This has probaly been covered alot but i couldn’t find much in the archives. I am working on restoring an old Hobie fish. A few spots have some bad rotted foam depressions. I plan to strip the glass, clean out the bad foam and replace it. The question is how to replace it? Can anyone give me some recommendations? Thanks. - Nick
I would use a router. Make a template of the area you want to replace, route the area out to the depth where the foam is white again. Then shape a sheet of foam to match tightly the routed area. Glue it in place, maybe use some Q-cell to have a “white” join line. Glass over. The hard part being to find a leftover piece of foam in which you can shape your replacement part… Good luck.
I agree …plug it glue sand paper to 1x12 and use this to flaten the bottom of your plug…leaving glass in tact arround the perimeter of the rout makes it easy to mark the plug outline …take flat set over hole and press down =result a perfect impression of hole perimiter …with time your plugs will become seamless…these days I use the zapagap to tack in plugs and it dosent create a hard rim to deal with when shaping…ambrose…glassing over the plug is another proceedure,you can use a dremel or a roto zip or a laminate trimmer if you no-mo router
Hey guys thanks for the info. Another question: is there any other sort of foam I can use? The areas i need to fill are to big for me to find a piece of left over blank to use. Any suggestions on glassing the plug? Thanks again. - Nick
find a broken board to use for foam…
I was a ding repair guy for a while. These procedures sound good. As for getting the foam, I used to have a whole blank designated for this very purpose. Seems a bit of a waist of a blank for just one board. Perhaps you could pay a visit to a local ding repair/surfboard shop and ask for some scraps. If it were me i would have cut you some foam.
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sheez… if its chunks of foam you want- I’ll send you a box of broken up bones and “choice” nose and tail cut offs. I go though alot of blanks a week- and theres alot of foam left over. As long as you pay shipping! -Carl