TBS Black Widow 08.5

Just a teaser for now. Full post coming later. Home-built board. I will post the full build as well as the first ride results...

Coming soon...

Gorgeous Troy! I do love that double wing.

Nice!!!!!! That looks like it could be quite fun!!!!

(Message edited by bac on July 25, 2008)

That looks HOT!!!

So some history here. I have been watching this site for quite a while. Been surfing consistently for 2 seasons now. My board of preference is the Yellow Loogey. I am a big guy, 250, but I feel I ride the yellow just fine, given the right wake.

So I decided to build a board that would be bigger so that I can ride on those not-so-perfect wake boats.

My design started as a 5' by 24". This is the first time I have ever shaped a surfboard, or ever even used fiberglass before.

I started by creating my template.


I then setup my work space



I decided to use the blue foam from my local hardware store (name to remain out of my post )

I used 1/4" birch plywood as the stringer (because I had some in my garage)



I used a tube of glue made for foamboard (comes in a tube like caulking), which in hindsight some general purpose 5 minute epoxy would have been better. When I started shaping the string came un-glued (literally) for a couple reasons. 1. I am impatient. 2. having all the weighted items on top of the foam, and the concrete floor below didn't allow for any air circulation, thus a good bond wasn't formed.

So I re-did the stringer utilizing 1 minute epoxy (refer to 1 above where I said I am impatient )

More to come later...

I Love a board Build Story

Nice build!

Thank you all for the comments/compliments.

back to the build.

Next I shaped the rocker. I didn't have a lot to work with since I was using 2" foam...

Next I traced the shape from the top view, and cut that shape out using the good old electric turkey knife...

Next I shaped the board. I utilized an orbital palm sander and and a Surform Flat File for the stringer.





The nose in this picture will bite the dust eventually (after paint unfortunately)



In this pic, you can see that the rail changes from rounded to flat. Hopefully this will give it good carving in the wake...

As you can see in the photos above, even with some fine sanding the foam still ends up getting torn up.

Next step was to use some household spackle and fill in the low spots. I didn't photograph that phase, but you simply spackle, let dry, sand.

Then I painted the board.
(notice the nose has changed. Once I got the first couple coats of paint on the board, and what I would call a "good friend" made lude comments about the style of my nose, I cut it off with my dewalt.)

also in the above two pictures notice the "Proud Stringer" (Thanks surfdad) - again back to a few posts ago, I am impatient

next it was time to fiberglass the bottom. Since this was my first board, and it was blue foam, and I am a big guy, I went overboard here. I have One 4oz and One 6oz sheet of fiberglass on the bottom, followed by Two 4oz and One 6oz on the top. I wanted something that wouldn't break the first time I rode it.

I used Resin Research from a local (to the Seattle area) fiberglass supply () type place.

At this point I started looking at the fins and fin boxes. I went with Futures QFEA Quads, and Probox boxes. Unfortunately the combination do not fit together out of the box. So it was time for some modification to the fins.

I used a dewalt cordless recipricating saw and a router and router table to do the job. I had to take off equal parts from the front and rear (dewalt) of the fins (well on the front two, but not on the back two as pictured below), as well as narrow them down a bit (router and router table) to fit in the Probox.

Back to the board. I finished the bottom layer of fiberglass, and the top layer. Sanded everything a little to get rid of any huge dangling fiberglass bits. I then did a hot coat on top and bottom...


Now it is time to install the fins. I chose the Probox's because of the cost and ease of install. Since this was my first time, I wasn't sure how much spray-adhesive to use to attach the templates to the board. I was scared to put too much on, and unfortunately I didn't put enough on. Looking back, the more the better I guess. One of the templates came loose while routing and I bored a bit too much, but it didn't have any impact on the install. The second problem was the templates are supposed to stay on while setting the boxes with epoxy, but the one that came loose had epoxy running underneath it and I was afraid it would permanently attach to the board, so I removed it during the box install. Everything went ok after that...

if you look in the last pic posted, you can see scratches around the bottom (in relation to the picture) two templates, and near the upper left. These are under the hot coat unfortunately. Plus if you look in the upper right hand corner and down that right side you can see a white haze. This is where the fiberglass was pulled around from the top. This can be seen all around the board at this point.

Looking back, I wouldn't paint a board (the foam) this dark of a color, or I am just not very good at doing fiberglass.

So after the fin boxes were installed, I sanded the hot coat and re-painted the board.

I then did the gloss coats (2).




in this next pic, you can see that I wasn't careful enough in placing the rear's and they angle in more than the front's of the quads...

You can see in this pic that I don't have much nose rocker. Doing this all over again, I would make sure to have more nose rocker...

next it was time for traction... I got some traction pad sheets from a local water sports store. I was able to free-form these

I wanted to wait to put in a rear heel kick just so that I know exactly where it should go after riding it a few times...

Now it is time to ride.

Getting up the first time... The board feels slow. it feels like a tank that you can walk all over. It didn't take long (after asking for the boat to slow down) to go without a rope...

Turning felt difficult. Normally with my yellow I like to do a turn to the top of the wave and then turn the board perpendicular to the boat (butter slide is what we called it in wakeboarding). But this board really didn't want to go up to that part of the wave.

Remember, I am a big surf-dude

Time for the friends to try it out.

though it feels like a tank, and slow, it is fun.



At this point we took out the rear fins. What a night and day difference. The board sped up, and you could cut it loose a bit more...

Now the board is having fun. I am sure that the angle of my rear fins was slowing us down. I wonder if I can cut them out and re-set them in a better position?

We had a couple successful nose-rides...


The board feels more like surfing in the ocean. Huge bottom turns, you can ride forever. And if you are losing the wake, you can walk forward on it for a nose-ride, catch back up, then re-position.

So behind this boat, with this wave we usually run 10.4 with the Yellow. We were riding at 9.6-9.8 with the TBS BlackWidows 08.5. so it is a bit slower, but man what a blast. It was a bit of a workout doing those big bottom turns.

We could really accelerate with making those turns with our back legs.

We could also ride much further behind the boat, and stay up much longer as compared to what we normally ride...

In Summary

Things I would do differently
1. take more time to angle the fins properly. I didn't measure my fin placement equally between the front and rears. Meaning, for the fronts I measured up 11 inches from the rear of the board and made my marks for the rears of the front fins. I then should have measured up 4.5 inches and made another mark. Based on that mark is where I should have measured my angle in, but instead I just "guessed" where 4.5 inches was. thus the front and rears didn't angle in at the same angle.

2. More nose rocker. While there is enough surface area to keep the nose up, it did take a while to get your ballance to not put the nose in the water all the time.


Up next, I want to try the 3.75 inch rear fins in instead of the 4.57 I have in currently. see if I still have enough speed, but loosen the board up a bit.

All total, I started this project on 7/5 and I rode the board by 7/25. Also note that I have twin 2.5 year old girls, and a full time job (not shaping surfboards)

My costs - not counting tools as those are usually one time costs.

Blank - $25+ tax since I had the stringer (counting 2 kinds of glue)

Fins - $53 - found out later that my local fiberglass supply type place has these cheaper.. oh well.

Fin Boxes - Counting install kit - $75

Fiberglass - (Resin Research Epoxy and fiberglass cloth) - $113

Traction - $20+ tax

Total: 286 - I would round this up to $300 easy with misc costs, etc.

That definately gives me a better appreciation for the price of boards today. But, there is something to be said for the satisfaction of making your own, and it actually surfs! Plus I feel I know more about how a surf board works now then what I used to know...

Special thanks to Surfdad for assisting me offline!!!

Cost of riding your own built board - PRICELESS

For a little video of the first day you can check out this link. We are still getting our balance and figuring out the sweet spot with this board. You will also see what I mean by wider turns at the bottom of the wave, further back in the wake

NOTE: this is a fairly large file, might be best to right click and choose "save target as" to save locally to your computer

http://thehutts.homeserver.com/tbs_2008/firstride/first_ride.mov

You're welcome Troy and congrats on your (first) stick! I love that you got it out and riding! There's nothing like that first ride on your first stick.

You can reset your boxes, you'll route out the old ones. Be careful, route slowly as the plastic boxes can rip HUGE holes in the foam, coming out. Once that is done, I like to fill the hole with pour foam, 2 pound will work. You could can also use "Great Stuff", be sure to fashion a lid so that the Great Stuff packs in there well (plywood with a single fill/vent hole cover it with polyethele or mold release).

With that done, route the new holes and epoxy the boxes in the new holes. If you want, you can laminate a football patch over the reset boxes.

Awesome write up and a great read!!! More inspiration for me to try and build my own too. It looks like fun!

Cool write up. I have the same wife/kids/job=zero time, but gives me some inspiration that I could tackle it this winter. Also thanks for your price sheet as it helps alot knowing that shaping your own board is mostly for pleasure and satisfaction than saving a ton of money over professional boards.

Being your first board I'm really surprised at the quad-fins. I'd be too scared of not aligning those properly. I think I'll stay with two. ---again, beautiful board enjoy.