Surfboard softened

[Maztrix]

Hey guys,
Pulled out my old Maurice Cole from storage the other day (probably 15ish) years old. The glass/foam has become really soft and can be dented just with finger pressure. What’s the go with this? Why does this happen? I assume it’s a non recoverable situation?

[oldmansurfer]

there are a few things that can cause the deterioration of foam, but what seems most likely to me would be water in the foam from back before you stored it. If there are only spots of it you might be able to cut away the glass and scoop out the damaged foam fill it in and reglass the spots, might not be worth it. If the foam still looks good you might be able to drill some holes and let the water drain out. If you hadn't been storing it for 15 years then that would be the thing to do.

[waikikikichan]

Pulled out my old Maurice Cole from storage the other day (probably 15ish) years old.

The biggest surfboard blank manufacturer, Clark foam, went out of business in December 2005. Shapers after that scrambled to find new blank manufacturers from all over the world to fill their orders. Of course, some came out of China, that were terrible.

Now things have settled down, but 15 years ago, it was quite chaotic. Not saying your board plank was from China, who knows were the blank was sourced from.

[jaffa1949]

If your Maurice Cole boards were made by him in Australia, likely blanks could have been Dion, made by Bennetts. or Farrelly Blanks the older foams tended to to go brown and crumbly if exposed to UV light in sunlight. Long soaked salt also corroded the grain of the blanks.