Fiberglass or Epoxy

Evan Mangione

1:30

Old School or New School?

If you ask anyone who started surfing in the 1950s what kind of surfboards they used to ride and you will likely get a long story about how surfboards were constructed entirely out of wood and weighed 50Lbs or even 60lbs. The solid wood surfboards marked the beginning of surfboard construction. Surfboard design has progressed over the years. Now you have the choice between fiberglass or epoxy surfboards. Which design is better? Is it most important to benefit the surfer or the surfboard manufacturer? Everyone has a different opinion about the ride of an epoxy vs. fiberglass surfboard but the facts are as follows.

In the late 1960s and Early 70s came the Fiberglass Revolution. Rather than shape a board entirely out of wood, the surfboard shaper would mold the surfboard into shape by pouring a mixture into a template. When the mixture hardened within the mold, the outer shell was removed and out would come a surfboard blank. Which was much easier to shape. The surfboard blank was polyurethane and substantially lighter than the old wooden surfboards. This extremely light foam blank would then be wrapped in fiberglass cloth, soaked in a clear polyester resin and then sanded to a smooth finish. The Fiberglass surfboard was to become the standard surfboard at this time. The blanks could be easily shaped and the fiberglass resin made for a clean smooth outer finish. For Shapers this became an artwork. The way the shaper hand crafts the board affects surfboard performance. Every surfboard that is hand made is unique in its own way. When word gets out that there is a shaper making ripable boards they tend to go far in the rapidly, growing surf industry.

There is an art to finding the perfect wave, your own perfect break, determined selectively by the certain style of board you enjoy riding and the type of wave you like to surf. The fundamentals to surfing are no more than a plank to perch on, and a plane of water that breaks from one side to the other. From these elements legends of surfing have become what they are. Shaping a surfboard is like painting, a way to express yourself with out words, but emotion. The emotions and feelings you get when you catch the perfect wave, on that hand crafted fiberglass surfboard created by the blue collar man, is a much better feeling than a machine which has zilch in the artwork department. Getting to know your shaper can improve your surfing dramatically. With talking to your artist, giving him your personal feelings about how you want to progressive as a surfer or what surfer style you have, he can design you with anything you want. You cannot custom order a epoxy surfboard because they have certain templates that the machine only pops out. Tuff-lite, a epoxy surfboard producer, makes a 6’2 and 2 ј design. Let’s say you wanted a 6’2, 3’’ design. You a surfer can’t customize your boards with epoxy made companies, such a Tuff-lite. This limits the way you want to express yourself which defeats the whole purpose of surfing. Companies such as Tuff-lite can mass produce these generic surfboards in a short period of time. This method of production is more expensive due to the complicated application process.

It’s unfair to the local surfboard shapers because they can only produce, not mass produce a certain number of surfboards at a time. A fiberglass shaper has to put time and effort along with ingenuity to create what you want. Buyers can be mislead because the average waiting period for a custom Channel Islands board is about one month. If you want a “just add water” surfboard it can be to your house in about three to five business days using FedEx. Waxed and ready for your riding enjoyment. Surfboard shapers get mad that a machine is taking over there way of life. Fiberglass surfboards give you a smoother, expressive and less stiff style, more old school if you will.

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