I had a slight suspicion that my board had water in it felt heavier and I've just weighed it and it is 1kg heavier than it is listed as. I've sucked on the holes, used paper towels, and found one i can get water out of. Has anyone experienced this before and if so any recommendation? The obvious one is to take it to a repair shop which I will most likey to do but was just curious as to iff others had experienced this.

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Matss said..
I had a slight suspicion that my board had water in it felt heavier and I've just weighed it and it is 1kg heavier than it is listed as. I've sucked on the holes, used paper towels, and found one i can get water out of. Has anyone experienced this before and if so any recommendation? The obvious one is to take it to a repair shop which I will most likey to do but was just curious as to iff others had experienced this.

Hi Mate can you put a countersunk screw in the leaking hole to seal it cheers Rich

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Matss said..
I had a slight suspicion that my board had water in it felt heavier and I've just weighed it and it is 1kg heavier than it is listed as. I've sucked on the holes, used paper towels, and found one i can get water out of. Has anyone experienced this before and if so any recommendation? The obvious one is to take it to a repair shop which I will most likey to do but was just curious as to iff others had experienced this.

Hi Mate can you put a countersunk screw in the leaking hole to seal it cheers Rich

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richw said..

Matss said..
I had a slight suspicion that my board had water in it felt heavier and I've just weighed it and it is 1kg heavier than it is listed as. I've sucked on the holes, used paper towels, and found one i can get water out of. Has anyone experienced this before and if so any recommendation? The obvious one is to take it to a repair shop which I will most likey to do but was just curious as to iff others had experienced this.

Hi Mate can you put a countersunk screw in the leaking hole to seal it cheers Rich

You need to get the water out, easier said than done. Likely salt water and air inside, don't leave board in sun.

If you have already got your moneys worth out of board, you could attempt sealing footstrap screw hole with epoxy but you need to get water out first.

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goggo said..

richw said..

Matss said..
I had a slight suspicion that my board had water in it felt heavier and I've just weighed it and it is 1kg heavier than it is listed as. I've sucked on the holes, used paper towels, and found one i can get water out of. Has anyone experienced this before and if so any recommendation? The obvious one is to take it to a repair shop which I will most likey to do but was just curious as to iff others had experienced this.

Hi Mate can you put a countersunk screw in the leaking hole to seal it cheers Rich

You need to get the water out, easier said than done. Likely salt water and air inside, don't leave board in sun.

If you have already got your moneys worth out of board, you could attempt sealing footstrap screw hole with epoxy but you need to get water out first.

The board is only a couple of months old so definitely still has some life left in it. From what I can tell its coming out of only one of the holes which is the one I normally use for the back foot strap. Drying it out at the moment and then am probably going to take it to a shop and see what they can do. If I seal it with epoxy I would have to use another hole correct?

Hello Matss, I am a repairer of things such as this and have repaired a few with this very problem. Firstly if the board has a vent plug take it out. put the deck facing down and depending on the colour of put in the sun till you get a good ambient temp in the board. Cover the board with a pale coloured towel if its a dark colour. Use a vacum cleaner to suck water whenever you can. This is just the first basics of this repair. They have always taken me from 2 weeks too four weeks In this gentle process but will end up being totally dry again.

1 kg is a lot of water (1 liter) and the footstrap insert is a critical,high stress area.

Unless you know or really want to learn how to do this i would take it to a pro.

If you want to mess with it go to boardlady.com/water.htm
and start studying :)

Do you take the strap in and put all the time? If you leave it in there just seal it up with 5200 when you put the screw in but maybe make sure it's not otherwise compromised. Obviously get the water out, vacuum pump on it as per board lady.

Did you weight the board when you got it or are you using the manufacturers website for the starting weight? They usually quote a very low weight with an * saying there is a massive tolerance to this number. 1 litre is a massive amount for a board to absorb in a couple of sessions.

Firstly I would do exactly what froghoppa mentions, then I would peel the pad back and take a good look. Is it the rear most hole ? I've repaired a board when the insert had cracked due a larger diameter screw being put in. The holes were for 3mm and the owner had used the standard 5mm screws.

A little bad advice above

Firstly if it is not that old, and you didn't abuse it / use a fatter screw blah blah it could be warranty so don't fk with it yet..... Ask the retailer first

Then if not a warranty -

(1) if it has water in it, and a goretex vent, the vent will stop working due to water vapour so it is important to get the water out. Don't just fill it up with epoxy or whatever

(2) don't put vac on it unless you know what you're doing, you can implode the board. Vac cleaner will burn out. Better ways to dry it, given time. Very basic and best chance is a wick made from rolled up paper towel that touches the styro core (like ram it with a stick) and the other end flat/flagging in the breeze, hole side down, in warm dry airflow (outside breeze) so a week in summer / 2-4weeks in winter.
Don't put it in the sun is a load of crap, its already got a hole that is venting and you know that cos it leaks!

(3) after drying you may be able to seal it up and use same hole, but yes why risk it? = use a different one. This is still not as easy as it sounds so is it really worth it, given a pro repair would be replace whole insert for $100?

Where are you?

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Mark _australia said..
A little bad advice above

Firstly if it is not that old, and you didn't abuse it / use a fatter screw blah blah it could be warranty so don't fk with it yet..... Ask the retailer first

Then if not a warranty -

(1) if it has water in it, and a goretex vent, the vent will stop working due to water vapour so it is important to get the water out. Don't just fill it up with epoxy or whatever

(2) don't put vac on it unless you know what you're doing, you can implode the board. Vac cleaner will burn out. Better ways to dry it, given time. Very basic and best chance is a wick made from rolled up paper towel that touches the styro core (like ram it with a stick) and the other end flat/flagging in the breeze, hole side down, in warm dry airflow (outside breeze) so a week in summer / 2-4weeks in winter.
Don't put it in the sun is a load of crap, its already got a hole that is venting and you know that cos it leaks!

(3) after drying you may be able to seal it up and use same hole, but yes why risk it? = use a different one. This is still not as easy as it sounds so is it really worth it, given a pro repair would be replace whole insert for $100?

Where are you?

Incomplete advice, but who has time to teach a amatuer how to fix the board here? As far as any professional doing a replacement strap plug for $100 try thinking $250! With the drying included around $ 400!
Now the Idea of taking it back for warranty is a good idea!

Well I do repairs 40hrs a week for a living and I'd do one busted insert for $100 (if its not under a very large thin pad that won't peel up easily).
Its 1-2hrs labour and a $1 part.
As to teaching, really all I said was use a wick touching styro and its obvious when its dry after a week or 10.


I sure as hell don't charge extra for drying time.

My new boards get their first owner-caused ding repairs for free (in addition to warranty stuff obviously)

But WTF do I know?

Now I do know why I'm very busy. Happy people come back. $250 for one insert - unhappy.

Just a minor correction:

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Mark _australia said..
(1) if it has water in it, and a goretex vent, the vent will stop working due to water vapour so it is important to get the water out. Don't just fill it up with epoxy or whatever

On the opposite, water vapour goes through the goretex vent, but not the liquid water.
This is what goretex was designed for!
But it is important to get the water out anyways because the gas (air, but also water vapor) flow through a goretex vent is very limited.

There is Decrepit's scientific testing of that on here. He did a lot of work on it and found they don't work when wet inside.
Once its wet wet it doesn't vent- too much water in the core for vapour to leave. Even Goretex admit that......its designed to pass miniscule amounts like sweating in your raincoat, not actually put a raincoat on after you showered and expecting you will get dry after a few hours.
PLUS the little bit that does escape leaves salt behind...... blocking the membrane

They're not magic vents like many folks assume....... replace yearly, wash regularly (external) to avoid salt buildup

However of course my perspective is in a place where its 45C outside, up to 80C in a car so the only vents that truly work over a few years with that environment are manual opening Cobra style windsurf ones.

Quote re the test performed


"My test rig, was a container with the vent mounted in the bottom, fill container with water and blow thru the vent as expected. turn vent over, and nothing happened. So emptied container and waited for vent to dry, even when apparently dry 3 months after having water on both sides, it still wouldn't breath in either direction. It doesn't need a puddle of water. to block it. Maybe the water I used was a bit contaminated, it was straight out of the tap, but that's no different to salt water inside a board.

This is not theory, this is a practical test. Even if you can repeat the experiment and get a better result, I'd still strongly advise against using a goretex vent in a board that has got water inside."