Ski Builders Forum

So just to start, a huge thanks to everyone who has contributed to this forum, I’ve been reading a ton over the last year in preparation, and whenever I’ve had a question, I’ve found an answer here. So I designed and build a pneumatic press right off the bat. I see that most guys use vacuum to start, but I like designing things, so I just went straight to pneumatics. If I’m skipping a rite of passage, forgive me! I’m fairly young (26) but I’ve been on skis since I was 5, and a board since I was 8. I live to ride, and I’ve moved through lots of boards. I’ve always loved the aesthetic of craftsmanship over mass production. I’m here for the love of making, and If I never make a board that can beat Burton I will still consider this journey a success. I’m hella tall 6’5” but only 190 lbs. I generally ride shorter boards because my riding style is more glades and fast slashing where having a shorter board helps. I decided for my first build I wanted something super stiff. My first build is a 161w directional. Hybrid camber (16mm camber underfoot, rocker nose). From bottom to top is: sintered base/unidirectional CF/glass/maple and poplar core/glass/biaxial CF/matte topsheet. Maple sidewalls. I like the idea of using wood, and I tried using Ipe on my first two cores but it was straight up kicking my ass so I’ve decided to revisit Ipe later, and went with the softer maple for now. I don’t have heat yet (I know, I’m working on it) but I retained 81% of my mold camber. I ran 45 psi in my two 8” fire hoses, and let it all sit for 24 hours. I love how it turned out, and the only mistakes I can see right now are cosmetic, and can be worked on in the future. I made absolutely sure my composites were all wet, but you can see under the clear topsheet that there were places with more and less epoxy. Maybe if I do biaxial CF again (for looks, the uni underneath is the workhorse) I won’t use a topsheet and just let the CF be the top layer. I still need to bevel and get a base grind. But overall I’m very pleased with the outcome and I’m feeling optimistic about future builds!

More pics

Great result for your first board! Nevermind the vacuum, if you can build a pneumatic press right away.

I like your press design! Have you checked if your base came out flat? If not, I would add a couple more of those cross braces.

I noticed you added a lot of inserts. My philospohy for boards I build for myself is to add as few inserts as possible to keep the weight down and not drill unnecessary holes into the core.

Thank you! So i actually had someone on Facebook bring up the baseplate concern, suggesting that if I had a double convex base to do what you said, add some more braces. But it is dead flat! I’ll keep checking, though, as I build more. I did add a lot of inserts. The idea was versatility, and I have an Arbor that also uses 12 per pack, so I initially thought that was an okay number, but I agree, it’s superfluous. From now on I’ll probably only do 8 per pack.

Great that your board came out flat! It's definitely a good idea to keep checking it for each board though. Pressing a board is a lot of stress on all materials involved.

As for the inserts, I only add that many if the board is supposed to be ridden by a number of differnt people or if I am not sure about the optimal location for the bindings on a particular board.