The Daring Dawson was my second attempt at a twin tip. I sought to try new techniques and improve on lessons learned. The biggest change between this one and my previous board was using a vacuum bag instead of a wet layup for the glassing.
Specs
- Designation: BPX2 – Daring Dawson
- Length: 140cm
- Width: 45cm
- Thickness: 1/4 inch
- Core: Marine Grade Plywood
- Deck Glass:
- 4oz Warp Glass
- 6oz S-Glass
- Bottom Glass:
- 4oz Warp Glass
- 6oz S-Glass
- + 4oz Warp Glass (error “correction”)
- Resin: Tap Marine Grade Epoxy
- Hardener: Tap Marine Grade Epoxy Slow Hardener
- Paint:
- Acrylic based spray paint
- Soundtrack Highlights:
- Sylvan Esso – What Now
- Jain – Zanaka
- The Coup – Pick a Bigger Weapon
Building the Board
The Daring Dawson used the same template as the Beautiful Ballard. Laying out the board, routing the outline, pouring the rails and inserts all followed more or less the same procedure as my previous board.
For this board, I wanted to try vacuum bagging. For vacuum bagging, you set everything up, seal it in a bag, apply a vacuum and let atmospheric pressure press everything together. Not only does this press together your board and glass but it pushes out the excess epoxy ensuring the optimal amount stays on the board.
Here’s what you need:
- A vacuum pump
- A vinyl sheet for the bag
- Peel Ply
- This keeps your board from sticking to the breather cloth
- Breather Cloth
- This helps the air flow from across the board. If you don’t use it, the vacuum will seal the bag and prevent the vacuum from distributing across the board.
- Bag Stem
- Air tight connector for the bag to the vacuum pump
- Sealing tape
- For this board I used Butyl tape
- Miscellaneous other plumbing that you find useful
Before glassing, I used the vacuum bag setup as part of putting rocker in the board. This helped me understand how the breather cloth functioned to distribute the vacuum. It also let me know that the butyl tape would work to seal the bag.
With a little rocker in the board I went ahead and glassed it. I put down the bottom fiberglass, wet that out, placed the board, then deck glass, wet that out, then peel ply and breather cloth. Sealed it up, applied the vacuum and let that run for the rest of the day.
Photo taken at the start of applying the vacuum. 
Photo after excess epoxy pulled through the Peel-Ply and into the breather cloth.
I let that sit overnight, came in the next morning, took a look at the results. It took some effort to get the Peel-Ply off of the board but once I did I was blown away at how beautiful the deck looked.
The stoke levels were high until I took a look at the other side and realized my colossal mistake.
The bottom was a complete mess. I had thought the vacuum would flatten the bag. On the deck this worked out well, on the bottom, the vinyl bag creased up. These creases led to pockets where the epoxy didn’t adhere at all. The lesson learned was that I needed to seal the bag against a rigid mold.
I chipped out the areas that didn’t adhere, sanded down the board, filled in the pockets with epoxy and decided that I should put another layer of glass on the board. This is where I made the second colossal mistake with this board: I thought I would try painting the board before putting on extra layer of glass.
After seeing how the Beautiful Ballard was chipping, I asked around for advice on how to make paint and fiberglass play nice. The suggestion was to use an acrylic based spray paint and avoid latex based paints. So the Daring Dawson got an acrylic paint job prior to glassing. Also this time around I picked up a paint tent since my last board left a nice yellow hue on the garage floor and just about everything at ground level.
Painting the bottom 
Freshly painted deck 
Adding another layer of glass to the bottom
With the board painted, and the extra layer of glass to seal up the bottom, I added text, gave the board a hotcoat and finished it off with a polish job.
Daring Dawson Haiku 
Daring Dawson at Jetty Docks
There are a couple of chunks torn out of the text. At this point I had not learned to put a patch of fiberglass over the rice paper to protect it or place it under the fiberglass during glassing. In a couple of places an edge floated up and got cut off during sanding.
The Ride
Even with the extra layer of glass on the Daring Dawson it was lighter than my first board. I took it out to Double Bluff on Whidbey Island for it’s inaugural ride. It rode fine, still a bit low rocker for the chop at DB but definitely an easier ride than my first board. Also, I didn’t lose a footpad this time around after learning the value of Loctite!
After my second session with the Dawson, I was showing it off to my friend Mario in the parking lot. He noticed a little bit of delamination in the board. At the end of my next session it became clear that much of the bottom was delaminating. Using spray paint between the layers of fiberglass turned out to be a huge mistake. From doing some more research I found that a lot of board builders shy away from spray paint in general.
The board sat on my workbench for weeks afterwards while I decided what to do with the patient. I knew that what was wrong was wrong throughout the board so it seemed the only reasonable thing to do if I wanted to make the board rideable again would be to sand it down completely and reglass at least the bottom. I eventually decided the patient couldn’t be saved and I should take what I learned and move on.
About Matt Dawson
If you’re involved with water sports in the Seattle area, chances are you’ve met Matt Dawson. He’s the manager at Urban Surf and is responsible for outfitting, helping out and getting the stoke started in so many people in the Pacific Northwest. When I finally decided to take the plunge into kiteboarding, I gave Urban Surf a call to sign up for lessons and Matt was the first person I talked to on this great adventure.
He, and the folks at Urban Surf, have always been so incredibly helpful that goes far beyond gearing me up. They’ve given me advice on locations, weather, local restaurants and so much more. Matt taught my ground school which was my first big step in learning to kite and opened my eyes to sensing the wind.
One day when I was frustrated with my progress and blaming my gear, I headed over to Urban Surf determined to buy a better harness. After griping to Matt, he talked me down and encouraged me to practice more before buying new equipment. I told him he talked me out of buying a new harness and he told me, “Good because I wasn’t going to sell you one anyway.” I knew at that point that the folks at Urban Surf are looking out for me. They’ve never tried to up-sell me on anything I didn’t need and in fact have often suggested cheaper alternatives. It’s my first stop when looking for gear.
In the shop, on the beach and wherever we’ve met, Matt has treated me like family. I was happy to gift him the board I made in his honor. Even though it’s not really rideable, I thought it might be a nice thing for him to hang on his wall. Which, to my knowledge, is where it lives today.