Me too i use often cork glass and or carbon sandwich. Realy ding resistant.
So it sounds like it could be the added resin that the flax holds that increases its resistance to denting and the board’s overall strength, and that increased resin would theoretically add weight and dampen the board simultaneously.
Is that a fair summation?
Yeah, I’m not sure I’m ready to go down the vacuum bag route yet. That said a good friend of mine has CoreVac Cannibal that he routinely bounces off the cement as a testament to its strength. No doubt vacuum bagging makes boards super strong.
Does anyone know if @sanded ships internationally? They don’t have anything on their website about it.
Jim Banks said he gets his flax from Colan Australia here:
The only problem is they don’t ship to the US. They have a distributor in the US, Florida Fiberglass, but I’ve called and left messages, and no one has gotten back to me.
Update: Got in touch with Fiberglass Florida and it sounds like they have an order in to Colan and they should be receiving some flax in the near future.
As I understand Lemat’s explanation, laminated Flax/linen cloth (4-oz, 6-oz, etc.) is thicker than laminated FG of the same weight.
So this should apply, “stiffness is directly proportional to the cube of thickness.” For example, for the same type of foam of equal density, a 3” thick piece of foam would be approximately 3.4 times stiffer than a piece of foam 2” thick.
Regarding cork, I believe cork can be well laminated to a board without vac bagging using an experimental method I have developed. I still need to do a large surface area verification before I post that method.
Good to know, keep us posted on that if you hear updates on Fiberglass Florida getting Flax in stock.
My friend/shaper has his shaping room in Rockledge very close to Fiberglass Florida, I may have him pick some up for me and try it out.
vido, where are you located?
will do, and el salvador
No need vaccum for toughness=bouncing strengh. A good thick layer of glass or even less brittle fiber with the right amount of good resin do the job. Most of time vaccum bagged fiberglass laminate are dry and brittle.
Linen don’t need sizing to match resin so you can use linen fiber from tissus store.
As all light fiber linen float over resin, need to be carrefull to not use to much resin. Better to lay fiber on resin and let it soak than put resin over. Linen laminate look dryer than glass.
Once a source of linen is found (surf supply, online, fabric store) does the linen fabric need to be washed and dried before being measured out on the board?
Although discussions above about linen being made from flax and the strength added is due to the ability to “hold” more resin than a similarly weighted glass, my understanding from one of the champions of flax (Jim Banks) is that flax and linen are not equal. That flax is superior in tensile strength.
I believe this is due to the processing done when creating the threads(s) to make linen. The strands that are naturally longer in flax than other plants (hemp, jute, etc) are somewhat broken down. One thing I’ve found in my reading is that if you are going to use linen instead of flax, it would be better to use “clothing-specific linen” as those tend to have a higher grade and longer strands of flax.
As for washing it, I don’t think I would wash the flax sheets specifically for surfboards. Washing the regular fabric you may buy from a store is a different matter. I guess that’s the user’s choice, but I’d avoid anything that leaves residuals. Also worth noting. Don’t use hot water or a drier with linen, as it will shrink it.
In France flax and linen are same thing=lin. There is specifics products for composits higher tensil strengh fiber but when laminate in resin many studdies show no real difference. Cost way more than from fabric store.
If it’s wrinkle may be you need to iron it.
Oh interesting, I didn’t know about tests saying the composite variant being not really superior. A couple of years back I talked to one of the guys from depestele at a trade show , he explained that the main development for the use in composites was to get them more reliable by using a different spin technique for the yarns…which made a lot of sense to me .
On the other hand its quite reasonable to assume that variables like skin thickness / weight weigh in more.
Happy new year everyone!
Just my 2 cents… if you want to try using flax, get the product I bought on Amazon. You can get more than enough for a couple of boards for the same price as just 2 yards at $16/yd.
Do a test with a small piece of off cut foam.
You can use the Jimmy Lewis technique for laminating with a plastic sheet to mimic a vac bag. I haven’t tried that yet, but one day I might. I have a vac system, but I only use it for wood veneers (compsand boards).
Yeah, good call out. I am keen to experiment with it, and as I haven’t yet heard anything from Florida Fiberglass about the shipment they are supposed to be receiving. I’ve ordered some from fabrics-store, some in 3.7 ounce and some in 5.3 ounce. It will take a while to get thru customs but I’ll defintely post about it once I make a board with it.
How would you compare it to say 4oz fiberglass? Going to make a 6’6 Twin Egg soon. Thinking about 4/flax and 4/flax schedule…
I don’t know what the weight of the fabric I bought is, but it does seem strong. I think it would be stronger than 4oz glass. I want to try 2 layers of flax and no glass next, but it will be a while. I am finishing a Balsa compsand and I won’t be making another board for a while.
Surftech and its founders were around long before Swaylocks and all its well kept secrets. Their techniques came over primarily from the Wind Surf side of things. They were probably the first to vacuum bag a surfboard. Randy French was making composite sailboards in the 80’s. Well before he could have “mined” anything from Swaylocks.
Bert Burger was vac-bagging wood veneer skin surfboards as early as 1994.
I believe Firewire used his tech.
Plenty of ideas are mined from Sways – many slick little technical pearls.
Sways member Bill Barnfield?
Et.al…
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Windsurfing boom was a good motor to find how to build “stronger” still light boards. Born of “sandwich skin” for boards. Because a this time guys build wind and surf boards they used, try, same tech for both then came asia mass production for windsurf and later surf…
Sandwich skin tech is the most effective way to build best stiff and/or strengh by weight ratio but it’s lot more work, material, attention and so cost to make it well. Single skin tech can do the job so it stay the norm for surfboards and for many windsurf boards too even if it’s hidden under paint.
Nowadays surftech tuff light is low density eps with 0,6 thin wood veneer between glass layers top and bottom. It’s the low tech for “cheap” windsurf, but it do the job. Many longboarders here, hollow beachbreack, used those surftechs.
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Finally found it… a notification bubble popped up on my screen , something from Swaylock’s, but i literally haven’t been on the sight for 10 years… guess it motivated me to have a look… Anyway, in regards to your comment… i started vac bagging in 89. tried at first to build something like surftechs, but couldnt get the weight and flex right, kept building P/U and started doing a lot of timber decks early 90s, while chipping away trying to get results with Sandwich construction, early 92 started making progress once i figured how to get a laminated wood rail… Which in later years Greg Loehr coined the phrase Parabolic rail , and the name stuck…
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