Maybe I'm daft but I'm looking at the possibilty of making a papier mache longboard.
Laminating the blank with papier mache and sealing it with marine varnish. I'm not sure how its going to dry properly or how heavy it will end up. My reason? I have made one conventional board before, loved the process, love riding the board, want to make another but am skink at the moment. Also its a challenge to make a board out of recyled materials - old windsurfer blank, newspapaper, flour and water ( and the varnish of course). I don't expect it to last too long but it will give me an opportunity to experiment with different shapes. An additional deck patch of something would stop pressure dings. I have done a bit of research and no one seems to have tried this (I wonder why!) Even if I can get one good session on it before it turns to pulp it will be worth it. If the chinese could make furniture out of papier mache why not a board?
what sort of structural integrity does papier mache with varnish over it provide?
are you going to stringer the heck out of the blank to keep it from being floppy?
how do you keep the foam from denting underfoot?
how does papier mache bond to the foam?
as much as I’d love to see this build thread (sincerely)…you can spend your time and limited money doing this, but would it be better to just save up until you can procure more functional materials?
I started building HWS because I thought it would be cheaper than buying a board…I could not have been more wrong.
An interesting mix of comments already. Thank you.
I have a 9 foot polyurethane blank with a stringer and fin box in it (ex windsurfer board) so no floppiness there. Structural integrity? I have made all sorts of things with papier mache and it can be pretty tough. I have experimented with laminating an off cut of foam blank rail with newspaper and pva wood glue - must have been about 10 layers. When dry it was hard and tough, Would take quite a bit to ding it. Certainly with more strength and dent proof than a single layer of 4oz cloth. I remember shortboards in the 70s that dented if you squeezed them too hard. To stop denting on the top deck I though a patch of pvc sheeting salvaged from another old windsurfer would do. Bonding - an initial coat of pva glue onto the foam should prevent delamming. Yes I am saving for the conventional materials but in the meantime why not think outside the box? Even Edison’s light bulb initially seemed like a daft idea.
No ibex where I live - and thanks Huckleberry - i’m over 50.
If you're serious, you should know that it probably will ''work'' to some extent. But it's a giant step backwards - the very first composites were paper and shellac boats in the late 1800s.
The cardboard boards are great and I love the one made from fence timber - certainly more solid than papier mache.
I will have to use exterior pva glue. Flour water mix may strong but it will be disasterous if water gets in through the varnish layer.
Started experimenting again this evening - ten layers of newspaper on one side of an old polysyrene body board just to see how it dries and what the strength is like. Something to read whilst waiting for waves.
Well, If MythBusters can make a boat from only using newspaper and water (then froze it)
Strapped a massive outboard motor to it and then got it to plane at 40 miles an hour
I reakon you could make a board from papermacha
Mind you, the boat only lasted 30mins or so before it melted.
and yes, what ever you use as the outer most layer , varnish etc, better be stong,
if water got in you would be in trouble.
I'm going to be having a go. Perfect for all those experimental designs that just cost so much to try.
Ther's a whole load of strengh in that good old paper mache stuff and I recon a coat of hot wax/rosin and shelac should see me surfing a good time befor any untold problems acure.
So lets all see, you can laugh if Ilovesarina or myself fail at this little challange but those that think outside the box have the last laugh when success is achived.
These success are what change the world so lets get some green board makin fun out there.
I'll post my sucess but also any failings I have. I expect success!!
I have stripped the windsurfing board, cut it in half and glued in a pre shaped 6mm plywood stringer with exterior pva wood glue. In the absence of clamps I have used 4 roofrack board straps to hold the blank together while it dries.
I have designed and drawn a plan and rocker template using AutoCAD polylines and printed it out full size on paper and cut it out. The design is based on the existing blank size, required volume for my weight and the intended purpose of the board. Although I surf traditional noseriders in the sea, I live within walking distance of the River Severn in England and have been surfing the Severn Bore for the past 4 and half years. This will be the perfect testing ground for the new mache board. A ride of several miles is not a problem especially if you have a long flat rockered buoyant board with a wide tail for stabilty in the white water. So at the moment the template is 8'11" long nose 14" only because of blank width 23" wide 16" tail 10" square tail 3 3/4" thick
Papier mache - my first test of 10 layers of newsprint and flour has dried rock hard on the XPS bodyboard. It fractures when you jump on it so I done some more test panels. 10 layers of brown paper with pva glue, another panel with 10 layers of brown paper with flour, and one flour mix alternating brown paper with news paper.
pva glue does not have the water content and drying problems of tradional flour and water but lacks its rigidity. At the moment it looks like the better option is going to be about 10 layers of 100 gram pure kraft paper with flour water mix, well dried and waterproofed with marine varnish or the above suggestions. A layer or 2 of linen might help.
After doing more research on papier mache, paperboats and the work of Elisha Waters I realise that my idea is not so daft after all.
And in the meantime my daughter has asked me to make her a 9 foot nose rider - polyurethane blank and polyester resin/glass not papier mache for this one.
Why not fiberglass it? I'm thinking build your paper mache surfboard, cut it in half lengthwise, glue up a stringer (or three), then glass it. I would trust that a lot more than varnish over paper.
Thanks for this alternative suggestion but would not glassing it defeat the whole point of the exercise? The goal is to produce a paper based product (excluding the blank at moment) that is strong enough, durable enough and waterproof enough to surf on. This pre glass/resin technology has already proved to work on canoes so its just a matter of applying the method to a surfboard.
Because its so different I have several times been tempted to defect to the conventional approach. The pva wood glue has not dried after 2 days because I used too much so I've pulled it apart and its drying in the sun. I'll have to use an alternative adhesive like resin or polyurethane glue. Pity I wanted to start shaping today.
Just looking for a camera and I can start posting some pics.
