As an old 60s surfer and a furniture maker for 30 years, I’m addicted to the beauty and nostalgia of the old style balsa boards. After building a couple balsa wall hanger trophy boards, I’ve decided to defy logic and good judgement and build one with all the bells and whistles for myself and actually use it to ride. After decades of not riding, I’m occasionally back in the water again, and it seems all the guys my age are going 10ft.+ now. To add even more insult to logic, I’m going to make this 10’2" monster 3 1/2" thick with six redwood stringers, nose and tail blocks and solid redwood outside rails. I’m willing to ooze toward the scary zone with close tolerance chambering, but since I’m not an avid or even a very good surfer, I’m not sure how heavy is too heavy or what reasonable weight I should shoot for on such a board. I would appreciate advise from anyone with balsa riding/building experience. I know I should omit the stringers, rails, and amenities for weight sake, but I can’t help myself when it comes to the beauty of wood, which for me, is part of the “ride”. Thanks for any input!
I’m not a pro and I’ve tried balsa only once but here’s my point of view : If you chamber you board, then you’ll have to put a vent in order to regulate air pressure. On 10’+ classic longboards, I don’t think a little extra weight is a drawback (I would tend to favor heavy boards instead – just my own taste) Mixing two different sorts of woods means different densities/softness : harder to shape and sand. Redwood outside rails will probably mean steambending your wood or laminating several very thin planks. Here are a few links you may also want to checkout : http://www.balsaboards.com http://solidbalsa.0pi.com/index.html http://www.chuckbassett.com http://www.riley.com.au/longboards.htm http://www.longboard.net/jl_junglebalsa.html http://www.balsabill.com/boards.html http://www.hollowsurfboards.com Rhyno Balsa had Shaping Instructions on their website. the site seems to be down. I had saved a copy of it on my hard drive, let me know if you want me to e-mail it to you. Pierre
forget the Redwood, and chamber away. Keep looking for the lightest wood. In those lengths you need, it makes the task all the more difficult. I watched J.A. chamber one and was surprized at how much weight was removed. I look at the “all balsa/no stringer” style as a more classy look. I have heard of boards matched more by weight than grain or color, but to each his own. Good luck. “Calling Jim Phillips”
I have a 9’5" gun, multi-stringer, a 6’6" Evo and a 10’4" all balsa to get in line for chambering. All will be taken to the max for weight reduction and I’ve never had one blow the seams apart from not being vented
Given your 30 years of furniture building, I would suggest you go for all the bells and whistles. The finished board will be beautiful. Check out Chuck Bassett’s and Paul Jensen’s web sites for some possibilities. Bassett has some interesting comments on adding weight in the old days. The weight problem, however, can be offset by the use of good lightweight woods in addition to the balsa. Chambering will greatly reduce the weight. Check out Jim Phillips in the archives of this site. He does some close tolerance chambering. In my humble opinion, given the strenght and insulation properties of wood, you can chamber down to 1/2" on the deck with no problem. At 10’2" I would aim for 25 to 30 pounds and see where I ended up. You should also consider using epoxy-more strenght with less weight. Good luck. Patrick
so i was watching monster garage the other day and they were making a vw bug into a swamp buggy. i saw them using pour foam. i was wondering if instead of venting if you could just fill the cavaties? seems like if you dont have any thing but foam in there you dont need ventilation. also its only 2 lbs per cubic foot.
Austin: Wood is a great insulator. Accordingly, I don’t think you need to vent. Perhaps if you left the board in a car on a hot day you might get some delamination, but this would happen to any board. A half inch of balsa wood over a chamber should be more than enough insulation and strenght to handle most situations. The few balsa delaminations I have seen appeared to be more of a problem with the resin bond than with the chambering. However, this would be a good question for Jim Phillips or Cleanlines. Patrick
If you consider pouring foam inside the balsa board, then you may be better off building the board with a sandwich structure : EPS core + balsa. That’s what I did and also what Riley does. Pierre
i was just throwing something out for discussion. ive never tried balsa and dont plan on one for a while due to lack of materials and $$ of shipping. Austin
Richard, Before you spend anymore time or money, please consider having Jim Phillips make the board for you. He knows how to pick the wood, build the blank, shape the blank and how to hollow the blank. This is really, really not a project for a novice surfer or shaper to jump into! Jim made a balsa board for me some time ago - it’s 10’4" X 24-1/4" X 3-3/8" and weighs 24lbs. Jim’s number is (760) 753-6299.
That’s my 10’4" in line for chambering! Can you hear that sound? It’s the sound of my drool hitting the floor.
Maybe you could try paulownia wood instead of balsa. Tom Wegener is doing some at noosa I think they may be a fair bit lighter than balsa but still have the look.
No Surfore, that’s the sound of a thousand angry banchies or maybe my router as it chews it’s way through feet of wood, yours may be lighter than Barry’s. It is thinner and the wood was hand picked by me, Barry’s was Harold Walkers teaked and twisted, overly heavy, rejected, rock hard, set aside especially for me to do my majic on