Board making

[pkupe]

I have a few questions about building boards. I have a press that i made, works great. Im just wondering what wood combination i should use to make it super stiff, and how many 1/8 plies of that. and should i fiberglass it? so manny options.. Help me out!

[Revolutionist]

Experimentation is the best way to figure out what works. Fiberglass is a great option for stiffening an board that is too flexy. The best place in portland to find wood for pressing decks is Cross cut. Their Russian birch comes pre-plied in 1/8" and 1/4" thickness and is still thin enough to press concave into.

[Mr. Tadashi]

Cross cut will also cut the sheet about 3 times at no extra cost. It makes it a bit easier if you don't have access to a saw.

[Nikolai!]

4 layers of 1/8th inch works best for getting rad concave and is the most stable 2 layers of 1/4 inch works Ok but not too very amazingly

[pkupe]

I used 4 layers of 1/4" baltic birch, and it has pretty snappy flex. i just want to know what to do for a speedboard, dont want it too thick.

[pkupe]

OH and how to make sick wheel wells

[Anti-Trend]

I made boards for my senior project in high school, if you wanna check out my press I noticed that I'm friends with you on facebook, look in my wall photos.. (my name in Nicholas Calafato). I messed around with combinations of birch and maple (if you can find some). I found that laying it up (from top ply to bottom>) birch maple birch maple birch, or, maple birch maple birch maple had the best results of speedboards. Try laying in fiberglass between plys and using epoxy to bond both the wood and 'glass and you should get a nice still flex with that.

[gh0stsignal]

if ya want it strong use maple, 1/16" 'thick' veneer. 1/8" bb works great tho too, jus more flex n a bit weaker. dont use 1/4" bb, its a bitch to form. i use a vacuum pump for my decks but i've seen some pretty good ghetto presses out there too.
dont go birch/maple/birch/maple. if your going to mix wood, use birch as your core with maple on the outer layers. the board will be snappier, stronger, and the maple is less prone to dents/scratches.

heres a few pics of a freeride board i built a few days ago to give ya motivation





and some mini's i finished yesterday:



good luck, lemme know if ya have any questions or need help

[pkupe]

those are pretty cool. Is the birch in the middle and maple outer the best super stiff combo? and someone please explainn to me this vacuum press thing i dont understand it. and wheel wells.

[gh0stsignal]

generally all maple ply's is the stiffest option. depends on your layers tho and your wheelbase. with birch 1/8" 3-ply you will need a thicker board because birch is a bit softer and because each ply has 2 length-grain sheets and one cross-grain sheet. maple veneer gives you the option for fewer cross-grain sheets cause you decide which direction the grain runs on every layer.
for a stiff birch board, 5 layers of 1/8" or 4 layers with a bottom layer of 12oz glass should do the trick. for maple 1/16" veneer, 8 or 9 plys with 2 running cross-grain will be good n stiff.

as for vacuum bagging, you can check out roarockit for some good beginner info. ted also sells starter kits on there but if ya want one, i think i still have a tap bag + pump laying around in my shop. it hasn't been used in almost 2 years, since i use an electric pump now, but i'm sure it still works fine

here's a tutorial that should get you on your way to doing wheel wells: diy-wheel-wells

hope that helps