juandesooka said..
Wow, fun to look back at this thread ... a lot of evolution in boards just in 2 short years! Sometimes forget how new this surf foil thing is.
Lots of changes in the last 2 years - you're probably asked by beachgoers (once they get past the 'no engine?') how long you've been foiling. Just recently had to change my answer from 'about a year' to 'a cupla years!'. How time flies and designs have changed!
Anyway - back to prone boards - I've had a few other foilers ask me about my boards, so thought I'd put them up after 6 months of testing since I'm super happy with how they've survived.
I wanted light boards - to me it makes a big difference in being able to pump, but still wanted lots of litreage for paddle in. I've shaped about 6 of my own boards from Sanctum EPS blanks, using their standard surfboard foam density ~30kg/m3, so a 40 litre shaped board already weighs 1.2kgs before a stringer, boxes or resin gets near it.
This year's solution has been using construction foam ~13kgs/m3. At that density the foam is so light you cant even bed a leggie plug in it, so solving the finbox anchor challenge was by using 2 half length stringers and bonding the boxes to the stringers and each other using a wood block. All glued into a solid girder structure using EpiGlue made in Aus by International. I was too cheap to use proper surfboard ply for the stringers - just hardware 3 ply. Main protection is the boards are almost 4" thick, volumes are 35l and 44l - both around 4'7 and 20" - you should be able to pick the floaty version. I've abandoned ship under 6' sets dozens of times, had a ferocious leggie pull, and popped up to an intact board and foil (Armstrong HS1550, 72m 60F 232)
Most of my homemade boards have sucked in water and become heavier since the light foam absorbs water, and my glassing is pretty basic. So for these last 2 boards, I talked with a great guy - John from
www.sanded.com.au/ about how I can use this foam without it turning into a wet sponge in 12 months. The answer was the basalt cloth (and professional glassing...) - as the basalt fibres are way more impact resistant so won't leak with fractures from body impacts. From his website:
Basalt is a hard dense volcanic rock. It's an igneous rock formed through the rapid cooling and solidification of lava. Basalt fibre is produced in a continuous process using crushed basalt rock, the only raw material required for its manufacture. It provides a good compromise between glass (20% stronger) and carbon (Not as brittle) Happy to answers any DMs if you want more details. I'll confess I had Sanctum run the foam through their shaping machine for $50, which is the best pineapple I've spent in a long time once you see your wife's reaction to EPS foam dust covering the house. Just don't waste as much time on BoardCAD as I did, when you realise 30 seconds of light sanding has fixed a rail problem you've just wasted a day on!
Really basic dead flat back half, and nose lift just by bringing the bottom up to the deck
In the high volume board I added about an inch of Vee in the nose to reduce stiction on pump splash downs - seems to work as I've bounced off the water with an overpump lots of times.
Great to see this thread is still going, since first started by Piros about 2 years ago.... I'm on my 3rd foil set & 5th board now lol.
