Paulownia Bonzer 5

General Discussion
1

When the cats away the mice will play.

My wife and 3 year old daughter are off to Italy for a month, so it’s time to make a mess!

I’ve started shaping my bonzer and it’s going great. I just had to talk/write to someone about it. For me, a once a year shaper, it’s almost as much fun as being on a good wave. Makes me want to hoot. Awooooo!

Pics will follow if someone can explain to me how to post them. The last few times I tried they (you, Mr. Swaylock) had reduced the max file size and all I could get uploaded were tiny, grainy thumbnails- not even worth it.

So I got my paulownia on Ebay from some guy in Jersey. It came in 8 foot strips, 3"-4" wide by 1/8" thick, rough sawn. Four were bookmatched. Four were just random. And there were five strips of really white wood with little grain. If I had only gotten the white wood I’d have been bummed. After much shuffling I found the ideal bookmatch pattern. (pics soon?).

I shaped the bottom contours into 1 lb. EPS on a top rocker table. I have to say, as I was feeling those double concaves the word “sexy” and “sensuous” kept coming to mind. Some thing about smooth bumps that come in pairs. :slight_smile:

I bagged on the bottom skin (standard stuff for you swalockian compsanders). I was stoked to see the wood suck into the concaves.

Now the thing that got me practically hooting was sanding the concaves on the paulownia when it came out of the bag. IT WAS LIKE THE GRAIN WAS TELLING ME EXACTLY WHERE TO PUT THE CONCAVES!

There was one big “dart” of grain right where the single went (basically under the front foot in the middle of the board. There were two more “darts” of grain right where the doubles start about a third of the way up from the tail. And then there are like “tiger stripes” right where the doubles deepen and go through the fins.

The wood also made it easy th shape the concaves in a slow and very controlled way. The only bad thing so far has been the raising of the grain, when I sand. Could be a problem if it telegraphs through the hot coat.

You guys who make boards for a living are really lucky.

Anyways, sorry to bore y’all. Wait til you see the photos.

2

I’m going to try and upload some pics. Sorry if they suck.



3

outstanding. show more as you go!

4

these pics are giving me a woody, can’t wait to see the fins setup. well done.

5

Looks FN awesome so far–keep the progress and pics going and coming!

greg

6

beauty! I’ve been waiting for someone to tackle a nice compsand bonzer for a while. It really shows how the concaves “pop” out of the grain. I can’t wait to hear your ride report.

off to go do a fill coat now.

pat

7

Done shaping. I had over 1/2" of thickness to take off and was thinking, “I wish I had a power planer.” But then this is 1 lb EPS and I took it down really fast with a surform.

The hardest thing about the compsand for me is trying to shape knowing that you will add thickness. My first one came out with a thick tail and full rails. This time I wanted thinner rails so I made them really knifey. At a certain point I panicked, “Oh my god they’re too thin!” I hope that 1/8" fills it out.

Tommorow, I’ll fine tune and then do the unthinkable- cut off the rails, to build them back up. It always feels weird to cut off the rails.

Sorry again about the photos. Does anyone know how to upload bigger jpgs…with MAC OSX?



8

That looks great Llilibel03. What an excellent way to spend a month.

Lars

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Oh, one thing I forgot to mention- this board has “timbre.” That is, when I put it on a single block and then tap it, it sounds like a frickin’ marimba! Seriously. Has anyone else experienced this? This board’s like a musical instrument. Cool.

10

The board looks grand. I’ll be anxious to hear the final specs. and weight when it’s done. The, as you say, accentuates they flow of the contours beautifully.

Good Surfin’, Rich

11

looks good jeff

well done man

love the concaves

can you show us a pic of the rails thiness

im liking the thinner rails myself

12

My wife and 3 year old daughter are off to Italy for a month, so it’s time to make a mess!

Care to swap wives?

Good looking stuff. So you havent skinned the deck? Will your deck skin conform to your deck shape? Carefull there.

13
Quote:
[i]Good looking stuff. So you havent skinned the deck? Will your deck skin conform to your deck shape? Carefull there.

Thanks.

I’m going to cut off the rails, put one stringer band of 3/16" balsa and then bag the deck (thanks Benny). The deck is pretty flat where the nose flips (the only really serious compound curve). My one worry…actually one of my many worries… is that the deck panel will straighten out the rocker when I vac bag the deck since I have no bottom rocker table (I watched with some concern as the board straightened a little as soon as I turned off the vac pump when bagging the bottom…At first I was afraid it was going to go totally straight in the nose!). I’m hoping the stringers will hold the rocker.

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To post pictures in OS X you have to use FireFox, you cannot do it with Safari.

15

A couple of bricks are your friend there. :wink: Looking great so far.

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hey jeff

epoxy takes a fair while before it gets stiff and holds its shape permently

the only way to get it to stay where you want it is to either speed up the cure with heat

or leave it for 2 or 3 days until it sets

my boards always loose rocker if i take them out of the bag to early

can i ask why your cutting off the rails?

brick sounds like the go benny

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Quote:
To post pictures in OS X you have to use FireFox, you cannot do it with Safari.

Seems to work fine for me. OSX with Safari. Here’s the concave pic linked above. Looks awesome!!!

18

Hi Silly (and thanks for all the past advice).

I’m cutting off the rails because there is no way to wrap paulownia. I’m going to build them back up with one layer of 3/16" cork and four of 3/16" balsa. I guess it’s the “Paul Jensen Method”. I’ve seen Daniel Hess do it that way too (although I suspect he hollows his out???). Benny suggested I lose the cork as it’s too heavy and absorbs too much resin. I’m leaving one layer in. Partly aesthetic ( you will see in a minute) and I guess I’m thinking it will serve as a layer that “gives” between the perimeter rail stringer (which will be stiffer) and the body of the board. I’ve read that cracking can develop there (although none did on my first compsand).

Now comes my big innovation- TAPERED perimeter stringers. I don’t think I’ve seen anyone do that yet (though they probably have). The perimeter stringers I’ve seen are tapered because of the foil, but I intend to taper my in plan as well. I figure you want the ends to flex and the middle to be stiffer so tapering the stringers will help achieve this end. It may be a moot point with the bonzer having so much fin in the back. But it will be flexier than if the rail stringers didn’t taper. They will go from 7/8" at the center of the board to 1/2" at the nose and tail (including the cork, so in reality at the nose and tail there’s only 5/16" of balsa). I don’t know if this makes any sense and I don’t think you can see it in my terrible photos but there it is- TAPERED perimeter stringers.

I’m going to try and weight the board even as I put the first rail band on (thanks for the tip Benny). As it is now the board has only 4" of nose raocker and I’d like 5".



19

Here’s a pic of the first rail band going on and me trying to add rocker back in. Spring loaded?

20

You’re in Benny-tech land now, my friend :slight_smile:

It works. If you need more, you can also set the board across your glassing stands and use a strap tightened down under the base of the stand. With a little fore & aft adjusting you can get it right where you want it. You can also mist the balsa with a kitchen sprayer to bend it easier & when its dry again, it will retain the new shape with no springback (and hopefully, hold the rest of the board there as well!).