cave_raver Posted April 5, 2004 Author Report Posted April 5, 2004 Just gotta tell someone. IT FLOATS! Not only that but it floats in a straight line (fins work) and it is light enough to carry down the beach. I haven't actually used it yet as I am without a surf kite at the moment and either the wind has been too strong or too weak but I'll keep you posted likewise with pics of the board (when I get them). CR Quote
cave_raver Posted April 5, 2004 Author Report Posted April 5, 2004 Should mention that I tested it by floating it in the surf. CR Quote
elementalsurfer Posted April 5, 2004 Report Posted April 5, 2004 Hi James Saw you trying body dragging with Richard's G10, how'd you get on, it looked horribly gusty even for a Guerilla. Did you try to get up on a board. It's good that the Ply-Surfer seams to work, it'll certainly get you started. Cheers Tim Quote
8015 Posted April 5, 2004 Report Posted April 5, 2004 Quick summary of how I did mine: Sheet of ply from B&Q - I chose 9mm but I might regret this, it might be way too flexible. Scaled down measurements off my mates 180 board, put them in autocad and noticed that a smooth curve didn't fit, so scrapped that and drew a corner by eye Cut the corner out and drew round it on each corner, then cut outside the line with a fine tooth (laminate) saw and surformed and sanded back to the line. Went OTT with the sanding given what happened next. Made the board 170 x 40.5 (I'm big). Following the technique described on zeroprestige I soaked and steam ironed the hell out of the bottom of the board and placed it on a couple of inch high blocks of wood with loads of weight along the centre so the rocker is only in the tips. During the soaking and ironing the sanding was undone, loads of glue or resin came out of the board and the nap was raised somewhat - luckily I got the iron clean after! After a couple of days I took the weights away and the board sprang back a bit to around 1/2" of tip rocker (ideal for a beginner?) and I sanded the bottom flat again and shaped the edge - just round for now. I was in the chandlers for something else and thought I'd check out the price of epoxy as I was no longer convinced that my ply would be OK with just varnish (it is interior grade and soaked the water up very well). After much umming and ahhing I went for an SP handipack, half expecting it to be a bit thick - it is, but I managed OK! I also noticed 50gsm glass cloth for about £7/m so bought a couple of metres of that (tripling the cost at this point!). I said previously I wouldn't bother sheathing such a cheap board, but the cloth just looked so good, and I thought it might help stiffen my thin plank! If you want to sheath, I would not recommend the handipack, it is fairly thick and you need to work fast with it - fine if you are experienced, a nightmare for a newbie to the wonderful world of laminating! (you will get tangled in the glass and stuck to everything you touch and it will all start to cure before you can sort it). Look for a resin designed for laminating, not one that says it can also be used for coating or sheathing or laminating! I sheathed the underside first and then the topside the following day (sanding the lap to get good mechanical bond) having cut the cloth to shape first. I wrapped up from the bottom to an inch on top with the first layer, and then had the top layer cut pretty accurately to the board so the join was on top leaving the bottom as smooth as possible. On the third day I sanded all over (removing a couple of voids I had failed to notice in the laminating) and then applied another coat of just epoxy (all done with a roller) - I was able to turn over and do the other side in about 3 hours, you can overcoat up to 12 hours before it becomes impossible to get a chemical bond so the edges will be just fine done like this. By this time the rocker has straightened out even more, maybe 1/2" at one end but less at the other I have used countersunk bolts to fit footstraps and an eye for a leash, unfortunately I wasn't able to test at the weekend (only one footstrap, wind was wrong direction for the proposed destination too) and I'm going on a couple of non-kiting holidays so it will be about a month before I get to try it out now. Whilst I have ignored the advice about not needing rocker, I have opted to try finless. It will probably be an utter disaster for me as a beginner, but I can always make/buy fins at a later date if I need them. All up the board took me a week of working an hour or 2 each evening, maybe 4 hours on the day I finished the sanding and did the first layer of glass as I had to check the shape carefully and cut all the glass to the right sizes. It's meant to be cheap and simple isn't it? If it don't work, it's £12 for another sheet of ply, £15 for glass and I probably have enough resin and the fittings will be transferred - I should have a lot of fun Skipping the rocker would get the thing done in 3 or 4 evenings! JIM Quote
cave_raver Posted April 6, 2004 Author Report Posted April 6, 2004 Way to go on the board Jim, sounds really good. I used a fibre glass layer with the specific aim of keeping the rocker and it seems to work. However, since making my beautiful but slightly over engineered board, I have seen other ply boards. It really seems that all you need is a slightly shaped piece of ply. No fins or rocker and they apparently work (eh Tim?). Elemental surfer - PM'd you. CR Quote
kiteboard_kid Posted April 6, 2004 Report Posted April 6, 2004 just wondering, where do you get the resin and fibre glass from as i bought some ply from my local shop but they werent sure about what i needed for resin and glass fibre. How much do these cost and are there an special ones that you would advise me to buy? Cheers Quote
cave_raver Posted April 6, 2004 Author Report Posted April 6, 2004 just wondering, where do you get the resin and fibre glass from as i bought some ply from my local shop but they werent sure about what i needed for resin and glass fibre. How much do these cost and are there an special ones that you would advise me to buy? Cheers For a cheap but not luxurious job like mine, pay a visit to a motor factors such as Kevin Cooper or similar. Look in the bodywork section where you will find plastic padding and suchlike. You can buy a basic fibreglass kit but I doubt it will have enough resin or fibre for the complete job, however it will have instructions. Having fibreglassed before, I bought a can of resin , a tube of hardner and some fibre matting (the lightest possible), all as individual items. Cost about £15 I think but don't quote me. You can buy more expensive stuff from a boat supplies place such as a chandlers or marina but I wouldn't bother for the first effort. Lots of technical info. on this thread about resins but it gets a bit high tech. Good luck. CR Quote
Airpowerd Posted April 6, 2004 Report Posted April 6, 2004 I'd say for the first one you make go BASIC, the more basic the better, use the time you're not on the water to try the techy stuff on the second one as you'll have more idea what it is you're trying to achieve, my first ply was 170x40 no rocker and no fins with 3 coats of marine varnish (total cost 17 quid) and still does the odd outing behind elementals 15hp zodiac on the windless days (great for practising transitions from heel to toeside and back) Quote
8015 Posted April 6, 2004 Report Posted April 6, 2004 Yeah, I would agree with the go basic concept, as I tried to explain I got carried away partly out of nostalgia for when I used to build boats for a living Coating with resin is more waterproof than varnish and a wise move for boards made of interior ply, sheathing is showing off You really have 2 choices for resin: Polyester - this is the standard stuff, it's what plastic padding is. However the plastic padding resin is awful to work with and the paste hardner is not my favourite (although marine suppliers have started using it, presumably for safety reasons). Best bet is to go to a yacht chandlers (normally found at the coast but check your yellow pages because there are many inland!) and look for the stuff there. I say use liquid catalyst (hardner) and measure the right amount for the weight of resin in the batch, but like I say there seems to be a move away from this - just ask for resin suitable for laminating. With polyester you can vary the amount of hardner slightly to vary the cure time. I haven't bought it for years but it is cheap. Epoxy - much more waterproof, several makes available now (SP, West, Blue Gee). This stuff is measured by volume rather than weight and is simple 2:1 or 5:1 ratios to make it foolproof. Varying the amount of hardner does not affect the cure time, it will leave you with poor strength in the laminate. I find epoxy easier to work with, and less smelly (no solvent, polyester contains styrene), but manufacturers tend to make stuff in repair packs a bit thicker. The reason for this is that there are loads of powdered fillers you can mix with epoxy to make filler compounds, bonding pastes etc and it's easier to start with a thicker resin and not put so much expensive filler in. I think the small pack of SP resin I got was £12 for 250ml resin and 125ml hardner with pumps to help measure it (2 squirts resin to one hardner) - this was enough for one layer of glass and one smoothing coat on a 170 x 40 board. Whichever resin you use, work with a small foam roller for the most part, just like it was paint - i.e. don't get things swimming with it! also use a cheap or old brush (work loose bristles out for ages because the resin is stickier than paint and good at removing them to lay in the job!) for things like the edge of the board and to use with a dabbing motion where the roller doesn't work. I hardly needed the brush at all. Also wear latex gloves as a minimum, consider barrier cream under and marigolds (heavy duty) over, although for smoothing the fine cloth the latex gloves give you more control. For glass: Get a woven cloth. Ignore chopped strand matting, it is only useful with polyester where you plan to dab the resin in with a brush all the way round - the strands will wrap a roller up quite nicely, and it looks a mess. I found 50 Gram per Square Metre (gsm) woven cloth in the chandlers in 1m squares for about £7.50 each. Obviously with board being 40cm wide and 170 long I cut each in half and overlapped about an inch (2.5 cm) in the middle, if you get the chance to buy off the roll (always 1m wide) buy the right length for your board and get it cut in half lengthways to avoid the lap. I layer of 50gsm might be a bit light, but I strongly recommend not going above 165gsm cloth (the lightest chopped strand matt is usually 200gsm or 250gsm!) - you are making a lightweight board not a battleship! If you are offered a choice of woven rovings or twill, take the woven rovings - it's easier to work with being a simple over under weave, twill is an offset weave (looks a bit like parquet floor, or tweed jackets) and seems to stretch differently in different directions! Cost the way I did mine was £12 for epoxy £15 for glass But you will also need thinners - cellulose thinners for either resin, acetone is cheaper but only works with polyester (I already had some) Also some tools - roller frame and roller refills (you can't reuse them), cheap brush 1.5" or 2", a tray to mix and use from, gloves (probably won't reuse - note minimise contact with thinners with latex gloves as they soften). If you want it to last you should cover epoxy resin with a polyurethane varnish containing a UV inhibitor - my board will be inside most of the time so I didn't bother. How long it takes and how much mess you get in is mostly down to experience I'm afraid, handling delicate glass cloth with sticky gloves every day gives you a knack for doing it without unravelling the whole cloth and getting tangled up in a ball in the middle of your garage crying your eyes out Mainly try and work tidily and most of the time it will behave itself. JIM yowi 1 Quote
bladebrother6 Posted April 8, 2004 Report Posted April 8, 2004 I'm not an expert laminater by any means, but have just finished my 3rd board and though i would share my experience. My first two where 'conventional' foam core and laminate types, this one is a ply base, with glass reinforcement and carbon skins. build went: 1 roughly shape 2x 4mm bit of exterior grade ply 2 set up chocks and weights to get the desired rocker line 3 glue the to bits together (putting a layer of fine woven glass matt between them) 4 When that was all dry the rails were shaped and the hard points were fiited into the botton of the deck (proper captive nuts if poss, if not chop down some wing nuts works fine) 5 then laminate the top and bottom decks, i used 70g/m*m carbon and epiglass resin for this bit and it worked a treat. the finished board it a little heavier than i had hoped, has very little flex left in it and may in fact be bulet proof! The next one wont have the grp inner, theres no need for it in this application. built one interesting feature in this board, soon to be known as the subtle assymetry concept. I always feel a lot more comfortable loading up on the toe side, dont know if its just me but ita what i've got to go on! So to take advatage of this i put a shaper rail on the toe side, and a slightly more pronounced curve in the rocker line. Only time will tell if it makes any difference at all!!! there should be a pic attatched, if not can somone tell me how to do that! Quote
kiteboard_kid Posted April 9, 2004 Report Posted April 9, 2004 Ive built a board out of ply, 2 layers of 6mm with fibre glass in between. Have given it a few coats of yacht varnish but there are a few holes in the join so how should i waterproof it because i dont think the varnish will hold all the water back. Cheers Quote
cave_raver Posted April 13, 2004 Author Report Posted April 13, 2004 Ive built a board out of ply, 2 layers of 6mm with fibre glass in between. Have given it a few coats of yacht varnish but there are a few holes in the join so how should i waterproof it because i dont think the varnish will hold all the water back. Cheers I would have thought that three coats of varnish would be fine to fill the gap providing it is no more than about 1mm. Otherwise use some wood filler like I did. You can also get wood filler with resin in it. Alternatively use some silicone sealant for the gap and then varnish over it. Hope that helps. CR Quote
cave_raver Posted May 12, 2004 Author Report Posted May 12, 2004 Just in case anyone cares, it works! Tried it with my G in the sea last Sunday in 20mph wind and was on it for nearly 2 secs! Okay so this will get better I hope but a good start. I also got a good bang in the back of the head with it after getting caught in the surf. Glad I had the helmet. It's also suprisingly light for a ply. job. Additions: Added 2-3ft of extra leash (old 6mm static caving rope). Instead of attaching this to my ankle I will instead clip it to my harness. I was constantly having trouble trying to get my feet into the toe straps even though they were set at their widest. I have now re-fixed them (moved the fixing points in) to give more height in the arch. Used cheap PVA glue to hold down the footpads as they did flap around a bit. Thought it may dissolve in the water but once dry seems waterproof and worked okay. All that is needed now is another attempt. I will endevour to get some photos sorted but I have to see a man about borrowing a camera. I know I keep promising but so far all chances have been missed. CR Quote
shrimpo Posted May 12, 2004 Report Posted May 12, 2004 Hey Cave _RaverInspired by your thread, had a go at making my own one. 150cm long & 37cm wide, 3 layers of 4mm ply, 3 coats of varnish, some pads and straps from kite shop, and bits from boat shop. Still need to try it in the water, and hope to this week end, hope it works. f:board_1.gif f:board_4.gif f:board_3.gif Quote
cave_raver Posted May 13, 2004 Author Report Posted May 13, 2004 Excellent, well good luck. Would like to see your pics as the links you posted are dead. I have borrowed the camera from work and took the pics last night. They should be uploaded sometime today. CR Quote
cave_raver Posted May 13, 2004 Author Report Posted May 13, 2004 Gonna have to do it tonight as I need to make the pics smaller. CR Quote
shrimpo Posted May 13, 2004 Report Posted May 13, 2004 Cave_Raver Just checked, and had only pasted the file into the reply, found out you have to attach them. So have done this. Hope it works OK. Quote
cave_raver Posted May 16, 2004 Author Report Posted May 16, 2004 Pics are cool man. Especially like the graphics! Got to trim mine down before I can upload then (65 - 50). Trouble is that with the sun shining I can't help but be outside New use for the homemade ply kite board on a windless day at the beach. Old fashioned ply bodyboard! It's excellent fun and caught several waves. You have to move your weight around to minimise the rocker but it works. Great fun had by all. CR Quote
cave_raver Posted May 16, 2004 Author Report Posted May 16, 2004 Forgot to say, HOW MANY BRICKS LOL! I've heard of rocker but NEVER seen that much weight. Still if it works then cracking job. Go on though, how many CR Quote
Airpowerd Posted May 18, 2004 Report Posted May 18, 2004 Pics are cool man. Especially like the graphics! Got to trim mine down before I can upload then (65 - 50). Trouble is that with the sun shining I can't help but be outside New use for the homemade ply kite board on a windless day at the beach. Old fashioned ply bodyboard! It's excellent fun and caught several waves. You have to move your weight around to minimise the rocker but it works. Great fun had by all. CRMKIII on its way soon 120x40 with flip tips about 6" from each end painted hammerite smooth RED made from 12mm shuttering ply (cost so far £6)just need some seatbelt webbing now for straps and it'll be making its debut. MKII was 150x40 with cutaways at the ends (1st board to go upwind) MKI was 178x38 no rocker or fins still works from 6kts Wind just complete ****e in the choppy water (used to start planning and holding ground) but loadsa fun towed behind elementalsurfers zodiac and 15hp engine Quote
cave_raver Posted May 18, 2004 Author Report Posted May 18, 2004 Sounds cool, I can't wait to see it. Just need some god damn wind! CR Quote
cave_raver Posted May 19, 2004 Author Report Posted May 19, 2004 Plus the final one. I'll try and do some plans at some point but again, don't hold your breath CR Quote
sgillow Posted May 19, 2004 Report Posted May 19, 2004 Nice looking board!! Well done. How far apart are the foot straps? I reckon they are too near on my 140x50 pictured here http://simongillow.mysnaps.org.uk/p3464539.html I am planning a 160x40 like you for my second try with the remaining wood and need to get the spacing right this time. Simon Quote
Airpowerd Posted May 19, 2004 Report Posted May 19, 2004 need to get the spacing right this time. Simoneasyest way is to stand on the floor next to your board , jump up high and try to land central to the board, your feet will naturally find a comfortable stance position Quote
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