eco-friendly wax?

And........???????

Mine turned out to be as slippery as Crisco.

I picked up some of the Matunas 100% natural biodegradable hippie wax at the San Diego Sacred Craft Surf Expo. I was expecting the stuff to be so so but in fact this wax is great! A friend was riding one of my boards and even commented on how sticky the wax was. When I waxed up my brand new board the base coat took some love to get going but it turned out great. The top coat goes on nice and is super sticky. check it out http://www.matunasco.com/

Crisco! LMAO! Man, you must have messed up real good!

Maybe you use a wrong ingredient? Or maybe the wrong wax for your use environment?

First time we made it we didn't know what to expect and it took a little getting used to in the application department. It doesn't work the same way as regular wax and if you try to put it on that thick it will take work. But it rode great! My wife historically has problems with grip using traditional waxes, all but the very stickiest. She loves this stuff.

Did you use pure extra virgin coconut oil? And pure raw (unprocessed, unbleached) beeswax (the stuff with beeslegs and stuff in it)? I found both very important. And if you are making cool or cold water wax I highly recommend using freshly harvested sap, rather than the dried stuff. The hardest time I had making the cool/cold water stuff was with the commercial dried sap. If you have to buy the dried stuff buy rosin used for violins and stuff. It's a poor second to fresh sap, IMO, but better than "dried sap".

We were impressed enough with it that I tried selling it on eBay. And sold hundreds of lots! The cost:profit ratio wasn't high enough to keep doing it that way on eBay tho. If I was selling in bulk at that price it would be a different story. I still get follow-up enquiries via email regularly and recently sold a batch of fifty bars to a repeat customer in WA.

Oh yeah, all waxes are flammable when molten and very, very hot. Take my word for it - they burn! So avoid open flames, handle carefully (thick gloves are a good idea) and have cold running water nearby.

And have fun!

Awesome! I was one of the guys chatting to Roy in that original thread, but never got around to making any. Still have my bees so wax is available. Of course I'm in tropical waters over here in HI. Anyone try making a warm water version yet? My board is getting slippery and I'd so much rather start making my own already!

Quote:Crisco! LMAO! Man, you must have messed up real good!

Maybe you use a wrong ingredient? Or maybe the wrong wax for your use environment?

Beeswax and virgin Tahitian coconut oil. My previous post explains it. I do prefer the hardest bumpiest wax on the market though and find the local favs sticky bumps and sex wax slippery too. I'm just a Bubble Gum man. I'm still open to the idea though.

wetsand makes ans sells eco-friendly wax

I'm not sure what double boiler is but I assume it's two pot's with water in between. We use it already because of more even heat distribution and supposedly reduced risk of fire. I've tried to melt the resin in normal pot too, but it just turns hard and smelly. I'll try using fresh sap next.

I guess in terms of eco - and other friendliness, it should be tough to beat the roy stewart idea of custom made surfwax using locally available, bike-transportable ingredients or getting surfwax shipped ( as in "really shipped", involving low energy - water transport) by someone custom making it.
the next step in the eco - direction could be to melt the ingredients inside a charcoal - dust blackened recycling cardboard box covered with glass. That will be my project for next years first really hot summerday. I hope the stuff will get hot enough to combine fully and from all i hear, it is most important to melt the wax first and resolve all of the resin before finally putting in the oil.
In music you would call it an ecowaxissimo.

cheers - d.

This is what I have, found it on another site...
Organic Surf Wax

Here are the ingredients:
• Beeswax
• Coconut Oil
• Tree Resin (cool water wax only)

For Sticky Warm Water Surf Wax :
You need only two ingredients, the Beeswax and the Coconut oil. That's it (talk about simple). With this recipe you don't have to worry about the scent as it will smell really nice already.

All you do is mix 2250g of beeswax with 750ml of coconut oil. First melt the wax, then warm the oil and stir into the wax. Stir well, stir some more and then stir(get the idea!). Pour into Paper cups and let it set.
There is a temptation to use other vegetable oils. Don't bother. Coconut is the one.

For Sticky Cool Water Surf Wax :
The mixture now is 3 parts Beeswax, 1 part coconut oil and 1 part tree resin. Make in the same way adding the beeswax coconut oil and tree resin together and stirring well.
(Tree resin can be bought in the form of granulated incense (as used by the Catholic Church) but can work out to be quite expensive - i.e. buy wax from a shop and save money - but can also be taken at the source - i.e. straight from the tree.

Hey Jar - as I was part of the original discussion, I was able to pull up the original thread in a jiffy. Here you go:
http://www.swaylocks.com/...t_reply;so=ASC;mh=25;
I've since found a source of coconut oil, and found out how to make it myself as well from local coconuts. So, have beeswax, have
coconut oil, don't have a lot of pine trees for sap over here.... I'm very interested in how yours comes out. Super tempted to buy some
of the Matunas brand (marketed as Greensurf through Wetsand.com) wax to solve the interim. There's a couple of other things that I
want to order from Wetsand anyway, so feel less guilty about ordering eco wax just to have it flown here.... Definitely want to start making
my own though. I'll have to go look at that post again myself. I have a whole potful of beeswax just sitting in my double boiler waiting to
be melted....

Edit - dannyj - was just reading that original thread and we mentioned propolis there too. Not sure if we ever sussed out if it would work
instead of the tree sap. Upside for me though - apparently I won't need the tree sap over here anyway, avg. water temps around 72 F, warmer
in the summer....

No worries, Jar. I remembered exactly where we put it. ;) I'll have to kick my own okole here and try making some of that wax finally. Keep reminding me.
Trying madly to finish my own little cabin first, but for sure I'll have a little 'hut' (or some variation) with a couch in it. Or at least a futon....
What's your new destination / living location?

PM right back at you Jar. Bummed they zapped Roy's post. I wanted to check it out again today. I know he has his issues, but there was nothing offensive in that post....

A few years ago, I too experimented with homemade wax using bees wax (the two sorts : the white purified one and the yellow unfiltered one). Coconut trees are hard to find in France but I found out that coconut oil was very cheap and available in any grocery store under the name "Vegetaline". Vegetaline is in fact hydrogenated coconut oil and it's widly used as a frying oil (not very healthy though). I used sillicon muffin molds to cast the wax.

I remember I had good results but the wax was too hard for the french water temp. However it was very good as a base coat wax. I still have plenty of bees wax left, maybe I'll try again if I can find some tree resin or any other way to make the wax stickier.

jar, if you are coming to NC, which i think you have mentioned there are tons of long needle pines around.

Good stuff guys.

I expect to see plenty of updates on this thread in time to come :D

Surfed on just pure beeswax today and wiped out on almost every wave that offered a lip to whack. Ate it on a few bottom turns too. I caught one set wave and my friend was on the shoulder pretending to try to drop in while the wave offered up a perfect opportunity to spray him. I hit the lip and was bringing the board around when my back foot slipped off and I went skipping and rag dolling. My friend was completely cracking up and said I looked like a leaf blowing in the wind.

Next up is to strip the wax and re wax with regular wax. I'll add coconut oil at a latter date.

Does anyone know where i can find a relatively cheap source for pine resin....the very few places that i found online were deadends.

Mahalo,
Ryan Edwards

James townsen and sons brewer's pitch goes for $12/lb

Quote:
Does anyone know where i can find a relatively cheap source for pine resin....the very few places that i found online were deadends.

Mahalo,
Ryan Edwards