The DIY Split "What would you have done different" Thread

[Chewbacca]

My first DYIs were Burton boards with 3D inserts. I got all wound up about the middle inserts, that I went the water jet way. For me it was a big bust. It was a first splitting sowboards for the place, and the cut was far from straight or even.

I got the boards doe, but in future I’m only letting circular table saws to any board of mine. If that means removing inserts firt, fine.

The Palmer I had cut on a table turned out perfect, and cost me about 10 bucks.

[AndyC]

@Berts wrote:

Anyone have a good trick for trimming and removing the overflow of epoxy from the bottom of the board? On my last split I used a razor to chip away followed by a hand grinder with sand paper. It seems to work okay but was hoping there is a better way to get a smooth finish and flush to the Ptex.

A sharp 1″ wood chisel, held flat to the board does a decent job.

[Matt Wood]

@AndyC wrote:

@Berts wrote:

Anyone have a good trick for trimming and removing the overflow of epoxy from the bottom of the board? On my last split I used a razor to chip away followed by a hand grinder with sand paper. It seems to work okay but was hoping there is a better way to get a smooth finish and flush to the Ptex.

A sharp 1″ wood chisel, held flat to the board does a decent job.

I epoxied spacers on a spare trim router and set a flush cut bit to the proper depth to remove epoxy / ptex. Works well, but I still leave it high and let the stone grind flush it up.

[powhound84]

1. Use a thicker straight edge to guide the circular saw. I used a thin metal straight edge and my saw guide rode up over it and made a sloppy cut for a couple inches around upturn of the nose. Ended up having to fill the void with epoxy.

2. Be more careful with the forstner bits. On one of the base holes, the forstner bit grabbed and pulled twice as deep as I wanted. Able to fill with epoxy but would have preferred the proper depth.

3. Line up the nose clip flush with the board. Not sure what I was thinking but I set it about 1/4″ back off the tip. More of an aesthetic issue than functional. Might actually help protect the plastic flip from ice and stuff but I dunno.

4. Line up hardware to check fit after center punching, before drilling. Somehow, the tiny hole that holds the plastic post on the tail clip didn’t line up. I’m not sure if my hand moved when I center punched the hole or what but I will have to drill a hole in the correct spot (right next to it) and fill the current one in with epoxy. At least it was just a surface hole and not one that goes through to the base!

Go that way really fast. If something gets in your way, turn.

Venture Odin Split 164
Spark R&D Arc
Spark R&D Ibex
CSD Simple Skins

Never Summer Raptor Solid 159
Burton Cartel

[Rinch]

I’ve split two boards one a couple of years ago and another one for a friend over the last couple of weeks. Here are some things I’ve learnt.

1. The cut I don’t have a skillsaw and I’m too cheap to pay for a waterjet cut so for number one I borrowed a jigsaw, tried to make a jig which didn’t quite work at the ends and ended up basically cutting by eye. This worked out ok aside from a little bit of “magnetraction”. The problem with the jigsaw is that it’s designed to cut curves so it’s too easy to have a wobble. For number two I used a common or garden fine toothed crosscut saw and cut by eye again (along a line I’d drawn). if you cut steadily and take your time this is fine in my book.

2. Sealing the edge: Used polyurathane varnish both times. Think I had to touch up the older one 2-3 times over two years. No problem.

3. t-nuts: I used the voile kit with t-nuts both times. Works fine except you have to drill pilot holes then use the forstner bit to countersink the t-nuts. If you drill the larger hole before using the forstner bit you’ll end up with the counter sunk holes in the wrong places. Then you’ll drill another hole sort of on top of the last one and have a big mess on your hands.

4. p-tex discs : For the first board i used the p-tex discs and on the second I wondered what would happen if I just half filled the t-nuts with epoxy and filled the rest with p-tex. Answer: when I was sanding I could tell my p-text wasn’t stuck to the epoxy and I had to pull all of the p-text out, chip out the epoxy and do everything again with the discs. Just use the discs.

That’s about it. Good luck!

[mushroom]

I made a similar thread years ago, with some (possibly dated) wisdom summarised in the first post.

Top Tips for DIY Splits

The big one for me is to drill pilot holes first, then use the Forstner or spade bit, then drill the full size hole for the tnut thread. This helps keep them centred and accurate, though contrary to the original voile instructions.

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