Frankenboard

Like I mentioned, back in Dec 2020 I went out surfing early one morning whilst the Santa Anas were blowing hard. 

I drove out to County Line at around 5a to get there at 6 and squeeze in a surf before work. The wind was blowing at 26mph off shore and after suiting up,  just as I turned my back to lock my car to go surf, my board (a 9'6" pig-like log shaped by Steve Irvin for Paul Strauch, The Ghost) got picked up off the street by a strong gust and blown over the cliffs next to the highway and got slammed on a stack of rocks about 15 feet below. 

The scene of the crime.

















Well my foam and fiberglass board got demolished.

After repeating the mantra "it's just a toy" over and over again in my head, I went home and figured out what to do next. Later that week I dropped the board off to a shaper buddy of mine for a damage assessment with the aim to have him fix it ... but after he took a proper look he found 21 open dings and delams and told me that id be better off buying a new board as repairs would cost the same and take months. I called some repair shops and got the same response across the board. So I took my friend's advice and bought a new old board (9'6" Jim Phillips glider for Orange Surfboards) and considered the old one a write off but after a couple of weeks I figured I'd try my hand at repairing it myself. 

It should be noted that I have no idea how to fix a surfboard so I expect there to be a lot of trial and error (mostly error) but nothing ventured nothing gained. And since this board is a total write off, I'm not precious with it so it's a perfect specimen to learn ding repair.

Post-damage assessment video:


So here we go, its been a few days of work now and so far... so ok? 
I've just been building a dust lair and prepped the damaged areas whilst waiting for repair material to arrive. And I've been documenting it and will continue to do so... progress so far below!



Delam'd glassed on fin needed to come off.








Delamed glass surrounds the dings.






From my shaper buddy Jeremy


~AG


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