How do most of you get a consistent belly in your retro longboards?
Hi
Out of around 500 shaped, I only bellied two, my first and #5.
Both I skinned and cutout the template on the bottom as normal, then marking penned the amount of desired belly on the vertical rail. with little slashes right at the rail peak.
While shaping, I just looked at the vertical rail marks to figure out how much belly to take out.
Hey LeeDD thanks for responding. We usually don’t do many of the retro longboards either but this one is for a give-away at a classic longboard contest. We thought we would go with the same theme on the board. I was thinking about skinning the blank, getting the bottom nice and flat then make two passes (maybe three) on each side with my planer. The outside cut would be full depth. The next one would be 1/2 depth. Or possibly more passe with each one getting shallower and shallower. Then all I have to do is play connect the ridges and this should give me a consistent belly across both sides! What do you think?
i just did my first longboard with full belly recently. my approach was similar to doming the deck. like LeeDD, i marked my bottom rail depth and cut to there and blended in towards the middle. you’ve got a lot of foam to move to get full belly, so more passes progressively shallower is probably the ticket for you (like it was for me). i was going for a 60/40 rail, so i took out about 3/4" off the bottom rail and blended in to the center. took quite a few passes, mostly 1/4-1/2 depth cuts to avoid overdoing it.
You might also think about using a portion of your outline template to trace a curve on the bottom somewhere between the stringer and rails… kind of a flat oval in the middle with a blended bevel or tri-plane kind of thing closer to the edge. This will give a reference line on where to break the curve. With the right tail rocker and belly, even a tanker can turn and cutback OK.
Make a pencil line 2.5" in from the rail along the bottom of the board. Make another pencil line 5/8" down from the bottom along the rail. This will be the depth of your hull. The deepest part of your hull should coincide with the wide point and crown of the rocker. Set your planer at a 1/2 cut and start making approx. 6" cuts from this point out toward the nose and tail. This way the hull is deep then fades out. For your second cut mark 1" in from the rail and 5" in from the rail. Third cut, 3.5" x 6.25". Fourth cut, 5.5" x 7.75". Fifth cut, 7" x 8.75". Blend the ridges and your done.
After making the initial cut for the hull other cuts can be varied to allow for flats, tri-planes, etc.