Hi all, As i was finishing up the rails on my 9’0" longboard, it fell off the shaping rack and got dinged in a number of places. Discovering each one, drew me closer to hacking the board to pieces but I was able to show restraint, take a deep breath, and take a break. Now it’s time to fix… The most notable ding is on the rail, where there is a fairly sharp crunch depression that is a little less then 1/2" deep. It is on the unfinished rail, so I still have some shaping left to do on it. What’s the best way to fill this? Should I use plaster? If so, what’s the protocal for fixing this and the other deck depressions that I now have? Your help is greatly appreciated. -RM
a heat gun ($30 at the hardware store) will pull most of the compressed foam back out. otherwise, fill the dings in with spackle. glad you didn’t trash the board. kirk
RM- good for you for holding it in and just picking up the pieces. It has happend to me several times at various stages of completion. The one I rember most was when a crow got into my shop. It seemed that he got in my glassing room and danced around on the bottom of my freshly sanded-ready-to-glass longboard. He must have been pretty agitated because there was bird crap in spots and the grand finale… he kicked it off the glassing stands onto the floor. The heat gun used carefully is the way to go if your dents and dings are slight. For bigger stuff I’ve used table sugar and lam resin mixed together into a thick paste. Level it off while it is soft because it will be difficult to shape down once it hardens. (this tip originated from a post years ago from Jim Philips, I believe it’s in the archives). The choice of how and what to use for filler will depend on what you plan on doing in the way of color and whether you are tinting the lamination. Good luck! Tom S.
Yeah, I hate it when that happens. I successfully filled a pretty deep gouge in the deck of a blank caused by a spoke shave doing a somersault. I used this stuff from the local big-box store called “Lightweight spackle” (calcium carbonate). When the board was finished being glassed, there was only a slight discoloration at the fill. Years later, the spot has darkened more than the rest of the board, but the board is pretty well trashed and it doesn’t matter at this point. Waterman’s once dinged one of my blanks and put a lame looking fish lam over the defect. I would have preferred they just fill the dent and leave it clear, but what can you say. I just saw a stock board over at a local surf shop with a 24" gouge in the foam that the glasser just glassed over and although it looked bad the performance of the board would be unaffected. Here is a blank damage horror story: Years ago I had just finished shaping a high performance 6’8" RP shortboard with 4 channels and the works. My shaping bay uses four 96" flouro-tubes and one had blown before I gave the blank the final eyeball. I left the board on the stand (big mistake) while changing out the blown tube. Like an idiot, I somehow axe-chopped half the tail off the blank with the new tube I was going to install. I lost 5" off the back of the board leaving the stringer and one side. In a fit of rage I took a handsaw and cut the tail off square at the break point resulting in a 6’3" board with a very wide tail. Then I realized I could have just glued the broken foam back on and salvaged the board with my pride being the only casualty. But I always try to capitalize on bad situations so I extended the 4 existing channels to proper length, added 2 more outboard channels for a total of 6, converted the squash to a shallow swallow tail and went with it. That board turned out to be the fastest board I ever owned. Live and learn.
Go to the local hardware store and get yourself some interior/exterior lightweight spackle. The stuff is bright white like the blank. Tend to be silca/calcium etc mixtures. There are numerous brands, all work very well. Your standard EPS blanks is completely spackled, usually. You do not have to spackle, but it helps with deep ruts or rough areas that EPS can be prone to. Also provides the best finish for painting an EPS blank. For you typical clark blank it helps to fill air bubbles and works wonders on blank dings. This is your best option, it will be virtual invisible when glassed (an experience eye can hold the board up to the light and see the difference, but this is true of any blank and any filler). The old school approach would have been to make a mixture of resin and foam dust, but this makes a mess. The spackle will shape and sand roughly the same as the polyurethane foam, so you will not have high spots when you finish. For rails, mix a little more water into the spackle then smooth and shape to your rail curve by hand. You will find it is very easy and you might even find yourself going over other areas. This type of spackle drys pretty stiff with very good compression strength. As a different posted said, you can use heat, but this is alittle more risky… Do not ever trash the board, go to a shop and look at some of the larger production house boards, particularly boards with fish tails. Often the corners get broken off or jacked up in some manner, and the glassing house ends up fixing it with extra glass/resin.
I was shaping some Local Motions, when one slipped out of my hand while flipping it over. Channin had designed and ordered the “new” shaping racks for the factory remodel. They were about 8" too wide, you couldn’t shape a short board on them as the rack extended past the rail 3" on each side. The real bummer was the steel adjustment arms, instead of having them welded under the bottom of the main beam, they were off to the side and made of 1" box tubing, a perfect surfboard “cookie cutter”. Yeah, a surfboard rail looks absolutely great with a 1" square hole punched in the rail
Happy thanksgiving everyone, and thanks for the great advice! I am going to try the heat gun for some of the deck dings, and try it on the rail. If it doesn’t “pull” out on the rail with heat, I’ll hit it with the lightweight spackle. Hopefully it will shape the same as foam as I go over it with the 80 grit screen…
Can somebody tell me what spackle is?.Is it the filler you use to fill the joins and nail holes in plasterboard?David.