Just wanted to see some pictures of the final product some of you ended up with when making boards using sheet foam from Home Depot. Thanks.
Here’s my last two boards, done with Home Depot and/or Lowes EPS and a bit of XPS
Skins from Ikea
If you go to my Flickr page you can see some of the long board build. http://www.flickr.com/photos/frickle/
The blank was glued up like I was doing a chambered board. i.e. 12 rocker profiles cut out of 2" sheet and glued up.
Hi Marco SD… What exactly did you use from Ikea to skin that? My Olivia is an Ikea fanatic, but so far her attempts to drag me there have been futile. I make boards the hard way, but I think it’s just as well because I am new at it, and I think I learn more by starting from scratch. #7 is done, and my latest, well I can’t really call it #8 because it was a rebuild of unglassed #4. I have never bought a blank. All my boards have been made out of xps or eps, from home depot or recycled construction demo foam…plus or minus some wood veneer or corecell…so I would check out Ikea if there was some cheap skin material. This last one, lotta time involved but kinda fun, tooka old bamboo rug to make my deck skin out of. Yer board looks fun, I wonder how it feels with that Civil War era fin onnit! Maybe the pic, but it doesn’t look like bamboo to me…whatcha got there? D. HD Blank Boards:[img_assist|nid=1046181|title=HD blank 1|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=75][img_assist|nid=1046182|title=hd bank .5|desc=abandoned blank|link=none|align=none|width=100|height=75][img_assist|nid=1046183|title=hd bl .239|desc=|link=none|align=right|width=100|height=75][img_assist|nid=1046184|title=Hommity Deppity|desc=|link=none|align=none|width=640|height=480][img_assist|nid=1046185|title=hdfest|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480][img_assist|nid=1046186|title=foam chepo|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480][img_assist|nid=1046187|title=fucka new blank mek yer own|desc=|link=none|align=right|width=640|height=480][img_assist|nid=1046188|title=obviously not right in the head|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=480]all these pics are reruns of old posts- sorry, but you asked for it. My humble homemade blanks, Inspired by all the raw Swaylocks builders. I may never buy a prefab blank. Fuckem.
The longboard is a super fun cruiser. That Fin has tons of hold and bonus, the pivot point isn’t as far back as I thought it would be. Actually works better the steeper the wave. It’s hard to quantify.
Ikea sells a mini-blind made from raw paulownia. I take the slats, cut the middle part out so there aren’t any cord holes, and glue them up into a skin.
It’s actually pretty nice, they’re already the right thickness and they’re milled square, so there’s no machining to do.
You can get enough slats out of one set to skin the top and most of the bottom of a 6’ - 6’6" short board, fish, etc…
So two sets will get you enough to do one board easy and they’re $20 each.
Yeah I’ve heard this before, these I’m guessing,
http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/20117513
LUPIN Venetian blind, Solid paulownia, Clear lacquer
(what are you doing to get rid of the lacquer?)
That’s them, I give them a once over with 100 grit on a hard block to clean off the lacquer. It’s pretty thin and comes off in two or three passes.
I also bundle them up together and go over the edges with a block plane to get them all uniform thickness, there’s always a few that are a bit off width or have a little crown.
I also pull the ones that have highly diagonal grain patterns as they seem to snap pretty easy.
Shaped 5-6 boards all with Lowes Foam, here's a few recent projects.. Surf these boards up on the great lakes!
These are boards I made several years ago with the help of CMP. The only board that is not made from Home Depot foam is the second from the right, #001.
I’ve made 5 or 6 more since this photo was taken. I gave 2 of these away, but I still ride the rest plus the newer boards I have. There are posts from Oneula that show many other boards we’ve made from Home Depot foam. We have also used Lowe’s EPS and the blue Dow Styrofoam. Lately I’ve been using PU blanks that I got really cheap, and I have several large blocks of 2lb EPS I got from a construction site. The PU blanks and the 2lb EPS have been much cheaper than the Home Depot foam.
Thank you…that is exactly what I wanted to know! Thanks, D
Definately thought this thread would get more activity. Bump.
I agree. Let’s see some more! I wish I could delete my last post on your thread, but I dunno how to do that. I just noticed that you asked for pics of the ‘final product’, I was all proud of myself and slammed up a bunch of half-ass unfinished board pics. So I got off my lazy ass and lined 'em up. #1, 2, and 3 have been decapitated or destroyed in a fit of rage, so needless to say, they are out to lunch. [img_assist|nid=1046284|title=willy wonka|desc=|link=none|align=none|width=640|height=480]from left to right: #5, #7, #4 rebuild, #6.[img_assist|nid=1046285|title=Doctor Suess|desc=|link=none|align=none|width=640|height=480]Uuugh… another post from dpicton…sorry fellers, I am addicted to this site of yers
I usually stick photos of my homedepot-lowes hack obsession and other hobbies here:
http://s164.photobucket.com/albums/u38/oneula/
Heres one,
6’1 x 19" x 2 3/8" - laminated construction grade EPS/balsa and cork rails, Epoxy glass.
just needs hotcoat and sanding…
Nocean, where do you find long pieces of balsa?, I wouldnt mind trying a construction like yours but need ot find balsa longer than 4'
I dunno what my stand is on cork rails but dude, that is coool lookin’! Looks like Gorilla Glue-up, no/yes? Adding rails after solves the prob of shaping through glue lines and last time I did that I used epoxy, before that GG- but with Gorilla Glue I packed all my loaf slices tight into my rocker table and I think that made it harsher to sand cuz seems like the glue is denser under pressure. I may try loosely taping all my slices next time I use GG so the glue is less densified and therefore easier to sand, in theory, I guess. Awesome nose/tail blocks. I haven’t attempted anything like that yet. This method is probably gonna be what my next will be started from, like my 7th board, slices/close tolerance. I surfed monday at Pt Judith RI, Mushy slow waist/chest highs, nothing special but tried out my last creation for a couple hrs and it is FUN! Anyway I wasted an hour on the way there trying to find this place Madison Polymeric Engineering in Branford CT, realized when I walked in it was a total plant/warehouse, nothing like HD or hardware store, I just wanted a piece of 2lb eps PLEESE, I sat innna dismal guidance counselor office/dmv type room in this warehouse with a dirty empty coffee pot and dirty drop ceiling forever while this chub secretary kept telling me the guy was coming down in 5 minutes…40 minutes later I said I had somewhere else to be, then I went surfing. Why can’t I just go and buy 2 lb eps in this F-ing state. fuck. So after that long story, yeah I guess I’ll be using 1 lb Lowes again, on #8. It’s gonna be sick. I am convinced.
Hi cthulu,
I dont remember 100% but Im pretty sure I got it from a company called Balsa Central in Australia, Im not sure where you are based but you can look it up online, they shipped it here to me but it was not cheap! Im probably going to stick with Paulownia for my next boards as its locally grown.
dpicton, yer thats right gorilla glue was used to glue profiles up, I just used bricks to clamp them together and I only put glue down the center of the pieces which limited the amount of glue line sanding I had to do, Im also not that bigger fan of cork rails but they are really easy and quick to glue up and shape, and I was surprised I actually dont mind them on this board, I will do another board like this once I have tested it, id like to make a Quad fish or something for small waves maybe with full balsa rails?.. so many ideas so little time!..
Here is one I made from the blue xps foam you find at Lowes or Home Depot, painted it and then glassed it with Solarez Zerovoc. This is only my second board so it came out a little rough, but learned a ton doing it. It measures 6’x22"x3"
This one I made it with PU foam bough from Brico depot.
http://www.swaylocks.com/forums/watermelon-board#comment-468718
This is a combined wood and foam built. Hollow construction with green XPS as the bottomplate. Finished with 4oz and pigmented epoxy.
