I saw that pipe clamp trick a while ago in a book on cedar strip canoe building. I’m sure those guys have read the book. I’m from the east originally, and know folks who are big into building boats from kits. An old friend of the family has a beautifull cedar rowboat that came as a kit, and is working on a wooden speedboat from a kit as well. You need something to do during the winter. I used to build radio controlled ariplanes with my dad as a kid. I’m sure their board kits will do well in the northeast.
i just saw a flyer from the Philia wooden boat factory that thhey are going to host a class in building these boards—$500 for class and $750 for the kit—runs for the month of Feb(when it generally suckes in theeast anyway) I’m thinking of doing the class, what the heck, might even learn something
Hey All, This is Mike from Grain Surfboards. Someone just forwarded this thread to me, and it seemed like a good time to jump in. We did explore a lot of different ways of building boards when we first started, mostly in terms of the rails. After a lot of trial and error, we settled on a method that uses bead and cove strips to keep the rails hollow like the rest of the board. Our reasoning was that adding solid rails to an otherwise hollow board would add weight where you don’t want it. Our frames are now cut on a cnc machine and the shape of each frame includes the rail profile. The glued-up bottom planks, which are 1/4" or so wider then the frame width, are then glued to the frames. We then essentially just stack B&C strips starting on the bottom planks, around the rails and up to the deck. We put enough strips on to get around the tight radius of the rail, then just handplane a flat surface, feathering the inside rail strips and extending the end of the frame on a straight line. Then we glue the top planks on as a unit, with a glue surface on each frame and the keel as well as the planed flat around the rails.
I do want to stress a couple things here. We put in a lot of time playing around with different designs but in the end settled on this technique. It keeps the board as light as possible, and keeps an even weight distribution. While I’m proud of the method we’ve developed, I have no reason to call it “my method”. From the beginning, we looked towards traditional boatbuilding techniques since that is what we knew. The use of bead and cove strips is a commonly accepted method in building a lot of small boats. We simply adapted these skills to building surfboards.
While our kits do come with everything you need to build a board (frames, planks, rail strips, glue, fin box, leash plug, epoxy, fiberglass, etc), a good deal of clamps are required. There are ways around it however, and cutting your own PVC clamps is a good way to save money. I’ve also found that while most 2" spring clamps run around $2.99, if you look carefully, especially at big box stores, you can frequently find the same clamps for just .99 cents. Look for the green grips instead of orange.
To end this post, I really want to say that we all feel extremely fortunate to be doing what we’re doing. We love it and wouldn’t change a thing. I’d be more then happy to answer any questions that anyone has. If you don’t see us on swaylocks, please feel free to visit our website at www.grainsurfboards.com or just call me at 802-598-7194. Thanks for including us in the HWS discussion.
