Hi,
The beginning of (hopefully) many detailed progress reports of my #001 is up on my blog, www.noviceshaper.blogspot.com. I’ll update the “#001” post as I progress, and give you guys the heads up when I do.
Enjoy!
kc
ps. Criticisms comments (hopefully constructive) welcome and appreciated
Love your blog mate. The planer is a dngerous beast no doubt - took the top off my finger a few months ago. Still, i made my second board with one and will never go back to surform for the large scale stuff. in fact i found that the surform takes too many chunks out of the harder foams. A trick with cutting out your template with a saw is to use WD40 or CRC to grease the saw so it cuts like butter.
Good luck mate
Ado
i’m loving the blog…i keep checking up on it. totally cool.
…from one novice to another. haha.
i had to back track after #1. haha. i didnt prepare as well as you. 
eeee!!! sorry to hear about your finger man. i hope you didn’t take off too much. well, thats one good reason to keep your cuts shallow i suppose 
thanks for the WD40 advice, i’ll try that on my next one.
be safe…
kc
thats a nice setup and the makings of a nice board…beats the hell out of using nothing but a surform and sandpaper on your back porch as i did on my first…keep the blog coming!
wow, that looks pretty nice!
are you glassing on fins?
p.s. don’t be too scared about glassing, it’s not too bad. I really enjoy it!
that looks sooooo much better than my #1 and my #2… and probably my #3
i guess research pays off then… (didnt learn that till later)
keep it up! i’m loving the blog!
are you going to glass it too??
Looks like you’re having a lot of fun and doing a great job,
especially for a first board. Excellent idea to get a reject to
practice on.
A few tips: Usually the outline is drawn on the bottom and the cut-out
done from that side. (your photo shows you cutting from the
deckside) Since your rail apex is closer to the bottom on short-
boards, this is more accurate.
To true up your outline with the planer, weight the blank down
on your rack(wrap padding around five lb weights and put one
at each support point). Run the planer near zero and go almost
end to end. The tips you true with a block.
You need the "slinky" hose like we use on the Clark system, a stiff
material will "pull" on the planer. Running the power cord down the
hose works great for me, but NOT twisted around the hose. Look
at the Clark diagram, that's the way it should run. I put about 4 oz
of weight on the cord (between the pulleys and the plug-in) so the
cord retracts at the same rate as the hose.
When you're done surforming your deck, take your planer back over it,
set on zero, running straight, and listen to the "nick-nick-nick" as the
planer hits the high spots left by the surform! There's a reason Jim Phillips
says to get rid of that thing. And I speak from experience, I confess I was
very dependent on the surform early in my learning process. If you must
use it, be sure to block sand a lot to clean up. Bottom line is the planer
and blocks cut much cleaner lines.
Mike
Mike, thanks for the tips. I used a planer to true up the outline and do one of the rail bands, but I just got too scared and chickened out on continuing with it. I’ll keep practicing though, its just a matter of time till i get comfortable.
JDM, barrel…ya, i’m gonna glass it myself. i’m not sure about fins tho, glasson or finboxes. whats the minimum thickness in the tail one should have when doing finboxes (ProBox)? the tail is pretty flimsy and thin.
glasson or finboxes. whats the minimum thickness in the tail one should have when doing finboxes (ProBox)? the tail is pretty flimsy and thin.
i’m not really sure. i’ve never glassed a board but instead have thought about it a lot. haha. to me, it seems much nicer to glass on fins for the first try although i don’t really know the real answer to that. i talked to a guy at a local surfshop who suggested that installing something along the lines of fcs was the smoothest way to go. i’m still curious myself. to me, applying a lot of glass and then sanding it down seems like it might create a little more room for error. suggestions anyone?? i’d think you’d need some sort of router for ProBoxs also…
Hi All,
Been a long time since my last update, but I’ve updated my blog with recent developments on my #001 (see Part 3). In case you missed Parts 1 & 2, I’ve included links to them below:
BTW, just want to thank all you guys for your help/comments thus far. Can’t imagine doing this w/o Sways.
enjoy…
kerry
Nice work!!! Wish my #1 would have turned out like that…
JSS
Hi,
Blog updated with hotcoat and fin glassing pics…
http://noviceshaper.blogspot.com/2007/08/001-part-4.html
kc
ps. can someone tell me if i’m supposed to sand/surform a tinted cutlap before laminating over it? will it ruin/affect the clean cut edge of the cutlap?
Wow… how you guys do that telekinetic razor blade work is beyond me. Did LeeV teach you how to do that?
just wanted to say that i am enjoying your blog. i am in the process of learning to shape myself and its good to know i have some company. keep up the good work.
To avoid sanding your cutlap and possibly making the tint lighter, you can ‘baste’ the lap. In other words, brush some resin on the cutlap before lamming the other side, so you are adding material to get a smooth transition from foam to glass instead of taking away material (sanding/grinding) to get one.
JSS
thanks brasco… more pics coming from last night’s first attempt at cutlapping…stay tuned.
max,
ya, basting (or “priming” the laps as its referred to in the Master Glasser video, i think) is something i’ll definitely do next time. meanwhile, i did my first tinted cutlaps on two funboards last night and used the “push the cutlap into foam” method by rolling the bottom edge of a paper mixing bucket along the cutlap edge with some pressure. seemed to work pretty well (the laps are flush with the foam) and was faster than inching along by hand. pics of this coming soon on the blog.
kc