i know this discussion has been posted SOMEWHERE but i had no luck finding one!!! but what tools do you need to fully shape a surfboard by yourself? i am only 14 but am really intersested in shaping a board, i also need to keep the costs low! SO please could you respond with a list of tools? also what glassing materials do you need?
thanks
Will
“Bings are the best boards ever.”
…you need guts
then:
an electric planer
so, like you have a small budget, you can´t afford a Skill 100 or a modified Hitachi F30 or a modified Hitachi sp20
or an unmodified professional brand
but you can go with a cheapo Chinese electric planer. There are some very cheap
do not listen that you can do a shape with a surform tool; well, in fact you can but better not…
yes most in the past did the first shape or something else with that tool, (I just used a cheesy greeter) but was other times
use the surform only in the nose and for some intrincated areas and to get rid of a couple of electric planers marks in the deck near the nose
and for the bottom rail bevels in a shortboard
change the current blade for a microblade
so, shape:
basics:
-electric planer
-block planes with differents blades set ups (at least 2)
-sand papers (to fine tuning and get rid of the electric planer marks) 50 grit, 60, 80, 120, 220
-surform with microblade
-side fluorescents lights and darker walls (to contrast the imperfections, view the lines, volume, etc)
then you need the instructions of how do you use the electric planer, the sandpapers, etc
positioning the lights
etc
thanks for your help! i will be putting this on my Christmas list! hahaha
thanks
Will
A few wooden blocks 24"x3"x1" &12"x3"x1/2", some 40-80 grit sand paper,a hand saw & a small hand plane, card board or paper template,pencil, and if you want to get carried away a surform-rasp.
Have fun ,
PS: Fill in your location on your profile and ask for help.If you find some willing to help in person it will save you much drama and the learning cure will go way up.
Will,
Checkout Foam-EZ in Westminster!
dd
I’m in complete agreement with Ian here - not only will the sanding blocks and etc do the job, they’ll teach the techniques you’d want to learn when you do get around to doing more boards, faster.
The power planer is a production tool…which means it takes away a lot of material fast. And unless you’re very comfortable and experienced with tools and especially power tools all it’s gonna do for you is ruin a lot of blanks…and they’re not cheap, those blanks.
But you can handle the long sanding blocks ( put handles on 'em) so that they are worked much like a planer, just they cut slower. If and when you do go on to a power plane, you’ll have the feel for it.
The one exception to the ‘hand tools only’ rule that I’d make is a decent random orbit sander for sanding hotcoat and polishing out the gloss coat. Nobody ever hand sands enough and a random orbit sander will do a nice job without taking away a lot of material too fast. If you were to start off with a 15 amp disc sander, well, put it this way, it is really, really easy to chew through a glass job and into the foam with one of those. Also, the better random orbit sanders are built similar to and held the same way as a big disc sander so that the style and techniques you use with it translate well to the bigger disc sanders.
And I found that if you want to pick up a few bucks doing ding repairs in your spare time, a good random orbit sander is the one tool you have to have. I really wish they’d been around when I was 13 or 14 and just starting out in the ding business.
hope that’s of use, and don’t hesitate to ask more questions, this is the place to do that.
doc…
so are you saying dont learn with a electric planer?
thanks
Will
it’s not necessary.
I found it more relaxing to do them by hand.
it also gives you some time to learn the process before you go ahead
and introduce power tools to help quicken the steps.
learning to shape is a whole thing in and unto itself.
learning to shape using a very powerful tool just compounds the learning
curve.
yup you Do learn with an electric planer REAL FAST
that blanks are expensive and go away real fast with a electric power planer…
to put that another way, POWER PALNERS EAT FOAM REAL QUICK
when the blank is big and fat in the places you dont want foam
they are wwaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyy cool
but when you have a place where
you need foam in your shape the electric Power PLANER
makes it not there…poof ,dust ,a memory gone ,next blank.
funny thing is planer
is kinda like planner
like when you know the plan
real good
yoou can go fast
Ol’ Doc says do it slow til you got technique
then later when you are
ZEN DADDY TECHNIQUE KING
you can go fast.
the first time you pick up the guitar
youo dont riff like that august rush kid
or did you?
maybe yoou should get a planer
and rip off a few riffs
and get your loose clothes caught
in the spinning blade
and first aid kit yourself
to the emergency room
and write a composition
for extra credit in english class
on the topic of the word maime
not mame she’s an auntie on broadway
…ambrose…
doc’s cautious remarks
are filled with concern and
higher under standing.
listen to the wind
next to the cliff before you jump
when it says dont jump
it aint just whistling.
buy a couple of coarse grit 4" x 21" belts for a belt sander (say 80 and 180 grit), cut at the seam and contact cement to a couple of straight 2 x 4’s cut about 19’ long. works great crossways for getting bottoms straight and legnthways for shaping rails to prevent odd lumps. nice for tucked or egg rails. Cheaper than a power planer and possibly less damage to you or the blank. a couple of pieces of sheetrock sanding screen and a piece of dense foam rubber for final sand. if you use a hand plane to skin the blank make sure the blade is sharp(see swaylocks about sharpening) and keep it level when working especially at the stringer. All these items last for several blanks as PU foam doesn’t wear out the sanding paper like wood. Just take your time, check the rails for symmetry by setting board upright and running your hands down her…er…the boards edges to see if they feel the same for thickness and shape. Lighting is very important. different lighting can be deceptive on the white foam. Have fun and take your time. My daughter shaped her first two boards by the time she was 13. She is in her mid 20’s now and still hangs on to those like they were gold.
Also before going at a fresh blank find a useless board in the trash or for 10 bucks, strip the glass, and start trying some shaping, get a feel for foam…how fast it cuts, how the plane and grit of the sand paper take it down, how to get a nice continous line on a rail, how to transisition from bottom to rail to deck and how to make a stringer flush with the foam. And be thankful blanks are not the huge pieces we had back in the 60’s and early 70’s. What part of the world are you in?
Do yourself a favor and buy either the master shaper series or the shaping 101 DVD…the Master Shaper series is far superior and will teach more than you know. Watch it 10 times then you can start. The first part of the DVD goes over tools/uses. That’s what you should ask Santa for.
Hi Will,
Ambrose put it better than I did, but yeah - it’s kinda like learning to drive in an Indy car, or learning to surf and doing it on a big day at Pipeline: you might do it and do okay but chances are you’ll do damage.
On the other hand, if you do your thing with long sanding blocks, set 'em up with maybe a front knob and a back push handle, like a power planer. You’ll learn how to sand things straight, sand curved surfaces, sand concave and convex surfaces and do it without taking out great gouges of foam.
And when you’ve done that on a few boards, well, you’ll have a feel for it. And then you go on to a planer and, having the basic moves down, you’ll be able to do a good job.
Other things to have? Maybe a saber saw or a coping saw, for cutting thin plywood templates and maybe making yourself some calipers/thickness gauges. A large square, maybe a framing square- very useful for laying out the templates. A good tape measure, a batten and some light nails ( see the Archives for battens and how to use 'em ) for more layout stuff.
Give yourself good lines to go to, don’t try to eyeball it. Take my word for it, it’s easier that way and it comes out a lot better.
Hope that’s of use
doc…
i think a couple of decent blocks and a surform and a batten and ruler
skinning the bottom is good practice for planer
sanding screens do give a nice clean deck and rail
Micro blade what is that ? I tried using a regular surfoam on my first board and it seems kinda funky . May be i just need to get a feel for it . Micrblade sounds like the ticket , where do i get one .
I started skinning and truing up the rail bands on my first blank last week and a power planer can remove too much foam if you are not carefull or a beginner like me . I am ready to do the thickness and bottom contours now and i’m kinda scared to use the power planer so i think i am going to do the rest by hand . i may use the planer to get the thickness down and do the shaping and rails by hand . i would start by hand for your first one if the budget is limited .
Coarse sandpaper removes foam pretty good .
good luck james
microplane makes better blades for surforms, as well as flat and half-round rasps, etc. Nice tools. Here’s the company that makes them, as you can see they make a wide variety of stuff.
http://us.microplane.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWCATS&Category=4
You can find them locally (you’re in Irvine, right?) at Foam EZ in Westminster. By the way the short blade (5 inch) and the long one (10 inch) have different cutting patterns, I think the short one is discontinued so worth getting one of each if you can…
.
Will,
Listen to Ambrose, Doc and the rest for a good start…no need to go high tech until you have a feel for what you’re trying to do.
The 3 most important tools you already possess are your hands, eyes and mind…use them wisely.
A couple of folks have mentioned some videos…If I was you, I would start with J.C.‘s “Shaping 101” for your first board…Jim Phillips’ might be a bit of overload if you’re not familiar with the tools and, J.C. does throw in some hand -non planer- techniques…just my opinion after a career in woodworking/power tool use…
Also…Lighting…it’s amazing how simple side lights can help in the whole process…probably the best and least emphasised, tool for shaping a decent looking board - even/especially the first one.
It’s all here in the resources and, as you see, plenty of people willing to help…
Most of all…have fun with the process…
Keith
Thanks for the tip on the microplane . One other question , i went out and bought a nice stanley planer and purchased a smaller german planer that uses razor blade type blades from fiberglass supply . The small german works okay , i would like a suggestion for a small japanese planer that are about 2 " long for doing thr curved part of the stringer . Any suggestions .
Thank you james
I have one of those small japanese curved bottom planers and personally don’t care for it. I use a mini (3.5 inch) spokeshave for that instead, they are made by Zona and X-Acto (same tool), and have replaceable blades (nice because it’s hard to sharpen a blade this tiny, only about an inch wide).
looks like this:
Way cheaper than the japanese version too, which helps if you are 14 and on a tight budget!!
