Knight Ridder Newspapers

LIVERMORE, Calif. – Surfboards and nukes may seem like unlikely partners, but technology borrowed from nuclear weapons research might save the surfboard industry from a total wipeout.

Scientists at Sandia/California National Laboratories in Livermore hope a specialized foam they developed to protect electronic equipment on weapons from severe impacts and harsh conditions can be used to build surfboards. A few tweaks in the formula could help fill the gaping void left in the surfboard industry by December’s sudden, surprising closure of manufacturer Clark Foam.

Since pioneering modern surfboard manufacturing more than four decades ago, Gordon “Grubby” Clark’s Laguna Niguel, Calif., factory had been producing between 80 and 90 percent of the country’s polyurethane foam “blanks” from which surfboards are shaped.

When polymer chemist LeRoy Whinnery read news reports about Clark calling it quits, he immediately went to his lab and started trying to alter the energy-absorbing TufFoam he had developed for encapsulating nuclear weapons electronics.

“I figured that with my wife being a surfer, this lack of foam could impact us at some point,” said Whinnery, who also surfs occasionally.

Whinnery and metallurgist Steve Goods set about making their foam lighter, to match scraps of Clark Foam they got from a surfboard shaper.

The trick is in the timing of the chemical processes that come together to create the foam. Particularly important is a delicate balance between the “blowing” reaction that gives the foam its airy, meringuelike structure and the “gelling” reaction that solidifies and strengthens the structure, keeping it from collapsing like a failed souffle.

Despite what some environmental activists might consider unseemly roots in nuclear weapons research, Sandia’s TufFoam has an advantage over Clark Foam in that it doesn’t use the toxic, carcinogenic chemical toluene diisocyanate, known as TDI.

“One of the main advantages of this foam is it’s more environmentally friendly than Clark Foam,” Whinnery said.

That appeals to surfer and boardmaker Ben Sparks of BearPaw Surfboards in Oakland, Calif., who also owns a recycling business.

TufFoam’s nuclear origins may not be as much of an obstacle to acceptance in the surfing community as might be expected, said Sparks.

“I actually would see that as a benefit – development through the nuclear program – where taxpayer dollars are funding scientists who are willing to look beyond their military applications,” Sparks said. “I believe many surfers would, as well. We’re a more conservative and professional group than the mainstream Hollywood media would have you believe.”

And TufFoam has history on its side as well. The idea of borrowing military technology is not new to the surfing industry, said San Francisco surfing historian Matt Warshaw, author of the “Encyclopedia of Surfing.”

“World War II gave the surf world a lot of the materials it still uses,” Warshaw said. Surfers have military research to thank for fiberglass, certain resins used to finish boards, and polyurethane foam.

Livermore Police Chief Steve Krull is an avid surfer who wouldn’t have a problem with catching waves aboard nuclear weapons technology. “I wouldn’t mind at all. I live literally across the street from the labs, so that doesn’t bother me,” he said. “There’s room for everybody in this business. It’s just another evolution in the sport.”

Clark Foam blanks are the gold standard in the surfing industry, however; convincing elite surfers to try something new has never been easy. But now they won’t have a choice.

“If they want to surf, they’ll have to get over it,” said Goods.

The abruptness of the Clark Foam closure led to immediate mark-ups at board shops and could spell doom for many small surfboard-shaping shops that depend on Clark’s blanks. But not everyone is lamenting the loss.

“I think it may be the best thing for the industry,” said Ben Bamer of Berkeley Boardsports. He and others in the surfing community felt some of the strong-arm tactics Clark used to protect his virtual monopoly on the industry stifled innovation.

“He really slowed down research and development in the surfboard industry,” Bamer said.

Shapers who used blanks from other sources could find themselves blacklisted at Clark Foam, Warshaw said.

“If Clark cut you off, you could really be in trouble,” said Warshaw. “He was almost like surfing’s robber baron. He really owned that industry.”

That all changed in an instant when Clark walked away from the industry he dominated. A wave of innovations may now follow, said Warshaw.

Sandia is actively looking for business partners and the TufFoam team has even thought of approaching Clark. The lab has filed a patent application for the foam and is considering doing the same for the process of bringing the foam’s density down as well.

The lighter density foam could have other nonweapons applications as well, such as car bumpers or airplane wings, said Scott Vaupen, a business development expert at Sandia. “We invent a lot of technology for national security that has multiple applications.”