Winter Wanes

Few quick pictures from a few evenings ago. Fun small waves with nice sunset.

Foam R+D notes

Some notes on the new stringerless Varial foam blank that I shaped up and had glassed. The foam off gassed a very strong rubbing alcohol smell but we were assured that is normal even though I got a serious headache with a respirator on. Shaping it was pretty fun it cut nice and smooth and had a different feel than regular PU or EPS. It did build up a lot of static coming off the planer and stuck all over but nothing that couldn't be vacuumed up easy. The foam was denser so it was less inclined to the easy dings of PU but for the final screening it was very hard to get a super smooth surface.
The board was glassed by one of the best glassing guys who we happen to be lucky enough to have semi local. Sprayed pigment on the foam and it came out rather nice looking. Finally got to ride it twice on some really cold days then like normal we had a lack of waves. About a week later I looked at the board and noticed some serious color changes going on. Since I have dealt with UV degrading pigment before I covered half the board to provide a comparison. However a day later the color was worse and spread around the whole board in an odd pattern and a few random blotches. Closer inspection showed the center fin box and become loose even though it was never used. Assuming the blank expanded and contracted so much it cracked the resin around the box. Might be a candidate for a vent, how ever I did put a slight ding in the board bringing it back to the shop and it immediately let of its obnoxious smell so not sure if a vent would do this also. Since the blank has gone through serious R+D by the company and had no problems the only real difference is temperature. It is damn cold here with water mid 30's and air in the single digits, possibly this is to much for this blank. So thats my observations take it for what it is since I only got to work with one blank.

Winter is cold

Lucky swells

A few pics from one of the last swells. After a few weeks of weird small swells with funky wind it would be nice to get some waves like this back.

Testing products

Finished up the first gopro stick prototype and will be making more soon. Worked out great when shooting some snowboarding over the past weekend and was sturdy enough to survive some crashes. Hopefully no more snow laden surf shots any more!