California carpenter produces the worldÂ’s first eco-friendly, high-performance balsa surfboards

Flying A Surfboards Movie

(LosAngeles.CityRegions.Com, September 24, 2014 ) Carpinteria, CA - Joshua Milne has come up with the best of both worlds when it comes to surfing. His new Flying A Surfboards not only perform better than typical boards but are also eco-friendly, made from nature’s own balsa wood.

“This will be the first surfboard shop to make eco-friendly, state-of-the art, high-performance balsa surfboards,” said Milne, a 43-year-old carpenter and surfing enthusiast. “I want to create a local small industry that will help to make the entire local economy thrive.”

Milne is the first to admit that the concept of a hollow balsa wood surfboard is not new. “Balsa surfboards have been made in California since the 1940s,” he said. “A man named Tom Blake invented the hollow wooden surfboard. His boards used World War I airplane wing construction techniques to create a light and hydrodynamic shell that was suitable for surfing.”

Milne took this basic technique, tweaked the design and used computer-aided drafting, along with modern tools, to develop a high-tech surfboard that weighs just six pounds. The name “Flying A” comes from those World War I fighter planes.

Christian Beamish of Deep magazine, a renowned surfing writer, noted that “the wood has a softer feel in the water than foam and fiberglass, yet it has good buoyancy. Milne’s boards have a particular flex pattern that is both forgiving and responsive.”

Paul Anderson of The Inertia, another well-known surfing journalist, wrote that Milne is “producing exciting results for the future of surfboard technology.”

Now that he has perfected the design, Milne is looking to ramp up production so he can reduce prices. He needs $11,500 to upgrade his shop.

The money will be used for an air filtration unit, a CNC router, a 12-inch table saw, better tools and a bulk purchase of balsa wood as well as an advertising campaign. In order to raise this start-up capital, he has launched a Kickstarter campaign, which can be viewed at the Kickstarter site.

Milne is counting on surfing enthusiasts from all over the world to support this project. Donations of any amount are welcome.

For $25, backers will receive a Flying A Surfboard T-shirt that reads “Wooden Surfboard Revolution.” A $900 pledge is good for a custom-made surfboard.

“Making custom high-performance balsa wood surfboards is a labor-intensive process,” Milne said. “I’m looking to upgrade my shop with a computer-controlled CNC router which will ease the most difficult parts of the process.”

For additional information, visit www.kickstarter.com/projects/437129222/flying-a-surfboards-high-performance-balsa-surfboa; the Flying A Surfboard website, www.flyingasurfboards.blogspot.com; or the Flying A Facebook page, www.facebook.com/pages/Flying-A-Surfboards/1383214075248551?ref=hl.

Milne can be reached directly at sbsurfguru@gmail.com.

Flying A Surfboards

Joshua Milne

805-617-8916

sbsurfguru@gmail.com

Source: EmailWire.Com