If you have seen or ridden any of Bustin’s new boards, you probably noticed the new Thermoglass/ThermoCarbon construction. Concrete Wave asked Ryan Daughtridge, founder and president of Bustin Boards, to tell us more about their new ThermoGlass and ThermoCarbon construction process.
What’s the idea behind this new construction?
Our goal was to create a process that can be done here in the USA. A process that would allow us to produce a lighter, longer lasting board with more precise flex patterns and rigidity while sticking to materials, compounds
and formulae that don’t hurt our employees or our environment.
How exactly does it work?
We take 3 or 4 plys of choice Great Lakes Maple, by sustainable harvesting methods, and soak them in a proprietary thermo-active formula that is the magic behind these boards. Later, under heat and pressure, this formula will expand and absorb throughout the layers, taking the place of any glue or resin that would otherwise be needed.
From here, we individually layup the panels with several layers of a fiberglass or carbon fiber cloth so that each board gets equal pressure, equal heat, and equal perfection. Now the sandwich is stacked and ready for the super press. The wood and fiberglass/carbon layers meld together so intensely that the new product is neither wood nor composite. The trimming process is next and is like a standard CNC process other than the specially developed carbide bit to handle the rock-hard ThermoGlass or ThermoCarbon composite that is created.
How is this eco-friendly?
The beauty of this process is that it uses no glue or resin and is, at least, partially recyclable. Any of these boards can be melted down to liquid form and then the material can be separated. The thermo-active formula can then be re-used for more skateboards and the wood can be broken down and recycled as pulp.
What does it all mean for the boards that feature this technology?
Similar to varying formula used in wheel urethane, the thermo-active formula that we use is really where the magic of each board happens. We essentially create a special formula for each board depending on what we want it to do. The fiberglass and/or carbon fiber layers help create stiffness and/or flex properties, but it is the formula interacting with the layers that dictates how each board feels. For our stiffer, race-ready, boards we dialed it to be very, very stiff both longitudinally and torsionally, while for some of our freestyle and push specific boards, we dialed it to be more lively, creating flex and/or pop depending on the board.