I just glassed a fish a couple weekends ago for a friend of mine. He just wanted an all clear board, so I shaped him a 5’8" fish out of an Ice9 blank and used 6oz E glass and Resin Research CE. It’s my understanding that the CE is more UV resistant than the original resin, and has optical brighteners as well. Well I finished the board and drove up to RI to drop it off. In the 8 or so hours it was on the roof of the car traveling north, it yellowed, leaving two nice lines where the straps are. You can even see where the buckles were. Now not only am I bummed that I have this already yellow board for my friend, but I’m bummed because I made several other boards with the same batch of resin and I really hope they don’t yellow the same.
The deck was down and is still nice a bright. And I used CE for every step of the board. Lam and hotcoat. I tried sanding it a little to see if it was just in the resin. Nope, yellowed foam.
I laminated a board using Fiberglass Hawaii lam resin (whatever Ted sold, this was several years ago) and red pigment. Left the laminated board in the sun several hours. It developed several clearly defined “stripes” across the lam where it was shaded, and pissed my off quite a bit. But the marks mostly faded by the time I finished the board off. In my case, the stripes were in the lam coat. Yours, the blank, and I’d consider seeking satisfaction from the supplier.
Anyway, the customer was from hell and declined to accept the board, I later sold it basically at cost, another story full of grief.
Don’t leave boards in the sun.
I’ve got a feeling that fish you made won’t recover, it’s scarred for life. But what difference will that make once it hits the water? Only in the rider’s mind.
Is the board a sanded finish (no gloss or clear coat)? If it is, I’ve seen some success by just re-sanding the glass job. It seems that a lot of the yellowing occurs on the very surface.
It’s the foam that yellowed, not the resin. You’re still using clear resin or you wouldn’t be able to see the stringer and why would you leave a board in the sun for eight hours without putting it in a board bag?
Not really sure what that means Dean- Isn’t the Blank made from Foam? In any case I don’t understand why after so many years of building boards everyone is still talking about White Foam turning yellow and what to do about it. The answer is… NOTHING. Foam (Aromatic Urethane Resin) AND Polyester Resin are NOT UV stable by their very nature. I.O.W. Chemically speaking they will ALWAYS yellow. It’s just a matter of time and intensity of exposure. It’s definetly NOT the manufacturer’s (Foam or Lam Resin) fault.
So help me to understand something please… If this problem has persisted for the past 45-50 years since Foam has been used in boards- why is everyone still hanging on to White Boards?
Dean- I’m not gonna say ‘your wrong’ because neither of us have ACTUALLY seen the board in question but I will say that I find your statement really hard to believe.
If in fact the Resin did not yellow then that means that it is absorbing (transfering) the UV energy so that it does not yellow. IF it did that, then there would not be any UV to damage the foam. I suspect that BOTH layers (Resin and Foam) yellowed but the RR/CE is loaded up with UV inhibitors and such whereas the foam is not (A COST ISSUE) that the foam shows its wear sooner.
There is so much myth and speculation regarding this subject and IMHO I do not think some of those commenting here are basing their comments on any kind of analysis done using the ‘scientific method’.
Anything is possible- if shapers were actually willing to pay for a blank that didn’t yellow for 10 years, I can tell you- it’s do-able. But the raw material costs to produce this product places it ‘out of the ballpark’ (i.e. Gimme that Ferrari but I’ll pay ya for the Hyundai).
Someone else here gave some insight into this, and it seems it stems from the past.
All those years ago the original foam/fibreglass boards were not white. I guess the foam was a little more primative, the fibreglass and resin also. That’s why you see those old off-white longboards.
As things progressed everything became more refined, the blanks became whiter, the resin clearer, uv additives, clearer glass, etc. So the better boards started to be judged on how white they were.
And now it seems the essence of surfboard is white. It’s ingrained in the mentality. Coupled with the fashion consciousness of not being cool with an aged looking yellowy brown board, Mr J excepted of course. Not counting sways people, but it’s even difficult for a lot of people to accept a change to the wood, balsa, or bamboo look, even if it performs better and lasts longer. Maybe the mentality will change, one day.
If it’s not white it’s not right! Where did I hear that?
Epoxy doesn’t yellow that quickly in my experience and I’ve left clear cured epoxy on bright white EPS out in the sun for long periods before. Did bugger all yellowing. As for PU laminated with epoxy left in the sun for long periods…
Real simple this one. I’ve done it myself … more than once I’m afraid. Mix ratio was missed by a bit. Epoxy resins are addition reactions which means that the resin and hardener are made to react thereby locking up all the chemistry into the finished polymer. When the mix ratio is missed it means that there are now unreacted molecules floating around in the glass job. These unreacted molecules are unstable to UV because they are … well. … unreacted. So these are what’s yellowing. Best thing to do here is to get out a couple posta pens and go a quick coverup. That’ll solve your problem. Oh yea, remember in the future to pay better attention when mixing.
Thanks, I’m happy to share … I have made soooo many damn mistakes building these things. When I started I’d look at something like this and wonder … WTF? After a while you get to the point where you’ve just about seen everything and figured out why. That part was something that took forever.
Greg- How much is “a bit”? Obviously you can’t know what Rachel did but what I mean to ask is… what is the tolerance level? +/- 5%? Or is there any tolerance at all?
Do you publish your mix ratios by Volume or by Weight? If by weight do you reccomend a specific type of scale/balance or do you just hope that most Glassers are not using a postal scale?
Obviously if we are talking about critical mix ratios here then it would probably be good to specify some of the parameters and procedures to increase success rate. Just my $.02
I’m sorry but I’m not familiar with your CE product so please forgive me if I’m asking stupid questions.
A boardbag would have been nice. Had I had one of the appropriate size. It’s not a board for me. All my boards go in bags. I don’t think half of my customers even own bags for their boards. But shouldn’t a board last longer than 8 hours in the sun?
I don’t think my mix ratios were off. I used a scale. If we’re talking a super small percentage, then maybe. But I did my best to make sure everything was mixed properly. Trust me, I of all people know the problems with bad mixes.
I’ve had other boards that did not yellow this way. I took a Teccel laminated with regular RR to Indo and it’s a little yellow, but pretty evenly. And it was left in the equatorial sun for two weeks straight. I’m less upset that it yellowed at all, because I get it, it happens. Just upset that it happened unevenly. Were it just yellowed no one would really notice. The fact that there’s two stripes across the board is the bigger issue.