There is nothing I hate more than a filthy board that’s caked with 6 months worth of oil and petrochemicals transferred from the parking lot to your feet to your wax job. Yuk. Usually there are some cool bits of hair and sand jammed in there too. In fact, I hate it so much that I have become a machine board cleaner and know every trick in the book for getting your board all sparkly white. Read on…

1. Wax Combs
Don’t even bother trying to clean your board without one. I once used a mini-ruler from my Spider Man stationary set as a wax comb and not only could no longer see Spider Man or rule straight lines, it took me about three hours to do the job. Combs come in a myriad of shapes, sizes and colors. Get one that’s nice and thick so you can get a good grip, otherwise the comb part jabs you in the palm, which is not so nice. When your wax comb looks like it’s covered in melted candle wax and is actually so gross you’re considering tossing it, boil some water and let it cool off a bit. Then toss in the comb and let the wax soften. You’ll be able to rub most of it off with a cloth, and it will live to clean another board, and you can spend that $5 on a beer instead.

2. Shavings
Go to your shaper and get a plastic bag full of foam shavings from his shaping room. This shit is the bomb! Leave your board in the sun for 5–10 minutes, scrape off the majority of the wax with your chunky comb, then take handfuls of this magic white powder (no not that magic white powder) and smear it all over your board. It sticks to all the residual wax that you can’t see and gets into the dimpled hollows that the wax comb can’t. Rub it with a cloth to really get it working! You will be amazed, rub-a-dub-dub!

3. Thinners
For the ultimate cleaning, get your paws on a bottle of Thinners. Dab it onto a cloth and rub where you see spots of wax, it also gets rid of grubby marks from your hands on the rails and if you breathe deeply you’ll enjoy it ever the more. Ha. Jokes, don’t do that or you will wind up passed out on your board and will have a massive forehead shaped ding that you won’t be able to explain to anyone. Also, don’t go and use Turpentine or Methylated Spirits by accident, make sure the label says Thinners or Laquer Thinners. If you use the other stuff your paint job will come right off if it is on top of the glassing and you’ll do some freaky chemical damage to your glassing.

To end off, don’t be a cheapskate and use old dirty wax covered in sand and car boot fluff to re-wax. Treat your board to a nice new bar of coconut wax. It deserves it, don’t you think?

Tags: Surfing