Kind of in a pickle right here. I just picked up a used 8’ board off craiglist for about $125. It was shaped by James Fulbright of Hurricane Surfboards in Galveston TX, and despite the 9 years of wax the guy had left on it (literally, we’re talking upwards of a 1/4", and it had discolored the foam underneath) the board is in pretty good shape. Minor dings at the nose and the tail and one small puncture on the deck near the nose. No horrible delams and the foam is in good shape. Fixable. The only problem is the entire board is covered in spider cracks. I’ve never seen anything like this, and I can only assume it’s from bad handling or a bad glass job.
My options are to strip the glass, reshape it to what I want, paint or resin tint it, add a removable 2+1 fin system (it has glass on tri-fins, which to me seems silly on an 8 footer), and have something I can use and like, or… I can fill the few dings it has, spray paint it to cover up the discolorations, and ride it until it fails miserably. My only concern with the latter option is if the spider cracks will make a big difference. They’re everywhere! And if I’m gonna go to the trouble of sanding it down and re-hotcoating, I think I’d rather reshape it.
Somewhere I think I wanted to ask if the spider cracks are a problem. Even I have a short attention span.
reshaping can be a bad expirence, for one your always thinking "Darn i should have left it the way it was… "
it’s way easier and more fun if you just sand and sand and sand away add a coat of resin over the top and give it a spray.
i don’t want to discourage you and you do have enough board too reshape but getting a blank or making a blank with the correct rocker for what your doing is a more humbling expirence. being that you don’t have to think you’ve ruined the board.
josh.
…besides if the glass doesn’t come off nicely you’ll have a pretty rank blank.
I think you will find that the spider cracks are usually in the gloss coat.
easilly sanded, and re-gloss.
The fin system is also a fairly easy job to convert.
Just grind off the old fins, clean up the area, glass with some 4 oz glass and sanding resin, sand flush and you are ready to install a new fin system. Re-gloss and there you go, new fins.
I am actually going to be doing that to a 7’8" funboard that I have.
If you decide to strip the glass, you will have to accept a thinner, narrower board.
I say strip it, reshape it, and make it into something you can really use, or some crazy design that you wouldn’t waste a new blank on. Either way you aren’t losing much money on it, you can’t really go wrong.
but i’m the kind of person that takes the camera apart to see how it works just to find out that i can’t put it back together as well as i’d hoped.
No matter which way you go, it’s something fun to kill time in the cold weather
Howdy Rachel! I would make it watertight and surf it first, THEN decide whether or not to strip it down etc. It may be a great board or it may suck, but you’ll never know if you strip it down first.
(Also I know 2+1 setups are popular but I’ve ridden some very good 8 foot boards with glass on thruster setups.)
PS I like your “Keeping Swaylocks Co-ed”. Makes me wonder just how many women are out there lurking?
Sealing it w/ conventional methods will most likely make it too heavy and perform sluggish…or not at all …D.B.S. =
(dead board syndrome).Here’s a quick solution ,Sand it down lightly,but completely with like 220 grit,then spray w/ clear acrylic paint(or what ever color you want…that should give you the closest results…you can always strip it down…but once you start there’s no turning back…
Thanks for all the advice guys. I think I’m gonna just fix it up and paint it. If in the end I hate it, I probably will strip off the glass and reshape it. Plus, I have just enough resin to fix it, but not enough to re-do it.
Although I’m still not sure about the spider cracks. They really are everywhere and they seem deeper than the gloss coat. Although if the board actually was glossed, I’d never be able to tell. I read in the archives that you can heat up the board and use super glue to fill them in. Perhaps I’ll have to try that if they go deeper than I thought.
if you don’t like how it rides , would your mum buy it off you ?
…then while SHE surfs it , you can use the money to finish off that eps epoxy board [you ARE making ? …aren’t you ?? …hehe …I WON’T let that rest , girl !]
I want to see THAT one finished …one project at a time, sunbeam !
I’d avoid heating the board up - leastwise to any hotter than standard room temperature.
Instead, clean it well, sand it lightly and then brush on a thin coat of sanding resin, thinned a little with styrene or acetone so it’ll flow well and penetrate into those cracks.
As a general rule, if you don’t see the weave of the cloth itself it’s not structurally damaged, it’s just an appearance thing, which may indicate that the glassing is weak or that it’s had a hard life or just that a previous owner was kinda heavy on his or her feet.
I would, though, look out for loose glass, delaminations on the deck and just what caused the discoloration you mentioned before.
Ben - I already tried that and she’s not buying it. Probably because I suckered her into once. To be fair she got a very nice board in excellent condition, maintained by yours truly. My mother (aka the Sunscreen Nazi) has yet to grasp the concept that boards with clear lams should not be left in the sun.
I’m still working on that EPS/Epoxy, but I like having multiple things to do, so when I’m waiting for the resin to kick on one, I can be working on something else.
Doc - I’ll try the styrene/acetone approach. There are a few cracks where water is seeping in that will have to be fixed, but that’s not a big deal. And there is a slightly soft spot on the deck, which I’m still trying to figure out the best way to fix.
Neira - I really love your work. I think a full cloth inlay would be too hard for me though. Also I don’t want to make the board too heavy.
