G'day all,

with a great knowledge base out there, does anyone know how to repair deep scratches in a North Jamie 2012 board?

I've heard you can use an iron to heat it up but I'm not sure if the board has the wake board slider bottom stuff (not sure what you call it), I don't wanna give it a go and stuff it up?

If you have some cool techniques I'd love to hear about them!

Thanks for your time,

cheers,

Robbie

My advise would be to turn it over and ride it (depends how deep it is)

... yeah, I know the board is still very rideable, just looks terrible!

The truth is, my son has borrowed this board for a trip away to Bali. He's scratched it, alot, gouged it you could say. He's now resigned himself that he's bought it and will replace it to our good friend when we get back but I thought we could some how lessen the trauma when he see's the board !

I remeber somewhere you can put a hair drier over it or an iron but I'm not sure what material the bottom is made of, if at all!

Anyway, just wondering if anyone has experience with them!

cheers,

Robbie

you could try a p-tex candle if its bad, available from most ski/snowboard shops

+1 on clear ptex, it works well on really deep scratches on snowboards, makes them barely noticeable- it's also water resistant so should be fine on kiteboards...

epoxy..araldite or similar

Epoxies like the hardware store Araldite (adhesives) are not designed for continuous immersion and water can fk them up. Plus they are not UV stable and not clear.
If using epoxy, West or Araldite laminating and casting resins don't have those problems.

But epoxies don't stick to thermoformed plastics so you need to know what it is made out of

... thanks guys!

I was hoping for a quick (read lazy) fix, a magic pill if you will. I know I can do the epoxy thing but as Mark says, I need to know what the material is before I stick stuff on it!

P-tex sounds interesting, I think I'll check that one out too. Pity, Darwin doesn't have many ski/snowboard shops so I think I'll have to do the net search to find it.

I probably shouldn't be lazy and do a search as I've got a vague recollection that you can heat it up to smooth out the scratch edges, doesn't get rid of them but looks better.

cheers,

Robbie

If it is a Ptex base It is really easy to repair.

Just get a stick of Ptex and use heat to melt it over the area affected, use enough that it over fills any scratches and then use a scraper blade to remove excess. After that hit it with a nylon pot scrubber pad and it will blend in to the rest of the base of the board.

What do you melt it with? ie can't use a match as the clear will get black carbon in it.. or just keep a decent distance?

Got the same problem with a Naish Money Shot, going to keep popping back in here to see what peoples ideas are, might try the Ptex solution tomorrow

Select to expand quote

aus301 said...

If it is a Ptex base It is really easy to repair.

Just get a stick of Ptex and use heat to melt it over the area affected, use enough that it over fills any scratches and then use a scraper blade to remove excess. After that hit it with a nylon pot scrubber pad and it will blend in to the rest of the base of the board.

... thanks dude thats great info.

What sort of heating can I use, is a hair dryer ok?

cheers,

Robbie

Checked on the website for North and is does not specify the skin foil material.
Basically there are a few it could be. Most likely PBT which is a co extruded foil, white base, clear top with a felty remay backing so that it sticks to the laminate. The colours are sublimated into the plastic. This means they are printed on a transfer film and under high temp and pressure the inks turn to gas and fuse into the clear top coat.
Nothing will stick to PBT very well. If you rough sand it you can fill a little but the resin is likely to pop back out. I would not recommend heating or trying to fill with petex.

Petex is UHMWPE Ultra high molecular weight polyethelyene. It has a special treatment to make it stick to epoxy when it is made. again resin will not stick naturally. You can fill with a ski/snowboard petex gun. This extrudes molten petex into the hole and when set can be cut back with a knife

so in sumary very hard to fix a gouge in the base

Cheers Adrian

Select to expand quote

Adrian Roper said...

Checked on the website for North and is does not specify the skin foil material.
Basically there are a few it could be. Most likely PBT which is a co extruded foil, white base, clear top with a felty remay backing so that it sticks to the laminate. The colours are sublimated into the plastic. This means they are printed on a transfer film and under high temp and pressure the inks turn to gas and fuse into the clear top coat.
Nothing will stick to PBT very well. If you rough sand it you can fill a little but the resin is likely to pop back out. I would not recommend heating or trying to fill with petex.

Petex is UHMWPE Ultra high molecular weight polyethelyene. It has a special treatment to make it stick to epoxy when it is made. again resin will not stick naturally. You can fill with a ski/snowboard petex gun. This extrudes molten petex into the hole and when set can be cut back with a knife

so in sumary very hard to fix a gouge in the base

Cheers Adrian

G'day Adrian,

thanks for that, not really the news I wanted to hear, its like talking to a doctor to find out what that lump is ... !!!!!

I've had another look at the board in question and the gouges aren't "that" bad, infact more like a really good scratches, or rather a bunch of scratches. The board rides fine, its just that it looks ordinary.

My beloved Purple Undie (144 x 46) has many scratches, along with gouges and its amazing I haven't done worse infact. I've run over rocks, reefs and even the ocassional anchor and metal spikes just under the water, so it goes to show how tough they really are. And I'm pleased to say it goes just as good as the day I bought it, just looks 'a little second hand' and no matter what base you have, it isn't going to be bullet proof when you abuse the sh!t out of them as hard as we have.

Anyway, I'll have to keep my eye out for a 'magic pill' I surpose and keep looking.

cheers,

Robbie

PBT is polyester based and I use the stuff on my boards, you can get resin to stick to it by just sanding the surface, thats how its laminated on to the board in the first place. Its similar to the plastic some clear drink bottles are made out of called PET.

best thing you can do, is either polish out very fine scratches, for deeper stuff, sand with wet and dry, then apply surf board resin (polyester), wont go yellow like all epoxies, then sand and polish back.

And I hear you about the quick and easy job, then just buy a $1 tube of super glue and wet out the scratches with the glue, since its your mates board, this is the best solution, the super glue might go a bit milky once hes used the board in the water, but hey, its the Australian way.

Select to expand quote

SugarQube said...

PBT is polyester based and I use the stuff on my boards, you can get resin to stick to it by just sanding the surface, thats how its laminated on to the board in the first place. Its similar to the plastic some clear drink bottles are made out of called PET.

best thing you can do, is either polish out very fine scratches, for deeper stuff, sand with wet and dry, then apply surf board resin (polyester), wont go yellow like all epoxies, then sand and polish back.

And I hear you about the quick and easy job, then just buy a $1 tube of super glue and wet out the scratches with the glue, since its your mates board, this is the best solution, the super glue might go a bit milky once hes used the board in the water, but hey, its the Australian way.

... thanks for that.

Is there anything super glue can't do. My daughter cut her knee and she didn't want to get stitches so I went to my local deli, bought some super glue and glued the cut, job done. When the missus found out she cracked it 'cause normal glue isn't the clean medical stuff and won't be clean enough, but what the hell, the jobs done now and my daughter was happy. Mind you, there is a decent scar now that apparently wouldn't have been as obvious if I'd use the right stuff!!

cheers,

Robbie