Need Help with Hansen Restoration

General Discussion
1

I picked up an old Hansen that I thought I would try as a restoration project. I’ve talked to Josh Hansen and here is what I know:

  • Board is 9’9" (15.5" nose, 21.5" center, 15.5" tail, 4.5" at end of block)
  • Is pre 1968 because of “Cardiff” still in logo
  • Foam or glass tail block (likely makes it 1963 or later)
  • 4 stringer setup with 2" green foam splitting the two center stringers
  • No model name and no visible serial number
  • Original fin replaced with modern fin box
  • Plenty of visible water damage, but no soft spots despite discoloration
  • A few open dings on rails and nose and plenty of cracks
  • Many large areas where the weave of the glass is exposed

Here is what I don’t know:
  • What year the board was actually made
  • What fin it likely would have had (If I can narrow it down I plan to get a replica from Juan at One World Surf)
  • What is the best way to go about restoration for this board given its current condition (sand it all down to the lowest layer of glass, strip all the glass, just fix the dings and add a hot coat and/or gloss, other?)

I picked it up fairly cheap, so I know that no matter what it is never going to be a high dollar collectible (not my goal). It’s a project I would enjoy though and if I don’t do the best job it won’t be the end of the world. I would like to make it look nice and good enough to take in the water occasionally. I was hoping to get some help from the experts here, particularly Bill T., and if anyone would like to help, guide, mentor, oversee my restoration, I would welcome the assistance and love to share in the stoke of bringing a classic back to life.

I plan to take the board up to Hansen’s this weekend and Josh and Christian offered to take a look at it and provide whatever insight they can - for which I am grateful. I’ve attached several photos and welcome any and all advice. Thanks in advance!



2

Some additional photos



3

2 more photos


4

Hola,

Resin pigment glassing or resin pigment hotcoat would be the best and lightest methods, but I’m not used to them. In fact I’ve never used them.

I’ll suggest this one:

-sand fiercely and remove old hotcoat till you reach good glass

-fix dings, just using resin+cabosil or so (filling)

-do a full cloth inlay on quite dark colors so you can hide all these brown areas (black+blue, brown+red,…). First deck with no-lap, then bottom with cut-lap. You can reach a tint-like of pigment-like effect.

-due to the poor state of the glass job, you’ll need to re-glass the whole board. 1x4oz on deck and 1x4oz on bottom should be enough

-hot coat and sand

Something like this:

ZIPS RESTORATION

I wouldn’t touch the finbox. It’s very useful if your work comes good and you want to keep the board as a wallhanger (no fin against the wall).

Or you can go “the hard way” like this:

BING RESTORATION

5

platty: where are you? this one’s right up your alley of expertise.

6

hi PB-Bob !

That’s interesting about the “Cardiff” in the logo .

A mate of mine [here in west australia] got a hansen mal [?somehow??] in better condition than the one pictured by you .

The silly bugger stripped and reshaped and reglassed it , against all better judgement and advice to keep it original .

His didn’t have the “cardiff” in the logo , and as far as I can recall , had the original glass on fin still on it .

For some unknown reason , though , I only ever took ONE photo of the board , and I think that was of the deck only ??

It is somewhere here , that photo …

I will try and find it for you . Like Oldy , I too hope “Platty” will guide you through this restoration , so that you can do the best job possible on it , because I think it will be a great project , and a board which hopefully will bring you a lot of joy in the water !

…it’s heartbreaking , really , how people [mis]treat[ed] boards sometimes …

…Just imagine the large numbers of boards rotting away under houses , or outside in the garden , and in other various places where sunlight and moisture are decaying the “life” out of what deserve to be ridden , and well looked after , "vessels’’ of aquatic [and sometimes, visual, too !] pleasure.

ben

7

Bob,

PM me and maybe we can hook up and I will take a look at the board and see if I set you in the right direction

Mark

8

PB-Bob,

By what I can see in your photos, that appears to be a glass and balsa tailblock. Most likely the fin was black glass with a white center, or solid black, matching the black line in the tailblock. The impression I have of the board is that it dates from 1963 or 1964, no later. If I had to choose I’d pick 1963. You have your work cut out for you on that one!

9

hi Bill !

while I’ve got you here ,

I found the photo of my mate’s aforementioned Hansen [pre- him butchering it !]

here it is …

What year would you think this one would be please ?

any help much appreciated …WISH I had a shot of the bottom of it , and the fin …

cheers ,

ben

sounds odd coming from me , I know , but …

I really wish I had bought this board from him , and kept it original , and I’d be riding it now (… oh well , not meant to be , I guess… )

10

Chip,

That looks like a vintage 1968 pintail ‘‘Master’’, with the removeable one bolt fin system developed for Hansen by Fred (Buzzy) Smole. How our past comes back to haunt us.

11

thanks a lot Bill !

…would you have any photos from around that ‘era’ , of the fins you guys made / used ?

cheers ,

ben

12

wow !

due to the wonders of computerised photo editing programmes ,

HERE is the lightened , cropped version of that photo ,

showing , indeed , the screw through the deck fin attachment , as well as the ‘Hansen’ logo … [it was , I think , a ‘Mike Hynson’ model , from memory…would that be right / ring any bells , Bill ? ]

( note to self …ALWAYS take lots of closeup detail shots , especially of [old] boards …)

cheers again , Bill !

ben

13

No,

I don’t have any photos, however looking up old ads in surf magazines of the era could be real productive. Hansen had a standard ‘D’ fin, and a Reverse fin that were offered at that time. There is no way to know which was on the board. The base length was the same as I remember.

14

Chip,

That looks like the later version of the Mike Doyle Model decal. If I’m correct, then the board could be from '69 or '70. Mike Hynson NEVER had anything to do with the Hansen company.

15

oh …

okay .

…like I said , I REALLY should have taken some closeups of the logo , the serial number [IF there was one ??] the fin , the screw hole for the fin .

It’s all just history now , he broke that board years ago …

sniff sniff

ben

[that photo I took in about ?1989?? , from memory ?]

16

[=1]I would be inclined to go down the fix the dings and re gloss road. Firstly because it is the least labor intensive and cheapest way. But mainly because, if you do a full pigment job, you do hide all the water marks and dings, but you lose all of the character of the board. And some will say, and I agree, the resale value of the board will be lowered.

The red Bing that I restored in a previous link was in such a bad state [ 2]

that it had to be pigment coated. It looks as if your board would be a nice rider. And it is in far better condition than the Bing was.

This is how I would go about a basic restoration.

Prep all the dings. If you have a 4" grinder with a 36 grit disc. Grind all the dings to below the level of the surrounding areas.

Repair the dings with glass, not Q- cell. Cut your glass into little patches roughly the size of the ding and build up the layers until they are proud of the rest of the board. I use 4oz. Trying to use heavier glass does not seem to be as affective. I try and mach the colour also. There are a number of ways. Docs coffee and acetone mix added to resin. Tints. General purpose resin. This is not clear and goes off the colour of old boards. Or Vinylester resin. This is light brown in colour and works the same as regular resins.

Once all the dings are cured sand them down close to the board. This is when I do the main sand on the entire board. All the dings will now get faired into the board during this sand. I use a soft pad with 40 grit discs and a half sheet orbital. Sand until you can’t se any shiny spots. You will be starting to see the cloth being exposed in areas. I would not go too much further. You do not need to expose all the glass. As long as there are no shiny spots. That will be fine.

That fin box. To keep or not to keep. That is up to you. It is an old board. I think it would be a shame to do a really nice restoration and not have a big old original 60’s style fin in it.

All that is left to do is gloss it. I use regular hotfoot resin not gloss. Because it goes on thicker and gives you more material to work with when sanding the board ready for polishing.

This is a pretty basic outline. I hope it clears a few things up. Platty.[/][/]

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platty: a concise, simple explanation. you make the restoration sound so easy & quick (as opposed to bing so laborious & time-consuming).

i agree, don’t go the pigment road. keep it real, waterstains, cloudy dings & all.

18

Neira, Mark, Ben, Bill and Platty -

Thanks for your interest and replies. I reviewed Neira’s experiment with the double cloth board and the photos from the Bing restoration. I agree with Platty that the character in the board is the old color and stains. I don’t want to pigment the board - I would much prefer to keep it in as original condition as possible. Every time I look at that board I cringe at the thought of someone yanking off the original fin. That box is definitely coming out and I will try and match the fin as close to the original as possible.

I was surprised to see that Bill thinks it is from '63. I knew that Clark didn’t really do many tail blocks prior to 1963 for production blanks, but I figured with the four stringers and foam center that a fancy setup like that might have been a bit later. 1963 is cool though.

If I take Platty’s route of sanding the board down to the original cloth and putting a new hotcoat on, I’m wondering if I need to worry about the strength of the stringers in the areas where they are pretty black. To the touch, the whole board feels solid - it isn’t soft anywhere, but I wonder if the areas where the board is particularly black has rotted a bit, at least the stringers. Is this a case of I don’t want to know or could I actually repair them if they needed work and removed some of the black discoloration at the same time. Just a thought.

Any thoughts on stripping all the glass (except the logo)? Pros and cons of trying to do this?

I’m taking the board up to the Hansen shop today. I’m curious to see what they say.

Thanks again for all your input. Much appreciated.

Bob

19

PB-Bob,

Back in the day Clark had nothing to do with tailblocks. They were laid up at the factory, and cut out and shaped by the shaper to fit the finished board, then it was off to glassing. I think the earlier date because colored foam had fallen out of favor earlier on because of instability. In '64/'65 Clark was doing some high density foam T-Bands with color, and some manufacturers were using high density foam with wood backing to do tailblocks. Carl Ekstrom comes to mind, he liked that method. The outline shape also looks to be from that earlier date. Hope that I’ve been helpful.

20

Bill,

Thanks for the insight. You have indeed been both helpful and informative.

I thought I had read somewhere that Clark had introduced foam tailblocks in the early sixties and included them with many blanks. Am I off base on that one? It’s entirely possible that my memory is all messed up.

Anyway, I’m off to the Hansen shop in just a bit. I’ll let everyone know what they have to say as well.

Bob