Home made light wind board?

[fokiten]

The high density foam wood samwich is a hybread i am going to try,my thinking is i can hav it all, light wieght, no fiberglass mess adj (belt sander) profile, and cheap.

[Mr Jo Macdonald]

Hi F,
I'm gonna try this too, thick 170 x 50, cross between a WT and a LFT, I was thinking 6mm ply top and bottom and balsa or foam in between to keep the weight down, but you'll have to laminate with glass betwwen the layers and top and bottom . If not you'll have a foam rail which won't be too strong, whadya reckon?
Btw want do you need a lightwind board for if you have such shit kickin conditions?
Jo

[kitesmurf]

So no sites for selfbuilding. Sandwich boards?

Not using this glass epoxy vacuumbag sh*t.

There must be somebody with the good ideas building a light board.

I am not gonna pay 700 euro's for a piece of plastic.

[Mr Jo Macdonald]

Like anonymous said above check this site

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/boardbuilding/

it's great

[fokiten]

joe I camp the wind dosen't start till 10:30/ 11:00 am. so i ride 16m in the morning love flat water too, on the board if epoxy won't do it alone hows glass going to help? anyway you'd sacrafice adjustable profile benifits. I'm skiping all the frills till I have my prototype dialed may be then I'll glass one but I doubt it, rude & crude has a certain charm I make teak fins to, so easy if you don't mind grinding a finger a nail or both I'm not working less im bleedin a little, to busy now for board maybe next month.

[Guest]

You can build a board with hand layup but you will not be able to make it as light or as strong as you can with vacuum bagging.

Vacuum bagging is also easier to do if you do not have the skill or patience for hand layup. I tried laminating a kiteboard by hand and although it turned out alright the laminate was obviously resin rich and the board was on the heavy side.

I have heard model airplaine hobbyists are using hand-operated vacuum testing guages sold at automotive stores to laminate wings. I have not been able to get the bag to seal well enough for this to work on a kiteboard but you can do well with a discarded refrigerator pump or do what I did and get a good Gast pump on e-bay for $35 USD.

The breather and peel ply you can get from a fabric store as polyester batting (the thinest is enough and cheaper) and pretty much any 100% nylon fabric (check discount racks first).

I use visquine (clear plastic sheeting)for the bag and have been using some weird asphalt/aluminum gutter repair tape to seal the bags but i think I would be better off spending the $3.50 a roll for the good mastic tape which is enough to do a couple of boards at least.

The vacuum bagging can be done for not a whole lot more than hand-layup and it makes it much easier to get good lightweight results. If you are using expensive foam, fabric, and resin for the construction then it is really the only way to go.

[BLOWN AWAY]

Just get an old windsurfing longboard.... those great big, heavy muthas that are about 4m long.... you will never sink with them even when standing still.

All you need is about 3 knots of wind (enough for the kite to fly)....

BLOWN AWAY

[Guest]

On 2002-10-07 21:29, Anonymous wrote:
Hey anyone ever tried making a light wind board from a windsurf board? I have an old 265cm and was thinking of trying it just for kicks and maybe getting out in LIGHT wind cruising.

I used one of these boards when I first started out..... The footstraps are too far back for kitesurfing but heaps of planing ability......

BLOWN AWAY

[Guest]

Doesen't the peel ply get stuck in the epoxy.
How do you get it of when it's ready.

[Guest]

On 2002-10-10 07:18, Anonymous wrote:
Doesen't the peel ply get stuck in the epoxy.
How do you get it of when it's ready.

I use ripstop nylon for peel-ply. Under vacuum the excess epoxy can flow through tiny holes in the nylon and into the breather material.

In test layups where I used way too much epoxy I ended up with both the peel ply and the breather totally saturated with epoxy. The peel-ply still comes off with not too much dificulty.

peel-ply is strong but very strechy (unlike epoxy) and the epoxy does not stick well to it. I cut the peel-ply layer out a little oversize so that the corners overhang the outline of the board and usually do not get wetted-out with epoxy. To remove all you do is grab a loose corner and gently but firmly pull towards one of the other corners of the board.