Ok well here’s my story. I’m at my parents house digging thru all the old board still have floating around there. Came across a buddy’s beater that we used to make our friends who really didn’t surf ride. I totally forgot about it. Its gotta be what used to be a sweet 60’s longboard that was absolutely hacked to peices and made into a horrible ugly funboard. But the blank is just awesome. 1/2 balsa stringer with about three inches of blue/green foam on either side sandwiched between two thin redwood stringers. I know someones gonna tell me this used to be a insert gorgeous classic board here anyway I just can’t junk the thing cause its beautiful and I figure I can get something out of it. so I’ve stripped it but run into a prob. There was a big peice of glass missing by the tail and the wood there is almost rotten BUT even worse its saturated a good portion of the stringer up into rest of the board. I wanna know how much this is going to effect the structural intergrity of the “blank”? I’m just letting it dry right now. Should I give up and hack off what was moist? I’d be lucky to get a paipo out of that. Any help would be great guys!
You might consider taping or bungee cording the wet blank to a finished board with similar rocker to minimize warping. Dry it in a dark place. When you do cut the tail, maybe you can get a scrap suitable for a tail block.
I’d think your best bet would be to put it up in the rafters of your garage, or near a dehumidifier, and just wait until it’s dry. Even if it takes months. Hey, the thing may be 40 years old already, what’s the rush.
Or - you might try sawing the old wet balsa out (maybe 7/16ths of the 1/2 inch stringer, then let those thin remaining strips dry, and re-glue the blank with new 7/16th’s balsa to bring it back to its original size. (What the heck, at that point you can make it a 1" stringer or whatever you want…).
I’m agreeing with Keith.Let it dry in warm place indoors.It may take weeks.If the stringer has black or grey water marks on it try this old Antique Restorers trick.Get some oaxalic acid (a mild bleach in powder form) and mix it with warm water…keep adding it until no more crystals will disolve at that point the mix is ready.Apply the bleach with a clean brush and hopefully it will remove the water stains…keep on repeating if needed.You can get this product from the Drug Store or refinishing shops…its cheap.
After being out of the water for 24 years and wanting to get boack into surfing. I needed a board that was big enough for me. A friend of mine gave me a old board that had a balsa Tband. The balsa was like 2 inches wide. I fixed up all of the dings and hit the water. When I got back to the house and stood the board up water ran out of the nose. I had missed a ding on the nose. Well I saw the the foam was kinda messed up on the nose so I just cut it off. Much to my supprize I could see all the way to the tail down the inside of the board. The balsa was all gone, except the part that was stuck to the glass. What I’m tring to say is you might want to make sure that you have some wood left there before you get to far into it. Good luck.