When building a foam-core board you MUST read ALL safety instructions first. Once you do this we can begin.
1st- Get the foam. Cut the foam to the shape you want. I've read that the best way to size a foam board for yourself is to make it's length the same as your length from toe to mid-waist and the width the same at the lenght of your shoulder to wrist. Then, sand the rails of the board so they have a slight curve downward. If you want stickers of color, add color now. I would use a light-weight paint if you use paint, but be careful with paint because most spraypaints can melt foam. The best type of foam would be a polyurithaine foam. It's best to get a block of foam and carve the exact shape of board you want with rocker already in it.
2nd- Now it's time for the first glassing. Take a sheet for fiber cloth and lay it flat on the board. Tape the the cloth that hangs over to the other side of the board with masking tape and make sure that all the air pockets are gone when you do this. Mix the resin and hardener(mixing instructions are on the resin bottle most of the time) and take the first paint brush. Use enough resin to completley saturate the cloth. Use the brush to GENTLY brush the resin over the fiber. Now let it dry for about 2 days.
Note: Do bottom first! Make sure to get the sides of the board glassed the first time as well. You do this by puting resin on every inch of the cloth that is showing, but don't glass the top of the board yet, just the sides and bottom.
3rd- Lay the cloth on the top the same way you did for the bottom and do the whole resin thing again as well. Include the side of the board again. When letting it dry this time, place two pieces of wood under the foam so the nose and tail will have slight curves. (Only do this step if you didn't carve the board out completely. See step 1 if you don't understand what I'm talking about.) The wood adding thing can be very challenging to do because you can't let the cloth come off the board or you're screwed. If the cloth do come off the board you can kind of fix it. I will tell you how to fix it: Simply let it dry and cut out the dried cloth that came off the board. Then re-glass this section. It won't look as nice but it'll still work great.
4th- After the board has rocker(the curve thing) you need to sand out the board. Just make it smooth. Then glass it again. Sand it again. And then glass it again. (You will see how the extra paintbrushes come in handy here because the hardener usually turns the brushes into glassed brushes.) This will make a nice and strong board with 3 layers of glass and extremely strong rails.
Note: On the 3rd time of glassing the bottom, don't include the sides of the board.
5th- Sand it down with a real fine grid sandpaper. After this, buff the board to give it a fine polished look. Now you're done. |  |
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