Surfboard Construction Guide I get the same question every day, “What is the difference between and epoxy board and a fiberglass board?”  First of all, all surfboards have fiberglass. Epoxy is just different type of resin. It is questions like this that made me realize the consumer really has no idea what they are buying.  I made up this list of types of surfboard construction to help customers understand the different types of construction.   PU or polyurethane production is traditional surfboard construction. This was started in the early 60s and to this day is an industry standard.  It’s just one of those rare times where we got it right the first time.  Polyurethane blank can have a density as low as 2 lbs which is Ultra Light Foam or as high as 12 lbs which is Tow Foam.  There are several densities between these but you have to figure out what is the best strength to weight ratio for you.  Obviously, a light surfboard is going to feel the best but it will get destroyed much faster.  Can you afford to buy a new short board every two months?  A heavy board might last you five to ten years but...

Firewire Taps into Primal Energy with Its New Volcanic Tech   Firewire has been at the forefront of surfboard construction essentially since the company started, leading the race to use the strongest, lightest, most durable and ecofriendly materials in surfboard design. Now the company has taken things to the next level, moving beyond carbon fiber to something called basalt fiber. Basalt fibers are extruded from volcanic rock at extremely high temperatures and woven into a cloth, similar to fiberglass and carbon fiber. The difference is that basalt fiber is superior to fiberglass in terms of strength and weight (similar to carbon fiber), and it is superior to carbon fiber in terms of flex memory, temperature tolerance, and eco footprint. Basalt fiber has been used extensively in the aerospace industry due to the fact that its heat tolerance makes it a good option for rocket and jet engines. It hasn’t been used much in the surf industry, but Firewire aims to change that and is currently releasing two boards in its Volcanic Tech, which is the company’s name for its basalt fiber-based board construction. The El Tomo (from Daniel Thomson) and the Seaside (from Rob Machado) are both being built with...

Firewire’s New Ibolic Construction   Firewire has spent the past year innovating newer, better construction processes for its wide range of boards—which is pretty impressive, since it already led the industry in futuristic tech. The latest option is the Ibolic Construction, which replaces the LFT construction. Ibolic was designed around the fact that many of Firewire’s more futuristic shapes had pretty complex bottom contours, particularly the vee quad concave bottom used on many of Tomo’s boards. This “performance hull” contour is quite involved and is difficult to glass with a bottom skin, which was the typical process used for the LFT boards. To address this, Firewire developed the Ibolic construction, which features parabolic high-density foam rails and a foam I-beam down the middle to create the central spine that provides the foundation for a pronounced vee. This results in a build that is 35 percent stronger than LFT and more strength in the rails (which results in a lively flex, similar to the Helium build), but without sacrificing the LFT’s feel and performance that so many surfers have come to love. The Ibolic still uses a single skin on the deck, providing a strong, durable platform from which to do...

WHAT IS HYFI 2.0? Our unparalleled epoxy technology, HYFI, is a unique multi-layer construction that feels like nothing else out there. Think of it as a futuristic exoskeleton for a surfboard that allows it to be lighter and stronger than ever before, while still maintaining the ideal spring-loaded flex for maximum performance. Now, in the last 5 years since it was first released, we’ve taken everything learned to improve each aspect – the performance, flex, speed, materials used and manufacturing processes.   SCALED ENGINEERING We found the next level of this technology by developing precision engineered stringers, or pins, which are scaled specifically for each board. The size of the pin changes depending on the dimensions of the HYFI, and therefore the weight of its intended rider. The shape of each board’s pin perfectly reflects our goal of making the stiffest part of the board at the centre, tapering out to each end. This results in an even better flex pattern that helps you load and explode into turns. We’ve also changed the balance of strength – whereas the top and bottom were the same in our original HYFI, HYFI 2.0 construction features a stronger deck. It’s been tested by...

Cutting-Edge Combination of Nature and Technology When most people think of Firewire, they think of TIMBERTEK. These are the brown, wooden-decked surfboards that first put the company on the map. Combining lightweight EPS blanks with a laminated wooden skin and proprietary parabolic rails, these boards look good and perform great. They are strong, lightweight, and snappy, utilizing the strength of paulownia wood to supplement the strength and flex of the EPS foam and epoxy resin. Paulownia is a fast-growing tree that produces strong, light timber, perfect for use in surfboard construction. By utilizing this wood in their construction process, Firewire is able to minimize the amount of petro-chemical products that go into the boards. The boards are still not entirely sustainable, but they certainly use less petro-chemicals than many other boards. Plus, because they are so strong, they tend to last longer, which is better for the environment. The TIMBERTEK surfboards are just as impressive for their performance. The parabolic rail construction eliminates the need for a center stringer, and instead moves the boards’ flex and life to the rails, where more torque and movement occurs. The result is a hyper-sensitive and maneuverable board that is stronger while at the...

Tell Us About The Thunderbolt  Surfboards You’ve Ridden... Thunderbolt. Well Thunderbolt came into my life about five years ago when Mr. Sumitomo, Yu Sumitomo gave me a phone call that began my journey with the Thunderbolt team. A good friend of mine that I’ve surfed professional longboards with for years, Kapono Nahina, gave me the original call that told me I needed to try this construction. I went to Hawaiian South Shore and that’s when I started my relationship with Dave. His awesome staff down there set me up and I tried my first Thunderbolt Harley Ingleby HIHP model designed by Billy Tolhurst. It changed my life and opened my eyes to the details within board construction. That was a serious turning point that really got me back into surfing again. I was enjoying everything about it like when I was full throttle professionally. The support got me motivated again and back to feeling excited about doing things in the surf industry! So right now the models I ride, they’re all good haha I don’t know where do I start. I basically ride the Harley Ingleby series and it’s become my absolute favorite. Harley’s 9’1 HIHP model in full carbon is the one, that you know, really sparked my...

…Lost’s C4 Board Construction Along with a wide variety of fun, creative shapes, Matt Biolos and the team at …Lost  have revolutionized the surfboard industry with their C4 construction process. C4 boards are built with sustainably harvested cork that adds extra strength and dampens wind chatter and high-speed vibrations, yet maintains the lightweight feel of a modern shortboard. These composite boards use a 1.5-pound EPS foam core wrapped with the harvested cork and layers of fiberglass, adding tensile strength to the deck without creating the flicky feel that a lot of epoxy boards suffer from. The best part is that cork is harvested from live trees that are not chopped down, so it’s a fully green, sustainable material. C4 construction is available on a number of …Lost models, including the RNF and the Sabotaj. We have stocked numerous …Lost models in C4 construction here at Hawaiian South Shore, and have had a number of regular customers test them out. A few guys in the solid 200-pound range have been riding C4 boards for years and hardly put a pressure ding in their decks, which just goes to show how strong these boards are.       More To Read...  ...

    Mark Nelson founded Carve Sports, Inc. / VERITAS SURFCRAFT in 2014.  Since that time, Mark and his team have partnered with Yu Sumitomo of Thunderbolt Technologies, and elite longboard surfers including CJ Nelson, Harley Ingleby, Ben Skinner, Taylor Jensen and Kai Sallas.  Together with their shapers, this team has created exceptional lineups of high performance and classic longboards and fun shapes and established distribution of their boards in most major surf markets around the world.  Brands include CJ Nelson Designs, Harley Ingleby Series by Tolhurst Surfboards, SkinDog Surfboards, Flying Diamonds Fins, Taylor Jensen Series and Kai Sallas Longboard Co. With so much history and tradition under his roof, you’d think Mark would be a throw-back, but he’s actually one of the most progressive forward-thinkers in the longboard world, and one of the first to utilize the revolutionary Thunderbolt technology.  Mark met Yu Sumitomo, creator of Thunderbolt Technologies when he was researching alternative surfboard construction. He looked at a lot of different construction options and toured a number of factories, and didn’t find anything close to Yu san’s boards in terms of quality and performance. When they met in 2014, Yu san was already making high-performance longboards with earlier...

Firewire is known for leading the surf industry in terms of modern, high-tech board construction, and recently they have added a number of different construction options to their boards. Two of the most popular—LFT and Helium—provide similar all-around benefits such as light weight and durability, but also have their own specific advantages, depending what you are looking to do on your board. Rob Machado has been designing boards for Firewire for the past few years, and has a lot of experience on both types of construction. He recently did a little video to explain the difference between the two, and what conditions each thrives in.   “The LFT construction has durable deck skin and controls flex down center, with high-density foam from nose to tail,” says Rob. “Helium also has a durable deck skin, but controls flex in the rails through a mix of paulownia and balsa wood.” He continues to explain that “Helium is light and lively, and great for generating speed in weak waves. LFT is still light, but a little more drivey and solid, and great for controlling speed in better waves.” Helium  Each Helium shape is cut from the lightest foam blank in our stable –...

WHAT IS HYFI? Our unparalleled epoxy technology, HYFI, is a unique multi-layer construction that feels like nothing else out there. Think of it as a futuristic exoskeleton for a surfboard that allows it to be lighter and stronger than ever before, while still maintaining the ideal spring-loaded flex for maximum performance. Jason Stevenson and his JS label (famous for the tractor logo) have been producing some of the most high-performance surfboards on the planet for more than two decades. No one questions the design elements of these boards, and a number of guys on the world tour ride them, including Julian Wilson, Owen Wright, Adrian Buchan, and Joel Parkinson. But what many people don't realize is that the technology that goes into the construction of the boards is just as cutting edge as their design. JS offers its range of boards in the HYFI construction, which is a hybrid fiber technology. The product of two years of research and development, HYFI is the latest and greatest in surfboard construction advances, producing light, strong, fast surfboards that are more durable than polyurethane boards but ride just as well. The flex out of the tail adds more drive and projection, the boards...

Helium Hydroshort  California’s Timmy Reyes has been a free surfing fixture for two decades. From his young days as an up-and-coming grom to his current legend status as a feral explorer of frigid barrels, Timmy has been shaping surf culture since he was an adolescent, and his edits continue to get us pumped up to drive a bit farther, pull on some rubber, and have an adventure. As it turns out, Timmy Reyes is influential in the surfboard design realm as well. Timmy got on one of Kelly Slater’s Hydroshorts (made by Tomo) a few years back, built in Firewire’s LFT construction. He connected with the board right off the bat, and ended up having Tomo make him one in Helium construction aswell. Timmy took both down to Baja with him to shoot an edit called Love Letter in Mexico, and had the chance to ride both boards in pumping waves—the perfect way to compare the two construction styles. While both construction styles have their benefits, Timmy felt like the Heliumconstruction just brought the Hydroshort alive—it made it feel livelier and moreresponsive, particularly good waves. The spot he was surfing has strong, consistent offshore winds, which are normally difficult to surf...

There are few board designs that have stranger stories than the …Lost Rocket. Back in the mid-2000s, Shane Beschen needed a board for his mini-grom Noah, and together with fellow …Lost pro surfer and shaper Noah Budroe scraped a broken blank into a straight-railed, low-entry rocker, wide-tailed, super-concaved speed demon. But then Shane ended up borrowing the board from his son, and found that the thing went ballistic. He brought the design to …Lost, where the design team tweaked it a bit and created what came to be called the Rocket—one of the most popular boards of the late 2000s. The Rocket featured heavily in …Lost’s film 5'5" Redux, being ripped to pieces by half of the film’s cast, and soon the board was selling like hotcakes. Now …Lost has taken the Rocket and refined it even further with the …Lost Rocket Redux. Staying true to the original Rocket shape, with its straight rails, deep concave, and hooked diamond tail, the Redux tweaks the outline and rails slightly to provide a more modern, high-performance twist on the classic groveler. To super-modernize the board, it has also been equipped with the patented …Lost Carbon Wrap, which replaces the traditional center, wooden...