Board #12
9'8" Hollow Wood
Surfboard
May '06
(above) May of ’05…
In the far North…
In the rain. on a
private island off of the West Coast of Vancouver Island,
a 45’ old growth Sitka
Spruce log is first cut
in the process of
creating two 6”x16” beams for boat ramp repairs…
Each pass takes a half
hour…
(above) Dan freehand
cuts a square edge on one of the Sitka beams…
These trees are
special, not sacrificed just ‘cause it’s easy…
They’re taken out of
need…
Dan needed some
43’er…
That’s not something
you can just order at a lumberyard, even if there was one…
In the thirty or so
years he’s lived there it’s one of the few trees he’s taken down for wood…
(above) Keep an eye on
the off cut…
It will surface again
later…
(above) September ’05…
A return visit to the
Island for some fun, some work and some flying…
Here is an aerial view
of another small island that is nearby…
A virtual drifting log
repository…
There’s also some real
surf potential within view…
Beyond the obvious…
(above) The sandspit at
Catala…
Just beach the boat,
start up the Stihl and harvest some washed up old-growth wood…
What do you need…???...
Cedar…???... Spruce…???...Fir…???...
It’s there…
It’s called resource
management…
(above) Tim fuels the
Zodiac that will deliver back to the nearest road some of the wood I’ll use
for board #12…
(above) A few hundred
miles from the Island is my house…
That’s where one of the
souvenir cut-offs of that Sitka Spruce ended up…
(above) The beginnings
of board #12…
A simple stringer and
ribs, and a beam air-drying for over six months…
Also visible to the
upper left are some balsa 4x4’s that’ll be part of board #12…
(above) The stinger is
clear Cedar with a couple Basswood reinforcements sandwiched to the outside…
The cross ribs are
simply 1/8” plywood…
Can you say
s-deck…???...
(above) Completely
unexpectedly, I got a phone call from another one of the cabin owners from
the Island…
On a recent trip up
there, he brought back this load of wood…
Sitka Spruce, Nootka
Yellow Cedar and some gorgeous Red Cedar…
It’s like I hit the
lumber jackpot…
Street value between
one and two grand…If you even get it…Which you can’t…
(above) The frame is
now done…
I added some balsa
reinforcements on the cross ribs on the deck side and along the inner rails…
The balsa will help
spread out the deck load with a minimal weight increase…
(above) On this board,
I’m trying to retain strength,
yet have this board be
lighter than previous ones I’ve made in this size range…
A board for travel and
hiking in with…
(above) The frame
weights only 2.5#...!!!...
(above) The bottom deck
skin is laminated with epoxy resin and 0.5 oz.
fiberglass…
Not a misprint, 0.5oz…
Like woven spider
webs…Hard to work with…
The slightest breeze
has it all over the place…
My theory on doing the
deck and bottoms this way is
that the epoxy resin
seeps between the 1/8” wood strips and unifies them as one…
The cloth merely holds
it all together, better…
These woods, Sitka
Spruce, Yellow and Red Cedars are some of the highest strength to weight
woods available…
Thin and strong…
They don’t look all
that bad either…
(above) The bottom skin
is now attacked to the frame…
The finbox was cut into
the bottom with a utility knife…
(above) Turn the board
over and there is the carbon fiber encasement of the finbox…
(above) Late afternoon
shadows…
(above) The rails are
done and shaped…
Here is the nose
wedge…Balsa & Cedar…
(above) Ready for
glassing…
Weight 12.25#...
(above) All done…
The glassing
schedule: a single later of 3.5oz s-cloth top and bottom…
HVLP sprayed “Imron”
gloss…
The top is fully domed
with a slight s-deck…
The bottom has a fairly
straight rocker (N-3” T-1.25”), but it’s loosened up with continuous belly…
The forward rails are
turned up and pinched, the middle is 80/20, going to very knifey at the rear
1/3…
(above) Logo printed at
Office Depot, $0.04 each…
(above) The back of the
finbox is 12” from the tail…
(above) Final weight:
16#...
My 11’6” with a similar
template weights 37#...
A significant weight
reduction, eh…???...
This project was
very special for me…
I knew when Dan and I
were slicing those beams that rainy afternoon,
I knew that somehow,
someway, I’d find a way to get some of that wood into one of my boards…
Little did I expect
that all of the deck and bottom wood would come from trees from the Island…
I’m definitely
connected to this board…
Westport 5-31-06
Swell: West 5’ @ 9 sec.
Wind: Light ESE
Air Temp: 55 deg.
Water Temp: Warm, for here…
The Javelin was waxed up last night, with the forecast
calling for the return of an easterly flow in the wind…Without that, the
drive out to crumbly surf just isn’t worth it…Been there too way many times…
I got up this morning at 3:15 am to be at the beach at
first light… I should’ve got up at 2:45…Long days in these far northern
latitudes…Driving out it was vintage Neil Young giving me company…
The parking lot at the beach was as empty as you might
expect, on a weekday, at that hour…The first view of the ocean revealed
decent surf…The peaks were defined and peeling, but the tide was going out
fast and low, and the eminent change in the weather and wind was simply a
matter of time…Hours at best…
I snapped a few pictures, then suited up, strapped on a
leash, closed the vent and walked west…The light weight of this board makes
getting it to the water a pleasure compared to the trudge that the 11’6” is…
Heading straight off the beach, I waded to hip deep
then slid on top for the first time… First impressions can make or break our
emotional connection to any board…There is something about that initial
feelings…The feeling I got when I laid on and paddled out was confirmation
of a lot of the design choices I made… Thick enough to paddle fast…The
narrowness at the wide point, as is my preference, felt right…The rails
thinned out felt sensitive, and the bottom contours felt loose…Pretty much
everything as expected…Most important to me was the confirmation that the
deck strength was adequate… It was / is…
Once out in the take off zone, the first ride came
fast… A five foot right…Easy paddling acceleration due the lighter weight,
the glide into the wave was familiar in feel…The tail rose, the momentum was
right… Wave caught…I let the board drop out and my feet met the deck half
way down the face…A fraction of a second later I was easing it onto the rail
for a familiar feeling bottom turn…I was aware of the increased sensitivity
the lighter weight affords… The deck is “lively”…Coming out of the turn at
the bottom, I shifted my weight forward for a higher trim line up the
face…Again the sensations through my feet were “lively”…Hard to describe but
“lively” seems to be the word that sums up the multiple sensations
transferred through the board to my feet…As I hit the high point on the
shoulder, I banked down going to opposite rail…Which caught, and ended the
ride… Not a surprise, considering the board was not designed for waves like
this… It was built with very specific conditions in mind…Fall and winter’s
hard offshore winds, and overhead waves…That and a lighter board to travel
with, especially hiking in to remote spots…
That was the first wave and first impression…
I continued surfing this board for another three
hours, with about an equal amount of rights and lefts…I found that frontside
the board, in these conditions, is better surfed with finesse rather than
power… Mid-board works well for climbing and dropping and for racing a
section,¾ forward is insane…Very “hull” like…The flatter rocker combined
with generous bottom belly, and thin sensitive rails, make for a board not
for the inexperienced…Under the right feet, maybe a magic board, under the
feet of someone with not enough finesse, likely a frustrating experience…
I confirmed last night another trip to the Canadian
Island from where this board was born…Two weeks away…I can’t wait…
Paul
Board 12
was sold for $2,400 and
is a private collection in Canada...
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