening waves that had a little chop…anyway, he was cutting through it all np at all! sadly he must have moved? I’m going to try Facebook to see if he still owns that board. Bummer I wont be able to try it as it was two and a quarter thick and probably won’t float me.
Not sure if the nose flip helped as the board had bout four n five eights of flip in the nose.
OTOH - my pu fish had a flatter rocker and slight rolled edges under the nose and faded thru entry… I never noticed a issue on the board. Then my old stinger would almost jump a bit if I planed through thick chop. FYI - it had firm edges…and a pretty lowish nose rocker. But I do like the pu feel. I’m pretty sure I tried a eps board that felt ok too tho. I’ll pick up an eps blank bcuz I can get one for $59.00 + tax for a fish blank. And he (Pearson Arrow) in santa cruz where I saw it, also had a six nine shortboard blank for a smidge more. Perhaps I should get aft I complete my current project. His eps one’s are us blanks and felt sweet. Dunno man, I just prefer a darn stringer! :l :/?
It’s good advice.
What I do with stringerless boards is to make a the laps a little longer, and I stagger them differently.
My typical lam may be 2 layers bottom and 3 layers top, but the layer closest to the foam has the widest lap then the laps get shorter. The last layer would be similar to a standard lap length, and the first one or two are at least an inch longer than the next one. This will create a very strong board, a little stiffer too. I don’t mind stiffer boards.
I often sand a little bevel along the rails to compensate for the extra glass to get a nice clean smooth surface after it’s all sanded.
Lately I have been using a heavier glass about 8 to 9 oz, so I was only doing one layer on the bottom and 2 on the deck.
XPS foam is easy to shape, but a bit more trouble to get a good glass job. Seems like keeping the finished blank rough like under 50 grit for the finish works best. Too bad, because you can get XPS so smooth. I also think the temp of the blank needs to be cooling when you laminate, so may be let the blank get warm and then go to a cooler place when you do the lamination. Where I live the temps are always above 70 F and sometimes in the high 80s. I work in open air rooms so I can’t control the temps, and I don’t like waiting until late evenings and nights to glass. I will stay by the board for a long time making sure any small bubbles are dealt with immediately. Just use the edge of a razor blade and poke it a few times to let any trapped air out, and push the bubble down. I think the heavier glass I used has more trouble with traped air than the standard 4 or 6 oz surfboard glass because it had a tight weave. The 4 and 6 oz glass I have from Fiberglass Hawaii is so much easier to work with.