As a result of being stuck surfing the most beat up board in the universe while I was in Maui I have become interested in building my own version of a “board that could be split in half for travel”. Has anybody had any experience with building one. I’ve done a quick google search, but I was unable to find any hardware kits.
There is stuff in the archives if you can find it. I made a tri-sect, w/a flexable tail, worked great for a while, but next time I’ll go sans flex. Good luck, Taylor.
I noticed some in the archives, but I didn’t see anybody who had actually built one. What method did you use to join them together? What did you build your board out of?
You might want to keep this very vague & then finish it through PM’s. I remember a guy from a while back - Austrian, I think - who showed his first few steps in construction.
He got blasted, on the forum, and apparently in his personal email, by P B-S Co. with claims of patent infringement, theft of technology, threats of legal action…
And his project was very backyard; very obviously personal/not-for-sale.
I’d even say, edit your post to take out the trade names…
Note that I’m not saying the Popes are bad guys at all. Just saying that when you have a patent, you have to enforce it stridently and universally, or else the professional knock-offs start flying in because you let someone else make one already.
Quote:
Note that I’m not saying the Popes are bad guys
Who’s talking about pope. I was planning to build a break in half travel board! What strange times we live in.
I’ve got a table-saw, I can split a board in half for you… Do you want lengthwise or cross?
But seriously…
I’ve been very interested in this subject myself, and I think it would be a great one to be kicked around here and chewed on by the resident great shapers and thinkers.
About the patent…
I don’t have the facts, so I may be speaking from my rectum (as I frequently do), but it seems to me that pope can’t hold the patent on the idea of simply splitting a board and rejoining it again. I’m certain that he has the patent on his particular technology for putting a board back together, but that with significant changes/advancements to his original design an innovative shaper could be in safe territory to make his own. In fact, one of the means by which you can get a patent from the US patent office is by creating an improvement to an existing device or process. It thereby stands to reason that if you were to make a two-piece surfboard that could be reassembled, and the process for reassembling it were measureably different than the pope process, you would be in safe territory to experiment. Hell, you could even apply for your own patent, if it was good/different enough. If nothing else, you should be safe to make a two-piece surfboard of ANY design, provided you weren’t making it to profit from someone else’s patented idea.
That is the purpose of a patent, is it not? To protect from financial losses caused by someone marketing your original design? I’m pretty sure its not to protect from some backyarder from messing around with it on his own.
And you know what else? US patents are PUBLIC INFORMATION, except when having such info could compromise national security. Since I can’t see any potential threat to national security with the pope bisect, I think we should discuss the design all we feel like it!
Who’s with me?!
Found it…
patent # 5,711,692
long, wordy document that is… But the first thing it says is a sectional surfboard, so I guess he does have the patent on that idea.
however, straight from the USPO website (italics mine) “Patents protect inventions, and improvements to existing inventions.”
Improvements imply non-profit tinkering to get to the improvements. I see no legal reason why we can’t make our own “hopefully improved” version of a “sectional surfboard”, and why great thinkers couldn’t knock some ideas around in cyberspace to that end.
Granted, pope has a great idea to protect… But when I saw the kind of heavy-handedness he displayed last time, it just raised my hackles.
Anyways…
Build it. You can’t be (successfully) sued unless you try to make a buck off it.
I have an idea for one I’ll try to post with a pic later.
Hard way…
get a board you like.
wrap it in plastic
Glass a sheet of 1/2"-1" thick corecel foam over the deck with glass under and over in a bag.
make sure you over lap the railline
Now do the same for the other side
Measure the rail over lap and cut the top and bottom rail excess so thay they merge seamlessly in the middle.
Cut two rail band profiles out of thick high density foam
Carbonfiber glass these to the inside of the rail of the bottom skin
Do the same to create a center stringer
Make sure the rail bands are at least 1.5"-2" wide with the center anywhere from 2-3" thick
Glass in balsa or Corcell foam bars to support your fin boxes on the bottom
Slowly shave the top down on these three bands till you can set the top skin down and the top and bottom skins meet seemlessly.
Now find the area you will cut in half and lay two cross beams of Carbonfiber glassed in foam where the cut will be.
Route or core a groove to insert a 1.5"-2" hollowcarbon or fiberglass tube in to where you’ll cut it in half
The tube should extend at least 1-1.5’ into each section
Now join the deck shell to the bottom using carbon glass tape along the rail and at the joint of the three fore aft stantions and the deck
Core out the boxes then glass the board top and bottom
Cut the board in half in between the two 2" thick foam cross beams
Glass the cut with carbonfiber
open up the tube holes
route out a Ibeam groove in the deck and bottom to support two i-beam connectors
cut a graphite rod to length to insert into the tubes
use the rod inserted onto the tube and the i-beam connectors to hold the board togethor…
you have a pope-bisect facsimile although not 100% hollow.
Easy way…
Find a board you like.
cut it in half
bore out two holes 1-1.5" diameter on each side of the stringer on boths side to insert hollow carbon tubes 1-1.5’ deep
glass in the tubes into each side
glass and seal the exposed foam with carbon and open up the tube holes
cut a carbon rod to size to insert into the tube holes.
route out an “I” channel on the deck and bottom along the stringer and glass them with carbon fiber
cut two pieces of aluminum or carbon fiber to fit into the i-beam slots on the deck and bottom
cut a carbon rod to insert into the hollow carbon tubes
Real easy way
Buy on of those ULI blow up surfboards
A flashback to Swaylocks - Dec 27, 2001: "retro-fitting YOUR OWN BOARDS to become “bisect LIKE”
Note: Angus Honey of Lorne, Victoria Australia
“SplitBits” was his prototype, but the web site expired
some time ago. (http://www.splitbits.com.au/)
(an archive search for angus honey returns 8 results)
http://www.swaylocks.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=96906;search_string=angus%20honey;guest=3574145#96906
From the Surf Coast Times (www.torquayonline.com/)- Monday May 17 2004:
"… features an invention made by Lorne local, Angus Honey. A surfboard that can be split into two parts, originally designed so he could ride a motorbike to Western
Australia and access some of the extremely remote waves along the north coast. Angus’s passion - newly turned business venture, aptly called “Split Bits” has received substantial media attention for it’s unusual design and traveling capabilities…"
I had read that post. When I originally googled their website it was dead. I have no problem buying somebody else system to make this work. In one of the threads I read Doc seemed to have some interesting ideas of how to make it work. Unfortunately, the next time I searched I couldn’t find it.
Ive never traveled with a board before, always had one back home on maui when I would go. But not that I am shaping I want to bring my own… did yours get screwed up from travel or did you just have to borrow?
I was too cheap to fly mine over for only 5 days. It would have cost $160 round trip and I thought that I could find a decent one there. Unfortunately, all the boards I found were pretty pricey so I ended up surfing an old surftech. It sure felt good to get back on my own board when I got home (although the 57 degree water felt colder than I remembered). I’ll have to keep researching how to split a board.