Finally finished glassing a set of wood fins I had foiled a long time ago. 5 ply baltic birch, 2 layers of 6 oz. E-glass on each side with UV resin. They have some flex to them, but it feels pretty lively because of the wood core. Got to ride them both days this past weekend in some head high Florida beachbreak. They felt really good, as good if not better than the template I copied them off of. They are pretty thin, I haven’t measured but I’d say around 5% of the chord. I rounded the leading edge a bit.
I learned lots making this first set, like definately use glass rope around the leading and trailing edges. Had tons of problems with airbubbles where the two layers of glass met. Ended up taping the LE off and building it up with resin to fill the bubbles then just sanding it all back down.
I found it was much easier to cut the glass to shape and wet it out in between two layers of plastic for the intial glass layup, then lay it on the fin pre-wet, as opposed to wetting it out on the fin with a brush. Less hassle with airbubbles that way.
They felt really solid in head high waves this weekend. It’s kind of a big template, little over 4 1/2" base and 4 5/8" deep. The glass added even a little more so the next set I need to make undersize a bit to allow for the glass. I think the next set is gonna be a much smaller template with a thicker foil and maybe a cutaway base. Just got a new epoxy board with Futures, so now I have to figure out how to mold the Future bases. Had enough problems just trying to get the FCS tabs nice and square and to get the bottom of the fin flat so there were no gaps between the fin base and the board. The molded Future tabs might actually be a bit easier once I figure out the process. (gotta re-read those posts PlusOne made a few weeks back). Anyway, sorry for the rambling post, here’s the pics:
