SUP: inner supports for the deck

We prepped the halves of the board for bonding and will put it together in the morning.
The deck has a gel coat finish and is a laminate of glass cloth set in epoxy.
It has bulking supports bonded in and these rest on carbon fiber tubes we make.

Here is a photo of the CF tubes bonded to the hull.  They are ready for the deck.

Here is the deck:

Sup Supplies

Today we drove up to Illinois to visit our friend John L.  He has a load of dried wood for sale and we need a lot for making SUP decks.
The goal this week is to rip the wood and build 10 decks.
We have that many Sea State hulls ready to go.
We already have enough Cedar , Cherry and Walnut for the accent strips.  Today we bought 10 foot lengths of Tulip Poplar.
It is a nice light blond color and light in weight too.
The planks are roughly 1.5 inches thick by 9 inches wide.

We ended up with 14 boards and this will yield enough strips for approximately 12 SUP decks.

It was fun to get back up to Elsah.  It is flooding again.  The water is right up to the edge of The Great River Road but so far it is still passable.
Here some photos...

SUP kit board: Deck details

This morning the deck was firmly bonded to the hull so we cleaned off the excess adhesive and blue tape.  Then we routered the edge and sanded the deck surface.  Next up was a fill coat for the deck's glass skin.
Once this sets, we will instal the deck access port, handle and do some gel coat detailing.

Glassing the new SUP deck

In preparation for the boat show we are finishing a new SUP.   The hull decks are are bonded and stringers are being tabbed in.
The deck got a sanding and 6 oz cloth on the underside.
We then trimmed it to fit the hull.  After additional sanding we glassed the top of the deck with .55 oz cloth.


After the epoxy hardens, we will sand with 180 grit and give the top a fill coat of epoxy.

SUP deck trimming

The Sea State SUP has a wood strip deck that sits upon a fiberglass hull.  This is very similar to a modern boats hull deck joint.  The inside of the hull has a flange so there is room for a bead of 3M 5200.
The deck edge extends past the hull by 3/16ths of an inch.  This provides an nice trim appearance as well as giving the rider ability to grip the board easily.
In the first round of classes we scribed this gentle curve on the underside of the deck as we where fitting it.  Then, using a jig saw followed by a sander, we smoothed it out.
To speed up the process and achieve better uniformity, we purchased a "Flush Trim" bit for our router and added an over sized guide bearing (7/8ths).  The bearing rides on the hull surface and guides the bit.
This makes quick work of cutting a uniform edge.  In future classes we will jig saw the edge to about 5/16th and then follow with the router.
Come to the St. Louis Boat Show February 7 - 10 and check out our boards.