The idea was to get a custom board at the beginning of our world surf trip and film the whole process for our documentary. From there I could take it along the rest of the trip and Chris would be our artist. Chris (together with his mate Gordon Knight) is one of the best surfboard shapers in Australia. The whole process took us 3 days so here’s the process in a nutshell:
First of all, every custom board is different depending on the needs, abilities and requirements of a surfer. The shape, size, glassing and design is made due to my own desires and the advice from Chris.
Step 1. Blanc: All surfboards are made out of a blanc, a rough pre-shaped board (secret mixture) to start with.
Step 2. Profiling: In this stage of process the blanc board is roughly (semi-automatically) shaped to the point where the shaper takes over by hand.
Step 3. Shaping: This is where the magic happens! The shaper (Chris in our case) shapes the board further completely on feeling by hand. It’s a process that takes years of experience to do it like Chris does. It’s really an art to see and the artist is completely in his own (shaping)world during this stage.
Step 4. Registration: The board gets registered including all the details on the bottom side of the board. Chris named the board after my last name; The bone shuffler model (Ooohw yeah!)
Step 5. Glassing: This is where Gordon Knight took over. The glassing can be done in different layers of 4 and 6 ounce of fiberglass, depending on the needs of the surfer. For my surfboard was used a 6 ounce layer of fiberglass at the bottom, followed by a 4 + 6 ounce layer at the top side. This makes the board just a little bit stronger for traveling. After each layer the glassing had to dry in the sun, because Gordon used an ultraviolet raisin, that dries literally in seconds.
Step 6. Sanding: After each layer of the glassing has dried, sanding is necessary for the particularly parts of the board where the glassing tend to overlap.
Step 7. Fins: The board is now ready to put the fin holders in (Jay used the FCS fin system of course). This is a very precise job that needs to be checked twice, before you start cutting holes in the board. After the holes are made the fin holders are placed in the exact right position and are held in place with little clay balls and a raisin. Before the raisin gets dry the position of the fin holders are checked over and over again. The raisin for the fin holders need to dry for a while, before you actually can put the fins in place.
Step 8. Painting: The board is now almost ready and of course it’s fun to finish the board with a cool design. I chose (of course) for a turquoise design… (Chris was the painting artist). We made the paint design look a little bit feminine. I think Chris did a great job!
Step 9. Surf: The next thing for me to do is go out there…start my surf trip around the world…have fun and surf my brains out…!!!
To see the whole process for real, you have to wait for the documentary…!!!
Special thanks to Rico and Kelly who took care of us during our stay at the Goldy…!!!
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