Last night I shaped 4 boards, the first one I used one of the clark blanks hiding in the secret spot in the back of the shop. Shaping as usual. The last 3, I used Teccel blanks: 6’2" fish, 7’5" and the 9’2". I’m finding that my planer sticks and doesn’t slide like on the Clark Foam. The other thing is when I’m doing my finishing passes with very little blade exposed, I don’t get a smooth surface like the clark. I also have to go super slow or I get major pox on the blank. “YES, MY BLADES ARE SHARP”. Has anyone used the grinding drum on their planer for these blanks? These issues added about an hour per board last night. HELP HELP HELP
Going slower is a must with eps, but Teccel . . . , could it be the quality of the foam?
I haven’t used Teccel blanks, but I have a grit drum on a Clark mod’d Hitachi. It leaves a rougher surface, but enables deeper cuts, stringer cross-cuts, … . – I skin and thin with a regular (blade) planer because of the consistent depth of cut, and I use the grit drum for banding the rails, scooping the nose, cutting concaves, etc. In this role, it works great for me. But if I could only have one planer, it would be a regular blade planer. I could do everything with blades if I had to.
$50 - $100 is allot cheaper than the ~$400 for the Clark and ~$200 for the grit drum. (There is a good drum from FiberglassHawaii. The one that has a spiral stripe pattern around the drum. Be careful of finer grit drums, I have heard they can cake up with foam dust and won’t cut eps. I don’t know how they do on PU blanks, maybe a pu/pe drummer can add more.)
Nobody has come close to a nice fresh powdery Clark superblue. All of the new foams I have shaped have had the same “sticky” feel with the planer. I use a Rockwell and have had to slow way down. Walker foam finishes super easy, easier than a Clark. Wait till you try a Burford, super hard foam that actually seems to get harder as you get in to it, plus has a “direction” to it{ my opinion}. Makes a strong board though. Safari for all its bad rap has some nice foam, The big secret is to spray silicon, some shapers use wd40, on the bottom of the planer. I use way more now than I ever did with Clark.
…I use Teccel (Surfblanks)and others foams. go with medium speed. the “problem” is the super tight foam formula
I ve 2 Hitachis, one is not too sharp and heavy(F 30 A) the other is a C F 03 sharped for C Foams. both machines go the same way if you work at medium speed…
yes Walker is easy like Elova foam, with the planer , but not to easy with the sandpapers
in my opinion, Surfblanks and Burford are the best foams available now for shortboards…
how can you compare walker to elova foam? elova is crapp people can not give that stuff away. what you need to get to shape most of these imported foams in a grit barrel, they work very well. walker foam shapes like butter!
The big secret is to spray silicon, some shapers use wd40, on the bottom of the planer. I use way more now than I ever did with Clark.
Second that one. I learned that trick from Paul Barga. He came by the factory the other day and the bay was all filled with WD40 fumes, he told me to switch to Lemon Scented Pledge for the same benefit, without the stink. Haven’t switched yet, but it’ll be cool to get a lemon fresh shaping bay instead of WD40 and sweat!!!
…I was told you that with the Hitachis planers I have the same type of work with both foams…and I can go with these foams faster than with Aussies foams…
and that with both I had been problems with some sandpapers grits. not with the Aussies…
in a couple of days I ll got some NEW formula Elovas…so I check them and compare
but still for shortboards Surfblanks and Burford have the best foam, but dont have the best plugs. for ex.: the Surfblank 6 5 is a bad plug