Before I start - loved the discussion I posted on Surftech’s and to where it’s lead with Bert going thru the step-by-step guide of his sandwich construction method - compulsive viewing…
Anyway - last night I picked up a copy of Billabong’s new DVD by Bali Strickland called The Free Way, and near the end of the DVD Rasta is holding and talking about one of his boards that was shaped by Chris Garrett from Phantom Surfboards on the Gold Coast.
From Rasta’s description the board has a foam core which was wrapped in cedar - however there was no glass or resin involved. How did they do this method of construction??? Another shot shows Rasta and Luke Egan walking down the beach actually sniffing the board - obviously because of its woody smell.
Can someone enlighten me/us on this process - as the board looks sensational and very strong. Good vid by the way.
im having dificulty with the concept … there either not telling the real story about how there made , or there pieces of junk and just another scam …
im suspecting that instead of fibreglass there using some other fabric underneath combined with pva wood glue or boncrete , something of that nature ,
id be curious to see one after a year of use ???
unless you put some sort of fabric either side of a single timber slice or at least make a ply and fabric on one side , its a positive failure …i also build boards out of cedar and theres no way that i would build one without glass or some other fabric either side of the wood , ive learnt that lesson the hard way before any boards got to market …
just because surftech can get away with building woodies without glass on the outside and build the worst pieces of rubbish in the surfability and durability department (look great tho), maybe its just become exceptable …
i might go out now and take a pic of an unfinished cedar board …
here ya go 9’-2", cedar , glass, epoxy , composite combo , built with a clean conscience , to last …
regards
BERT
i could be completly wrong , maybe theyve come up with something revolutionary , but seeing as im pretty much one of the pioneers in this field , id gladly eat humble pie if i got a few more facts …
I could be completely wrong , maybe theyve come up with something revolutionary , but seeing as im pretty much one of the pioneers in this field , id gladly eat humble pie if i got a few more facts …
Chris Garrett is not all that far [geographically , at least] from Dick van Straalen, Bob McTavish, George Greenough… influences, perhaps ?
Good stuff CAN and DOES come from the east coast of Australia , too…
…lest we forget , for example, the ‘shortboard [r]evolution’…
Roy (and I) build timber boards using cedar without glass or any other fabric and they are very strong. We are using 5 to 10mm thick planks. The wood epoxy saturation technique (which doesn’t require cloth) has been around for a long time and it works. If your board is too weak without structural cloth it is because your veneer is thin. It is simply a matter of designing a structure which suits your purpose. Just because you use a thin veneer with cloth, does not mean that no timber board can be built without cloth.
I`ve talked with David about his boards. He said they were “Wood veneer glued over polystyrene foam, with a little resin around the fin plugs… they have a great feel, are very strong and smell good, too!” The reference to odor was due to fragrant citrus oil used as a sealer.
The skin had to have been glued to the core in some way or other, something like contact paper.
Pretty please Bert can you show me some of the features of your cedar board like nose, tail and rocker view with measurements.
PS. Dragon you’ve been with Roy too long, your sentence construction is exactly the same…can you start a thread with some of your pictures you’ve been talking about, I hear you’re into photography…
‘we basically just take a standard shaped blank and glue veener all over it… Then we seal it with anything off the shelves from bunnings!!’- Chris Garret.
Rastas not the only one riding them… Matt Hoy went herbal on one, plus Jack Johnson apparently loves the one he rides at pipe.’
||||||||||||||||||||||||what tracks said.
Can’t really shread any light on the situation but there great looking boards, and I think they last…
Who knows? theres alot of great things comming out of the goldie… Superbank, the heads, kirra… Parko, fanning deano, mp, rabit, and boardwise Dick Van Stalen was making aluminium boards not to long ago…
yea sorry dragon , i should of made my thoughts clearer …
using a veneer that thin without glass is a sure failure ,
ive run heavier thicker woods , ive got cedar out the back ranging from 1.5 through to 5mm … and there is no way i would run any of them over eps with out glass under it , or some other fabric or material …the reason is , ive already run a range of different timbers either without glass or without enough glass underneath and basically put my foot right through the deck on air landings , harsh floaters and solid drops …so im not being a critic for the sake of criticising , im speaking from experience …on the other hand , we do have waves with real lips over here , so maybe that makes a difference as well ?..
what you and roy are doing is in another class again and different rules apply , but your comment is valid and i didnt realise that my words could have taken a second meaning…
i do think if you got to handle and ride a real performance woodie , youd enjoy it …the extra length and width without the dead weight …
say hi to roy , i kinda miss his wit around here …i should drop into surfer to say hi one day …
We can do light boards with a balsa internal structure and cedar or redwood on the outside but we like the extra weight which is definitely ‘live weight’ not ‘dead weight’. Also balsa is expensive here and redwood is cheap. We just got enough redwood for two big boards for 40 bucks. Balsa would be more like 1400 dollars!
We get real lips over here too, just not as often! Roy has put his foot (and a thumb!) through the deck of a redwood board which had a 3mm deck, frames at 10 inches apart and glassed with muslin. The board was built for the 2002 Nationals and we thought if it lasts a few months and makes it through the Nationals then it doesn’t matter if it breaks. By the time we got to the event the board had patches all over the deck made of plywood and even woollen blanket soaked in epoxy. The bottom was still slick though. Sadly because of a lack of a vent the board blew up just prior to the first heat after being left in the hot sun with the bottom covered in coconut oil, and the heavy single concave turned into a floppy bulge bottom. We screwed the bottom back on with brass wood scews but the board never got back it’s original squirt.
I’ve been with Roy for 16 years and I have picked up his sentence structure for sure!
Here’s a pic or 3. The first one is of Roy at Whale Bay 1986 on a 6’6" foam singlefin, second is flex bulbfin with tunnel and the third is one of our pet birds.
yea dave , if your bottom layer ran across the board , that would help enormously , like making a ply , and if that was on high density eps , you would get better results …
then getting a good seal on the timber is the next big hurdle …
not impossible …
the information given on the boards still leaves questions , if more information was given , then it could all be weighed up , by an informed consumer…
with so many grand claims being made by companies these days , offering sub standard product , its only natural to be suspicious when things dont add up , especially if your working in the same field and have run thru the same problems …
ive built plenty of stuff that was lighter and stronger than a conventional board , but still not as light and as strong as you can go , so my perspective about what is good or bad is related to the stuff ive done , where as others making comparisons to conventional equipment will end up having a different opinion …
a good board is only as good as the best board youve seen and ridden …
Rasta was also riding a traditional fish - some of the best fish surfing i’ve seen and that board looked as though it had a cedar deck!!! Anyone else checked this vid yet???
