If you ever saw a wooden surfboard it was probably hanging in somebody's house or underneath a deck
But kind of in the last 10 or 15 years wood has made a big comeback
They surf wonderfully
It's beautiful and it feels great to be on one of them
I always had a love for wood and kind of passionate about things that went in the water
I've kind of been around wooden boats most of my life
There's just so much character
The way their built, the stories that come with them
A lot of that has translated over to why we build surfboards the way we do
When we first started thinking about building surfboards, wood was the natural material we chose
They have a very high strength to weight ratio
Wooden surfboards have the longest history of use in the surf world than any other material
People have been surfing wooden surfboards since kinda the first
documented history of people riding waves
Board starts in CAD, where we take a 3d model
break down the shape and kind of create frames and templates and
all the inner parts of the board that we get cut
on a CNC machine
We take those frames and we just pop them out
assemble the frame into a kind of skeleton
We go out to our lumber shed, pick a bunch of cedar, bring em into our mill shop
put glue along the edges, clamp it all together into a panel
Everything's book matched, you have symmetry in the colors and texture of the wood
Cut your outline
Take our assembled frame
gently put it down right on top of the plank
Once that foundation is started, you're basically building up the three dimensional shape
the outside part of the board using lots of strips that kind of interlock and fit together
Every piece of wood is going to be different and it's all gonna react differently
There are frustrations with it, but I think that's one of the things that keeps it challenging
you learn to read the, kind of what the grain lines are doing and what the color of the wood is telling you
Once those rails are cleaned up, we put our top planks on
It's a little bit like putting a lid on a box.
It's like this is it, whatever's inside that board is staying inside that board
and by tensioning some rope you can clamp the two together
It's like a time capsule
What makes our boards unique are they are built right here in york
they're built using material that grows right here in the state of maine
they're built 100% by hand, by local crafts people and surfers
There is a lot of time that goes into these boards
between forty and sixty hours, start to finish
We wanted to build surfboards that were as hollow as they could be, but still be strong enough to work well
Too light and they don't surf well but too heavy and they don't surf well
so there's a, there's a balance pint there and that's where we try to be
Taking the board off the rocker table, once the top has gone on.
that is by far one of my top favorite parts
It's just you, and a shaping stand
a board and a hand plane
Everything else is out of your view
it's simple
it's pleasurable
it's quiet
you can be with your thoughts and you can kind of just be present
There's something about taking a nice sharp edge tool to a beautiful piece of wood and feeling the curls coming off
and knowing that every pass that you're making. you're kind of getting it closer and closer to what you have in mind
Once we've shaped it down and the boards looking like it's supposed to look like, time for it to go into the glassing room
4 ounce fiberglass, laying it over the board, draping it over the edges, cutting it, applying epoxy on the board
Once both sides are Lamb coated, it's time to put in the hardware
drill and router and install the fin box
and on the other side we drill and put in the leash plug and a vent
There's a lot of air just naturally inside the board
And that air wants to expand and contract with temperature changes
and that vent has a little piece of gortex fabric in it, and it allows air to kinda breathe both ways
but it doesn't allow water in it
Once all that hardware's put in, goes back into the glassing room,
we brush a nice beautiful thick coat of epoxy over the whole surface
and that we call a gloss coat
that's supposed to look beautiful and glossy and shiney and flawless
you get to see that board come to life
whatever the colors in the wood they really come out
it just makes it look like candy
you jus wanna touch it and run your hands down it and it's just kinda the icing on the cake
once everything's hard, we put it into what we call the oven
Get that epoxy to cure, really kind of bake it, and just get it to harden
put in the fin, screw in the vent, ship it out
we just love the idea of building something that's sustainable and long lasting and made by hand
kinda give you a deeper connection to the product over something you might buy on a shelf
When a customer gets the board
they feel it. They 100% feel the amount of work and the amount of passion that went into the board
So, I'm not really looking at hours and efficiency
I'm looking at like doing it right and enjoying it as we go