Major ding to repair - help needed

Hey guys,

I have a pretty large ding to repair on the bottom of my surfboard.
It is about 30cm and at its deepest is about 22mm.

Would I try to get some foam in there or would it be OK to just fill with Q Cell?
It may be a pain in the but to get the foam.

I have seen quite a few of the YouTube tutorials, but none with a ding of this size.

Any help would be appreciated.

I have cleaned the ding up as you can see in one of the pictures.

I am definitely going to put two layers of 6oz cloth over it, but am going to struggle to get the foam to fill it and thought Q Cell might do the job.

I am not sure if most would recommend it but I usually use some expanding foam on things like that. Have done some amazing jobs with it. Just rebuilt from the rail under the fin box on one of my boards. I just cut the foam back so its under the level of the board and fill with q-cell. Then apply a few layers of glass on top. Seems to work a treat. You can get the higher grade marine pour foam but I could not find any locally when I needed it. Otherwise you can just get some foam off cuts and cut a few bits to size and then q-cell around them before glassing over it as you normally would. You can just q-cell the whole thing if you get desperate but the weight it will add might be significant depending on what board you have there. With a ding like this you are going to have to do the repair in stages. Probably 3 or 4 to get a nice finish.

Have a look on sway locks for a few tips. Get something like this

www.bunnings.com.au/filler-expanding-foam-500ml-boom-expanding-foam_p1211402

Just make sure you are using the correct resin with the foam and board. Do not use PCU with an epoxy board or you will end up in all sorts of trouble. Lots of examples on youtube. Check out the board lady - she probably has done something similar although she mostly vacuums her repairs.

But seriously, it isn't too bad. If you go to a decent surf shop, the people working their should be help a bit.

How'd it happen?

easy go to your local shaper and get some rail off cuts.

grab a router and cut out the damage. uniform depth if posible.
sand the perimeter glass down a bit to feather the job in when glass ing at the end.

Shape the PU foam off cuts to fit as best as possible.
apply some PU foaming woodglue to hole and part. have surrounding areas all taped yp with plastic to avoid contamination.
apply a weight on top and let cure.

once set, remove brick and sand to level.
spray the foam yellow with a matching ACRYLIC (anchor brand is best) spray can.
layup glass.

DONE

Go with Bertie's advice spot on IMO, before you glass I usually grind down the glass around the area a bit not all the way through but close as it'll help you get the patch job flat without having any areas that are thin.

when you apply the finish resin before sanding this will infill those small gaps. You can just tape around the ding and use a brush or a nice sharp edged scrapper to apply it.

god i hate Q-cel, looks like ****

My take on the bubbles is that the q-cell mixture can be quite thick or viscous so when you pour it into the ding it takes a bit of time to slowly get into the small cracks and holes. These air pockets that are filled then slowly will try and come to the surface. It depends on the cure time and viscousity as to whether they will make it to the top before it hardens.. Can also be some bubbles stirred into the batch whilst mixing.
I obviously spend too much time thinking about these sort of things.

Job Done!

Ready to roll mate, looks pretty good. Nothing like doing it yourself!

Anyone tried quracell? Or something like that, used for boat building and a bunch of other stuff. We got some and apparently it is heaps stronger than q cell.

We used it to glue the tail back on the ol' man's mal, some dude cut the tail off my running over it with fiberglass fins in his board, ass.

Tom.

Bloody top effort!!