I'm curious to know if there are any good references anyone knows about
on how to do your own ding repairs (on an epoxy board)
Is it worth attempting yourself, or best left to a pro?
Thanks for help...
Is it worth attempting yourself, or best left to a pro?
Thanks for help...
You can use any kind of epoxy to repair a board. If you aren't
sure if it's epoxy, put a small dab on a styrofoam cup. If it eats
the cup don't use it. I also use regular "fiberglass resin"
(polyester) for repairs as long as the styrofoam core is not
exposed. Just make sure you rough the area up really good, because
it wont stick as good as epoxy. If you use polyester resin, just
make sure it has wax added to it or it will
take weeks to cure enough to sand. I like to use Polyester (with tons of
wax) because I can sand the board in an hour, instead of waiting
overnight for Epoxy to dry. The 5-minuite epoxy stuff is good and can
be bought anywhere, though you will have to pay 5 bucks for a small
tube. Most epoxies will turn yellow from the sun, so don't use them on a
really good board unless you have no other choice, unless it specificly
says something like "ever clear mombo jumbo" on the label. Also, there
is no difference between epoxy glue and epoxy resin and either may be
used as the other. I've used a dab of surfboard resin to glue my car
mirror with success and wouldn't hesitate using tubes of glue to
build an entire board out of as long as someone else is paying for
it. For structural repairs you'll have to add (fiberglass) cloth. Most
of the cloths sold at boat shops have chemicals added to make the cloth
soak up the resin better, this is ok to use, but it has a greenish tint
that will look bad on a clear board, so make sure the cloth is clear if
you are repairing a good board or it wont look pretty. If you have a
small area and you want to reinforce it, just snip some cloth up into
short pieces and add it to your resin. Remember that resin reinforced
with cloth is many times stronger than resin alone. Go ahead and try
fixing it yourself, you can always take it to a shop and they can grind
off the mess you made if you***up. Just make sure you don't sand
into the origional cloth to much and you wont hurt anything by trying to
repair it yourself. There are a lot of little tricks that I could
publish if anyone is interested and I have tons of info on building
boards as well.
Surfsteve
: I'm curious to know if there are any good references anyone knows about
: on how to do your own ding repairs (on an epoxy board)
: Is it worth attempting yourself, or best left to a pro?
: Thanks for help...
The best reference I've had has been from the local board builder
and repair shop. They have given me some real good tips when I
run into some problems when trying to do a certain type of
repair.
I'm *no* pro at it and the board shows that fact but where it is
only cosmetics I won't hesitate taking the sandpaper to the
problem. If the board is not your "favorite" board I'd give it a
shot. Glass is fun because if I mess it up I sand it off and
try again. Now, If I had a finbox to do or if I had to reattach a
delaminated bottom [sound familiar Tom] I'd take it to the shop,
unless you really don't care too much about it and just want to
learn. I've still got problems trying to feather out repairs to
look flat and sharp rails are giving me fits.
Have fun,
Harold
(WWW) http://www.access.digex.net/~donheff/donheffernan.html
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