The Byron Bay Surf Festival this weekend

 

This is a great weekend to celebrate surfing , art , music and all things connected with surfing. It is growing and expanding each year and is the best of it's kind around. Do yourself a favour check it out on line and get on down there.

www.byronbaysurffestival.com 

Surfrider Eco Challenge , Wooden Surfboard Event 2013 - Sunday 10th November

A great day at the beach at Coolum on the Sunshine Coast. There will be markets , kites , bands a skate comp, a wood board get together and public display running from 8:30 till 12. Tom Wegener is doing his bellyboard demo and fundraising"hire" on the beach and Dave fron Surfing Green will be down there with a bunch of handplanes.

For more info check out :    www.surfriderecochallenge.com   it looks like a fun day

100th wooden board built

 This happy looking guy is Dave Bunyan and he made the 100th Wooden Surfboard at the September Workshop. Dave is an Outdoor Education Instructor at the local Shoreham Camp and is the 100th person to make a Wooden Surfboard at a Tree to Sea Australia Workshop.
With participants coming from all around Australia and overseas it won't be long before the 200th Wooden Surfboard is made.

Back to Tree to Sea Day at Pt.Leo Victoria

Rob, Gary and Darren from Tree to Sea Australia are organising a Back to Tree to Sea Day at Pt. Leo Victoria on Saturday December 7th. Starts at 10am.
" So if you have finished your board or not, come on down and show us your Wooden Board. Bring the family and friends.

We will have heaps of boards on display so come on down and catch up with old friends and maybe make some new ones."

A great chance to catch up with the people who you did the course with and see how their boards turned out, how they go and what is next. I am sure they all plan to build another one. If you have a mate or family member who is keen this is the ideal time to check out what sort of board they can build.
The boys do a great job of organising these classes and have a great range of board designs on offer. Check their site for lots of details.

Rob, Gary & Darren
Tree to Sea Australia
Ph.0409 211 751
Ph.0423 804 975
info@treetosea.com.au
www.treetosea.com.au
woodensurfboardworkshops.blogspot.com.au

The wooden spoon

 This is a great looking project by Brian Himlan of Long Ship Design

"LONGSHIPDESIGN is an endeavor to find harmony with wood and the sea. Utilizing a lifetime of wood working skills and strong belief in craftsmanship, I wanted to use old world techniques to make furniture grade surfing tools. The beautiful simplicity of the wood, the raw unpredictability of the ocean, combined with the challenging balance of riding the waves is the spirit driving this project. This site is dedicated to the process and investment in these different elements.
All BELLYBOARDS and HANDPLANES are designed and built individually in my wood and fabrication shop in Santa Cruz, California. Years of material testing and R & D has resulted in solid shapes that will last a life time.  Please enjoy."

A great day at the beach, Prono Paradiso

 Lots of hand planes , mats , belly boards , body boards , sufies and various aquatic creations to try out

 A big thanks to Neil Pye for organising this little get together at Currumbin today. Great weather and some nice waves to test out all the different craft that were on hand

 Neil with a couple of Nobby's friends that live here on the Coast. Nobby from Japan sent out a very traditional Japanese handplane .

 Tom and Fin had a great time trying everything out.

 Mark from New Zealand happy to be in some warm water and loving the day with Geoff from Dovetail surfboards

 Geoff getting ready to road test one of his handplanes

  One of Tom's surfies getting tested,

 As I said what a great day weather , waves and people wise. We need to do this more. Thanks Neil.

 Lots of craft to swap and have a go on.

Prono Paradiso from Rhys Edward Jones on Vimeo.

Year One wooden surfboards

Tyler Frome formally of Santa Cruz has relocated to SoCal and is continuing making wooden boards with his best friend from high school Andrew Luttrell.  They have named the company "Year One" and have been pumping out some really awesome boards.  They are planing a trip to Hawaii this winter for some R&D, and are hoping to make it to Australia for the Wooden Board day in 2014.

" I attached a couple shots of a thruster we just made and donated to the Yosemite Climbing Association.  They auctioned off the board at an event called the "Face-Lift" which is a climber led trash clean up in Yosemite.  Its a very cool event, and we were really stoked that the winner of the board is a surfer who plans to use it! "

 Yosemite Facelift Board – 6’2″ Curly Redwood, Walnut, and Maple Decks.

  Leopard Wood, Walnut, and Maple Fins. Thruster

The boys make some great looking boards, using a nice selection of timbers.

Contact them anytime by phone or mail with any questions.

Phone: (949) 322-6873

Email: yearonesurfco@gmail.com

SingleFin Classic Surfing Festival 2013 Italy

Good friend Marco Mazzini just sent me this great little clip from last weekends Italian version of the Fish Fry. A gathering of Italian surfers gathered and camped in the Tuscan hills to celebrate their surf / skate culture.

Illustrious characters at Byron Bay Surf Festival 2013

This year the Byron Bay Surf Festival is hosting a unique and rare array of captivating workshops and presentations delivered by several illustrious characters from our worlds surfing tribe.

Some of the individuals presenting include international and local identities such as Keith Malloy, Belinda Baggs, Derek Hynd, Bob McTavish, Nat Young, Rusty Miller, Tim Baker and many others. Some of these will be ticketed evening events at the Community Centre on the main street with others up by the main beach day markets in the Presentation yurt and SurfLit Tipi Lounge. For the larger events, tickets will be limited and available to buy at the Byron Community Centre online or on site at the centre. Many others are for free viewing.

Californian free surfer Keith Malloy will be presenting his recent project 'The Plight Of The Torpedo People' on the Saturday evening, guaranteed to be a rare window into a the niche world of bodysurfing; the purest form of surfing there is. This has been a long anticipated project undertaken by the celebrated Malloy brother and will be a great visual scene to behold, revealing of the magic and trickeries of various ocean masters.

Just as fascinating, and not known for his public outings, the illusive and friction free surfer Derek Hynd will be also be showing his face at the Community Centre venue. Hynd will be delivering a standing dissertation on the 'State of the Art of Surfing' which will highlight some unknown quirks, tales and designs across surf history unto today. Derek's sharp and poignant 'gift of the gab' and uncanny ability to articulate language and historical detail is something to behold. Being the only top ten pro surfer to have ever completed a university degree, he is a clever cat and revolutionary surfer to this day. In his time, he has documented over 2000 interviews with top surfers including icons like Isobel Lethem or Skip Frye and remembers every single detail.

Also brushing the topic of design and historical surfing will be Belinda Baggs speaking to a short film by Nathan Oldfield documenting her unique experience with an old 1960's logger board inherited from Australian legend Wayne Lynch. Belinda is renowned for her grace and style in the longboarding world and has a lot to say about the use of weight and line in logger surfing. Accompanied by some female logger greats, Lauren Hill and Taylor Miller, Belinda will discuss the evolution of women in modern day loggin with the audience.

Also presenting/ reading at the festival specific Surf Lit Lounge will be Bob McTavish and Rusty Miller on their newly released books, Nat Young joining Bob for a historical yarn, Rebecca Olive on her academic thesis about women in the lineup and a handful of other obscure talks and activities such as the helidrone demo, ocean survival skills and surf forecasting/ oceanography drill. Check out more details and the rabbit hole of succulent events at the online festival program.

Get your tickets for all Byron Community Centre presentations early and book online here http://www.byroncentre.com.au/whats-on/ or at the Centre.

The Sunhouse / Patagonia board swap at Coolangatta Saturday October 12th

Click on the poster to enlarge and get the details.Great day planned , be there.

Treehouse wooden surfboards

 Hi Guys,
We are excited to be officially opening the Treehouse Studio for the first time on the 5th of October at 5pm, 2 Molloy Street Bulli.

There will be a BBQ provided (BYOG), a music jam (open to all), art by Simon Perini, Aaron Hughes and Keiron Lewis, surf films and of course a selection of our latest boards.

We've got a rad little showroom and a couple of well equipped shaping bays (one of which is available for hire).

Come down for a relaxing afternoon and check out our local business that prides itself on handcrafted quality and sustainable design.

Dave
www.treehouseshapes.com.au

Building a 5ft 2" Hydro Simmons - EPS core , Paulownia skins.

This is the whole process of building an EPS core board that I have designed in AKU so that I know the volume of the board and that what I end up with is accurate and true. I design the board and then design a blank file to suit each design and board.  From this I get the VH grade EPS blank hot wired out of block foam. This the outline of the board minus the thickness of the intended wooden rail laminates. Depending on the board that is between 10mm - 20mm of rail. The blank is made thicker to give the machine operator plenty to work with.

 

 The hot wired blanks is ready to have the first rail band templated ready to cut out and glue onto the blank.

The 3mm Paulownia strips are glued on with polyurethane foaming glue and high quality masking tape.

 All ready to go off the be profiled on the AKU machine.

 The AKU machine operator is given the blank with the first rail band on. The file I give him to cut with has the combined thickness of the top and bottom skins deducted from the design. And due to the cutting file being wider than the blank the machine cuts the rail band and foils it to the foil of the board design all  at once. So when I get it back there is very little to do to it . After profiling , I set up a level bench and screw down blocks to fit the natural rocker of the board design to cradle it on the table. The middle or there abouts of the board is flat on the table top.

A centre line on the blank and the table help line everything up and keep it true and square.

 

The 4mm deck and 3mm bottom skins are marked out and cut about 5mm oversize. Glue is spread onto the EPS blank with a squeegee and a mist of water is sprayed onto the skins prior to positioning them on the blank with masking tape.

 The blank with the skin attached top and bottom are loaded into the .7mm PVC bag and located on the blocks I set up earlier to hold the rocker.Once everything is lined up , I tape the bag closed with masking tape and start the pump.

As the air is sucked out of the bag I push down on the centre of the board to hold it against the table and the blocks under the board. This holds the rocker and with all the contact surface area , nothing is going anywhere.The shade cloth allows the the air to be taken out without the bag sucking onto itself.

 

After 2 hours in the bag under pressure the glue has gone off. Now it is a matter of cleaning up the edges and excess top and bottom skins that over hang the rail bands. Now the EPS core is encapsulated in wood and sealed.

 Glue a couple of 5mm rail bands down each side and mark out the double diamond but crack.

 Get the Japanese saw in there and cut out the shape.

 Clean it up if you have to with a rub of sandpaper and glue the laminates on

 Then laminate the last of 3 x 5mm strips down the rails each side.

You will be amazed at the holding power of good quality masking tape. It just conforms to all shapes and angles like no clamp can. Or not that I have ever found.

 All looks a bit rough and ready in the raw state with glue dags and all.

 Nose laminates are all added as well.

 Get the freshly sharpened hand plane out, load up the board with a weight and get into cleaning this lot up.

 Get all those glue dags and excess wood honed down to the foil of the board

 It helps to have a nice good quality hand plane and know how to sharpen it. Add some wax to the sole of the plane and she will cut through this Paulownia like butter and slide over the surface like a beauty.

Now you get to see that outcome.

You can end up with a few shavings in no time at all.

Mark out the centre line and fin placement. I get someone else who has a jig to route out the install the fin boxes for me. 

When you get your fin boxes routed in , it is best to put a clear coat of resinaround the edges to seal the raw wood before setting the boxes with the black tinted epoxy.As the black epoxy will bleed down the grain of the timber and not look the best. Something you learn the hard way.Same with the leash plug as well. It is interesting to note that with experimenting with this process even with the VH ( very hard ) grade EPS the epoxy will bleed through the beads and connect with the deck skin giving a good bond for the boxes. If you use lighter grades of EPS you might want to consider a heavier grade of foam as an insert to put the boxes in.

 Well "Mo" has put the fin boxes in and I have hired his shaping bay to start shaping the rails. The 15kg weight is great for holding things in place while I get a start on things.

 I have found good quality and sharp tools is the answer to getting the job done without a lot of stress.

 The lights help big time with getting an even flow to your efforts. They cast shadows and allow you to see your progress as you blend. You need to plan ahead take it easy as you really get one shot at it.

Steady as you go.

 I find that 80 grit emery cloth which is a fabric backed metal workers sand paper is strong flexible and tough enough not to tear and break down. You can get a good grip on it and pull it across the planer lines to smooth and blend your rails very easily. Very handy and very simple.

 You can then go back to a lot lighter sand paper and go through the grades up to 240grit to smooth it right up to a great finish.

 Round things off up at the nose and blend all the curves looking at them from all sorts of angles. The lights help here as well.

 Just the but crack to deal with. I use a fine Japanese saw to cut a line and curve that I intend to work to in the middle and then use a rasp and sand paper to clean it up and blend all together.

I have a small orbital sander to fine sand the surface lightly as the sheets came well sanded and true.

Lots of hand sanding to fine tune the finish. If you have any knots or small gaps you can fill them with a putty made from fine Paulownia dust from your sander and polyurethane glue. Sand it off and it will just about disappear.

I use a rubber stamp and a good quality solvent ink to brand my boards which seems to work fine. You can get a branding iron logo made for some serious bucks. But it would depend on your logo as to the suitability for this. Fine type would just burn out literally.

Looking good and nice and smooth finish all round.

These are the tools I use to build a board.

A small orbital sander with a range of sandpaper

A small sanding block.

80 and 120 grit Emery cloth for sanding the rails is a great help.

You will need a good mask as this fine dust will get into everything.

I have a small hand plan and a really small hand plane , both really sharp.

Get yourself a Veritas honing guide and water stones for sharpening your tools.

I have a spoke shave for tight curves , concaves.

A Japanese pull saw, very handy.

I use Fix it Mate polyurethane glue which I fine great for what I do. A bottle goes a long way.

You will need some cheap plastic spreaders. These ones are great the glue won't stick to it.

A small spray bottle is handy to mist water onto you timber before clamping as the glue is moisture activated.

Good quality masking tape is important as it has the right amount of stickiness and strength in the paper backing. Experiment, you will be amazed at the hold you can get with it and all the angles to do the job right. Lesser quality will let go or snap when the glue foams and expands , just when you have left the workshop. You don't need the surprises for the cost of a few dollars.

The odd spring clamp is handy.

I also have a small band saw which is very useful. I get all my Paulownia supplied dressed , thicknessed and glued up in sheets as I need. It all means you don't need to invest in expensive machines that will get little use.

I also have the vacuum pump and a PVC bag for it. You could share the cost with a mate.

The Lanolin I use is the General Purpose lanolin from Lanotec. Lanolin in the natural wareproof grease extracted from sheep's wool. It is all natural and about as environmental as you could get if that is what you are after. It will waterproof and nourish timber, stop it from drying out. The added advantage is when it hits salt water it becomes stickier than any wax you have used. Yet when it dries out it is touch dry again. It last a fair old while between coats.

Just brush it on and let it soak in. You will know when it is saturated as it will not dry out and leaves a film on the surface.

Turn it over and do the other side.

Just sit it out in the sun and let it soak in before laying up another coat.

5ft 2" x 21" x 2 1/2" - 36 litres

surfboardsbygrantnewby.blogspot.com.au