Wondering if anybody cares to fill me in on which PU foam manufacturer produces the best blank and why…or maybe this dead horse has been beaten too many times. I am a relatively new shaper and have tried a few manufacturers’ products…starting to think more about whether my end product can be improved just by choosing the best materials up front. Any thoughts?
Giving us some clue where you live might be beneficial.
Sickdog
Fair enough, Sickdog. I live in Central California…so Northern or Southern California manufacturers are the most relevant. Let me know what you think…and thanks for the reply.
try some blair foam good stuff . you won’t be disappointed.
What do you like about Blair, pierpont, when you compare it to other foams? Have you worked with EPS? Thanks.
it is very consistent good quality foam. shapes very nicely not soft no pukas voids etc. great rockers , fast turnaround time on custom orders. etc. like the way pu rides and not really in to eps .
Good luck…get ready to search right along with the rest of us.
Here is somewhat a fact of life if you make surfboards on a regular basis: quality of materials vary. This fluctuation can sometimes have you tearing out your hair because you are aspiring to make a ‘perfect’ product. Paints, resins, blanks, cloth, sandpaper, adhesives, tape…all of them can vary with some degree…some are controlled really well and the variance in quality is minimal. Foam is probably the biggest wild card in this whole equation. Clark, for better or for worse, had a helluva lot of experience in seeing what could happen and cared enough about controlling what he put out to the public.
There have been some comments about how the new foam is so much better than Clark’s Foam. To be quite honest, I think that is a big load of crap.
It would be interesting for me to have some Clark blanks handed to me and to shape some again like we could play a way back time machine kinda thing, just to see what my opinion now would be.
I’m pretty damn sure it would be the same as above…
P.S.
As far as you are concerned, start by trying the most easilyavailable foam you can get for a fair price and go from there.
Alot of South Bay Guy’s like the Blair. I haven’t shaped it myself nor have any of my customers have requested it. However I’m in Orange County.
US Blanks keeps getting better and lighter. Really easy to Shape. Ice Nine as improved as well. It shapes really easy.
So for PU we are down to: US Blanks, Blair, Ice Nine. I’m trusting the South Bay Crew as there are a lot of good shapers from that area.
I have had bad experiences on the other foam manufacturers plus most of them are in financial difficulties as they are selling mostly seconds. So it’s hard to know if there foam is really good or not? Maybe their first are good? It’s not worth cutting corners using seconds because once it’s glassed you might be stuck with it? The $10.00 you saved ends up being a $175.00 Glass Job down the drain. Stay with first.
Epoxy is really a good way to go. The glassing schedule is equally important as well. 2.0 EPS from AUSTIN, WHITEHOT, MARKO and US Blanks (Molded) are the most reliable however you can make your own if you can get a block? Try XPS for the experience. However most people don’t know how to glass it and it will gas if your not careful. If you leave it finished with 60 grit your chance of suceeding is greater. I have some XPS if you need a blank. I can make on for you.
If you new to shaping watch out for haters there are a lot of them. Ignore them and have fun.
SD…good advice. I’m wondering if when Clark went out if that meant Clark Foam everywhere else went out? Wasn’t there Clark Foam in South America and Europe? Were the formulas only blown here and shipped? ???
yeah there is still clark foam available in ireland.
Ireland eh?
Well if they stayed in business I wonder what the particulars were. I do recall shaping some Clark Foam when I was in Peru in '79 but ironically the stringers were a joke (ironic if you think of all the fantastic wood down there) and the glue ups had voids so if you were laying up colors guys would either tape the othr side or prefill resin if they could actually see the void ahead of time.
Also the foam wasn’t as good as the U.S. Clark…when I got there, I was immediately swallowed up by a bunch of guys that wanted to ‘pre-buy’ my boards when I was leaving…the drill on that was the foam floated better and my boards were thinner high performance boards but lighter and stronger. I still remember kind of blowing my mind at the see thru fins they made out of plexiglas that were sunk in with resin like we used to do on longboards… super fun time down there, terrific people.
So why isn’t Clark Ireland doing a big biz???
no they are just whats left over from clarks shutdown.
there is no foam being blown here (i wish)
So how is the foam that they stocked? Sounds as though it came from U.S. …was the price really high? Who else do you guys use? I know Homeblown and EPS, but others?
yeah the clarks are just odd sizes left about 30 i think, but expensive. this was from one of the last shipments to europe before clark closed.
im using xtra foam and surfari
the xtra foams are real nice to shape, but have sent a few of the surfaris back due to bad holes.
I’m unfamiliar with Xtra Foam, but I think Surfari is South African? I did hear some Blair Foam was making its way over there and I think some Just Foam went over too…your on the Euro so you guys have the bucks now and we are poor Yanks…howz that for a change?
I’m headed to France on the 8th and I’m powering all the orders I can right now because it isn’t going to last very long…back first of August…
A Bientot
(My mistake…meant you’re on the pound not Euro).
yeah surfari are south african, so are xtra foam, though they are developed by rod mc donald from king mac
have a good trip!
Thanks.
I wonder what the point is of all the different names? I’ve heard good and other about King Mac, but mostly good.
There’s a heck of a lot of foam out there right now. If you start browsing on the net you can come up with a dozen or two brands you have probably never even heard of!
What a world.
heard king mac filed for bankruptcy? any truth anyone?
Boy what turbulent times…also heard a certain retailer was VERY unhappy that their Biofoam based stock inventory is yellowing INSIDE the showroom.
Bummer.
…life shouldn’t be this hard. Sheeeeesh.
probably not the only ones, all the guys I have talked with won’t touch that shit with a ten foot pole, yellowing I think is the least of the worries we got a blank that is creating its own double barrel concave from nose to tail. got to love bio