Freeeeeeeeeeeee!

So I cleaned up the garage some tonight, then came in and was online, and saw this.....

 Free windsurf board! in Long Beach, just come by and get it from the driveway. Enough said, I drove over and it was still there!

 But no, I am not taking up windsurfing on this ancient, heavy windsurf board. Just look at all the foam that is inside that board! (Not cheap!). The board is 11.5 feet long, and it does have a slot all the way through the thickness, but I'm pretty sure I can get a good board outta this once I strip off the shell, and a handful of handplanes! Yes, more projects!

 Big guy!

Oddly enough, this is the second free windsurf board I've gotten in Long Beach. First one I resold for $40, this one will become a surfboard and actually be used!

moral of the story - check craigslist free section!

Vans ramp rebuild part 2

 I went to Vans again this weekend to help with the last days of the rebuild. These guys worked all week and had gotten it pretty close to being done! Have yet to skate it, but it's looking awesome now!

 

 Corners done, everything connected, pool coping in place, and checkerboard tile going on underneath coping!

 

 Everything was getting painted to look nicer too

Adam sent me this pic once it was all done! Swimming pool colors! Can't wait to skate it

Earth Day

Mel and I celebrated Earth Day with some frisbee and soccer at a park down the street from us. It was awesome. Melissa Maher is pretty cool to say the least...

 Boom! comin at ya!

 Reaching for the sky!

 Whew, got it!

 Ugggghhh, take that!

 Got it got it got it!

 Jump..... now!

 Alright, warmed up, let's do this

 Whew! much better without that jacket

 Crap

 Sup

 Two hands, good form

 Grrrr

 Sup

 Supppp

 hiiiiiiii

 

I'll go all day!

 Kaboom!

 Dancin, or playing soccer, who cares

 Old man

 thinkin back to the glory days watching the ball sail through the air!

 Got carried away and forgot I was just kicking it not to far to Mel...

I can't help it. It's fun to kick hard

Happy couple (been together for 4 years now!)

First day in the water

  I got out to Huntington at the cliffs by about 6 this morning to try out my new board. The waves were supposed to be very small, but it wasn't cloudy, and the water was super glassy, so even though they were pretty small, I had to get out and at least paddle around on my board

 About to make it's maiden voyage

 In the water, floating, not leaking, and feeling awesome underneath me. The sound of water splashing against a hollow wooden board is pretty cool; cooler than water splashing a non-hollow foam board...I'm hyped on it, can you tell?

 The sun finally came up to join the session

 It floats!!!!!!!!!

 These guys were in full force this morning, diving pretty close to me.

 And soaring everywhere

Got a handful of small rides in this morning, enough to get a taste for how the board feels, but not totally. Regardless, I was beyond pumped, as you can tell. It's a totally different feeling of carving around on a wooden board, and I'm super pumped on the shape too! Can't wait to get it out again!

Weird to say, but it's done!

Welp, however many weeks/months (4ish) later, it's done. Not in the water yet, but that will be this week once there's some waves again. I finished up sanding today. Since I sanded the hotcoat, and I'm not doing a gloss coat, it's flat looking, not shiny, but I'm psyched on that. My hotcoat wasn't the best, along with just tiny dimples here and there, so once I sanded it, some super small little shiny spots (low spots) remain, which the sandpaper didn't get to. There's a lot of small ones, mostly on the deck. Too many to sand, and the only option to get rid of them is to put on another thin hot coat, but I don't want to add more weight to the board, and the shiny spots are only an aesthetic thing, so whatever. Most will be covered with surf wax anyways. I'm no professional, and these bumps/shiny spots are proof! :) It does look good though I think! Got the fins done today too, and have them angled/canted right at a 3 degree angle, so I'm pumped they are in so well. The ones that I finished are on the small side, but I have two other sets I'm working on, so they will be other options, along with others down the line.


Top side, done!

Bottom side, fins in place!


Closer of fins



With the light right, you can see all the spots I'm talking about. Oh well. Learning...


I don't have a scale to weight the board, but at least for reference to my foam fish board, I figured I could at least see how much heavier it is than that board. So I whipped out some old physics and actually applied it, cool! In a nerd way. I wrapped the leashes around the ends of a board and put the board hanging over a pivot point. I scooted the board some until the boards hung there balanced. Since a moment is equal to force (weight) times distance to pivot point (M=Fd), I can at least see a multiplier of how much heavier the wooden board is than the fish. The distance from the pivot point to the fish board center of gravity was 26.5 inches. The distance from the pivot point to the wooden board is 21.5 inches. So the wooden board is 1.23 times the weight of the fish. The fish is 5'8" and 22.75 inches wide. The wooden board is 5'2" and 22 inches wide, so it puts it into perspective that the wooden board is heavier, but not too too much. This is just a fact of wooden boards though; expected it.

Pretty proud, hope it surfs well!

Went and got a burrito from Secret Spot to celebrate!

More progress

Got some more progress to report. Very close to being done! Thought I'd be done this weekend, but no.... Close though

Made the leash loop last weekend. Carpenter's pencil wrapped in parchment paper (doesn't stick to resin) worked just great! The leash loop is just fiberglass rope/thread, drenched in resin. Keep it bunched up and together where it's off the board, and then spread it out where it touches the board, like roots stretching out for support. Then you can sand it pretty smooth where it attaches to the board.


Tilt your head to the right here. Finished leash loop!



Then I hot-coated the top of the board last Sunday! Looked nice getting it all shiny!

Glimmering. I just tape off halfway down the rail, at the apex, and then put little tape balls on the underside, so the tape doesn't wrap around and let dripping resin flow onto the bottom of the board

Tape balls on underside

Some fins I was working on. They started to not look so good, so I've abandoned them for the time being. They will be finished though...

Then I hot coated the bottom of the board on Monday

Shiny. I then let it all dry for a few days, thinking I may just leave it all unsanded and it'd be done and ready. But my hotcoating isn't exactly perfect, so I started to sand it with fine grit sandpaper this weekend, which will eliminate the shiny-ness, but it'll at least look smoother (partly because it will in fact be smoother, and because it won't be shiny and shiny things show every little imperfection). And also I'll claim that I don't want my wooden board to look plastic-y. More photos to come of it finished!

And started on other fins since I didn't like those ones I made. I spliced a piece of cedar so that each fin has the same grain pattern. I like it... unfortunately the many layers of cloth and amber resin (bio-epoxy I've been using) on each side kinda hide the detail of the grain...Need to use clear epoxy on future ones.

They're thin, bc I need to put 7-8 layers of cloth on each side to make them strong enough to not break off when surfing, and still fit into the fin box

I put 7 layers of fiberglass cloth on each side to begin with (one at a time, but right after each other). Then I check to see if they fit into the fin boxes and adjust them to fit. I made a few sets of fins with 2 or 3 or 4 layers of cloth on each side (didn't pay too much attention to it in my first attempts), but they broke pretty quickly, so I'm sticking with at least 7 as one set has lasted long with that many.