Heresy Bushfire Fundraiser (+ Austria Launch)

Heresy had intended to hold our Austrian company launch + environmental fundraiser (for a local enviro cause) in Fiss on February 21st @ Dorfstadl, but the local crew, after seeing the horrible destruction as a result of the Victorian bushfires, asked that we make this a fundraiser for the RSPCA and Red Cross and we thought that was an amazing idea.

I am constantly amazed at our community; they take Heresy and it's ideals and add to it and help it be better and grow and truly make a difference. It is truly humbling.

If anyone you know is in the Fiss area around 20-22 Feb, please shoot them the Facebook event or send this post to them.

The flier is below. You are free to download it and distribute it. The photos are not ours but we have attributed credit on the flyer (sorry photogs, it's for a good cause).

The ongoing scenes from the affected communities are truly heartbreaking but the subsequent sense of grit and determination in those communities has made me proud to be part of not just humanity but especially proud to be Australian. Seeing the victims - some whom have lost daughters, sons, wives, husbands, parents - grieve publicly without shame, then grit their teeth, set their jaws, shoulders and backs firm with resolve to do what needs to be done, truly shows what being Australian and human is all about. Rising above adversity and pain to raise the sun on a better and brighter day. It is moments like this that for me despair is banished and hope springs eternal.

No-one is untouched by this and our hearts have broken as we have watched and felt your loss on the news, in the papers, on the net, or in person as our fellow volunteers, Army, police, SES, fire and ambulance crews have helped ease the burden. Know that we are all hoping and praying for your speedy recovery.

To all the international community, Australia thanks you for all your messages of heartfelt support.

If you can, your support is needed.

Thanks for reading.

Tim | Founder Heresy

Photos from Heresy Crew in Canada/US

Some of our Heresy peeps are in the Canada and the US and sent us these rad photos from I think Sun Peaks BC and Sunshine Village in Alberta (bottom two shots). Jase is riding a Heresy 156 Mirror Twin. Jase just emailed us this feedback.

Been riding the Mirror 156 on all kinds of terrain over the past few weeks from powder days in Sun peaks and Sunshine Village to laps through the park in Mammoth.

Overall been stoked with the board... super stable at speed, floats nicely through the pow, poppy and most importantly fun to ride.

These photos got Jase a discount for life. You want the same thing? Get similar photos with Heresy in the photo, send them in, and you get a discount. For life.

Even though I think Jase looks decidedly Wookiee-esque (see below: Related? You be the judge) in this shot, I still dig his steeze.

By the way, that is a sick tail block at the bottom - and I don't care if you disagree. Like AirBlaster says, if you don't tweak, your sh!t's weak. I can pretty much say Jase got hooted out then high fived his homies after this totally amazing block. Look how much fun he's having. Fun, fun, fun.

tim | heresy

-987,534 Wookiees agree: Jase's tail blocks are rad.

Product Drop: Limited Ed Colours, new prints

Ho, ho, ho! Like some sort of awesome Santa, we're dropping stuff all about the place.

Now, we were looking back at some of our early stuff, which really was pretty rubbish (we didn't realise it at the time, promise!). It's funny how you grow as a company, and many of those on our mailing list have watched this from the start (I see a few of them who have been with us since we started in May 2002).

But we're very stoked on our new stuff, we think it's getting better and better and the feedback we're getting from our sales crew and from emails seems to agree.

Anyway, here we go - most of our stuff will be running in predominantly unisex sizing - after speaking with our female crew, they tell us that girls stuff slightly loose is hot this summer - plus we think girls look crazy good in slightly loose tees and singlets - just ask the kids over at Hayley Mei.

First up we have Roots. This design, Heresy loves it. It's from one of our designers over at Messy Design. It really does speak to what we're all about, not just as snowboarders, but as humans. It symbolises the symbiotic relationship we have with everything around us. No Earth = no humans. We have to look after this planet, really we do. We've run this on unisex tees and singlets (down to small for ladies), and a girls-only cap tee.



Next up we have Shark/Amaze. As previously posted about shark finning
, we think it's very lame - in fact it's fricking shaky what goes on - so we want to help stop it. This beautiful artwork from Messy Design once again (love you long time Jase) is designed to make people look twice. Maybe you can explain why shark finning is so wrong (you know, sharks being finned and thrown back to drown or be fed on alive ... that old chestnut).

Next we have Snowboarder. I like this one because the message is simple but the implementation requires you to look twice and decipher it...."WHAT does that SAY?". It's pretty strong too, "I'm a snowboarder." Says a lot by not saying much. We're going to run this on some other stuff too, but we wanted some bright stuff now for the southern hemi summer and bright for the northern winter to cheer you all up. We printed this low as it's a bit different and keeps the chest pretty clean. The stripey singlets we did this on look rad - we will post some photos in the next few days.

Below we have 'Heresy, J'adore' - thanks to Kat for this art. This is for girls only. We love it.

Keep an eye out on the store for these soon.

-tim|heresy

2009 Boards

Hey crew, well we are pretty stoked out on the 2009 boards. We're keeping the range tight and using the unnnbelievable talents of our Collab peeps - this is the kick off of our long dreamed-of Art Incubator (more on that later).

Both these designs have the brand ethic (and what we believe in) intrinsically woven into the design.

All boards are rocking 1 year manufacturing defect warranties, sintered 7500 bases, triax top sheets, rockwell 48 edges, our sweet timber sidewalls...why is timber so rad? POP! SNAP! CRRRRACKLE!....therefore more awesome. And we've got banana boards this year, but we're calling it Smile. Why? Because when you're floating that nana on some pow and spinning a two-seven onto that box, you're going to SMILE.

Developed in collaboration with Messy Design, the Amaze celebrates the amazing creature that is the shark. Scary? - yes. Amazing? - YES! We're killing this being at a rate of around 200 million PER YEAR...and why? For sustainable feeding of humans? Oh no. These animals are being pulled into boats, having their fins cut off and being thrown back into the sea; where they sink the bottom - unable to swim - and drown and/or are fed upon by other fish. Sounds fantastic.


You check out more about this at Sharkwater.com.
Watch the trailer below.


Heresy is pretty intent on helping reduce stupid, ridiculous carry on like this, so 5% of ALL sales of these boards are going to Sharkwater, so Rob and the crew can keep working toward protecting these beautiful beasts.

Seriously, I LOVE this board. Even though I am pretty not-stoked of sharks when I'm surfing, they don't need to be slaughtered. I have to throw down some serious props to Messy Design on this one, those guys have some unreal chops and design skills to pay the bills. Thanks Messy girls and boys, we love you long time. Sharks love you long time too.

Sharky (not Fergal), is coming in a 146, 153, 156, 159, and longer by order (drop ship 2 week turnaround). Bananas are by order only, and we can custom-make the board and tweak it so you can get some serious tweakage off sweet jumps.

The second board, which we've called We Love This Earth...what can we say? Kat has done a RAD job on this one. We all love this Earth, right? ... RIGHT? It's the only one we at Heresy know about, and we're pretty much in love with this planet, and don't really want to see it chopped up, so 5% - in addition to our 1% For the Planet commitment - is going to Greening Australia for carbon abatement and biodiversity programs.



WLTE is mainly for the chicas, but I personally will be rocking one. These come in 146, 149, 153 and we might have a few 156s floating around.

So there you have it crew. Buy one of these collector's editions, help save the sharks and save the world, and we're going to throw in a free tee for whichever one you get.


These boards will probably fly, and will be a collector's item, and will certainly be in our exhibition (more on that on another day), so keep your eye on here, and on the store, for their release around Jan 2009. We'll actually have a few in a fortnight, so if you're interested, drop us an email to see if you can snaffle one.

Drop us your comments and feedback, and if you subscribe to our mailing list, we're known for offering specials to our mailing list.

Australian Ski Fields under threat

Now, I don't know about you guys, but this report from theage.com.au is frightening.

No Australian ski season by 2100.

"So what, Heresy Dude. That's 92 years." Or, "So what, that's just Australia."

Let's take a step back here. Firstly, this doesn't just affect the Australian snow season. The global environment is a closed system with a lot of positive feedback that doesn't respect borders.

Down here in Australia, we're pretty marginal already given the nature of our precipitation events, the temperature of precipitation and our generally low alpine elevations. We're not the only ones though. Switzerland, Austria, Germany and others are next in the gun barrel. I don't know about you, but I want to see my kids skiing and boarding and experiencing the miracle of snow-sliding.

I'm seeing more and more daily reports of this nature.

Ok, some think this is rubbish. It's a conspiracy. Or, just a natural warming period.
More and more organisations - industry and NGO and GO (NASA for instance) alike - say we're having a devastating effect.

I have two issues with the conspiracy/skeptic theory.

1. What if that theory is wrong? What if human-induced warming is a reality, and we do nothing? I'd much rather do something and be wrong. What's the worst that can happen then? Investment in solar, geo-thermal, clean nuclear. New jobs. Less carbon-pollution. Less cars on road. More trees planted to offset carbon from flights whilst chasing the snow. Hmmm, doesn't seem so bad.

2. See the graph below [1] - you can see clear increases in temperature, with accelerated gradients as we industrialise (I mean, REALLY industrialise). Seems pretty clear-cut to us at Heresy. C02 levels have a lag in the environment, meaning


Now, with all this, it's really easy to feel helpless, however, grassroots programs and support for change is growing. You've got Protect Our Winters, 1% For the Planet concentrating on snow, and many, many others, driving grassroots awareness of this issue. Here at Heresy, we've joined 1% For the Planet and continue to put our money where our mouth is (we're at 4% of sales to 1% FTP program so far) on this issue.

So. Where do you stand? What will you do.

Money where our mouth is: that's how we roll.

[1] Giss, NASA - http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 4

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 4
This is part 4 in our series showing how to make a snowboard from start to finish.

In Part 1 we learned about the printing of the base and topsheet graphic and the transfer onto the actual base and topsheet material.

In Part 2 we cut the base in preparation for the next steps - attaching the rails and cutting the core and attaching the sidewalls.

In Part 3 we attached the rails (step 4) and prepped the core with the inserts, tipfill and attached the sidewalls (step 5).

In part 4, we'll cut the fibre glass, prepare the topsheet and see how the board is actually layed up - the guts of the board that goes together to create the magic!

Step 6: Cutting the fibreglass
Here we cut two lengths of triaxial fibreglass for use above and below the core.  Triaxial glass is stiffer than biaxial and gives better edge hold and flex performance.  Two sheets of glass offer a good compromise between absolute indestructibility of say 4 layers (with hugely increased weight and stiffness), and the softness of 2 layers of biax (very soft).  We'll be looking at introducing quadrax very soon in some incarnation to slightly increase the stiffness of some of our boards.  Currently Heresy uses carbon stringers in some boards to add stiffness, but this also adds weight.


Step 7: Prepping the Topsheet
In this step, we take the printed topsheet, and apply a layer of thick masking tape to it as a protector from scratches in the press.  The heat in the press will not affect the topsheet now that through the transfer process it has permanently taken on the print.


Step 8: Layup
Although all the work up until now has been fun, and important, this is where we have to pay really careful attention.

This step must be completed efficiently, accurately and quickly.  The resin used when activated, starts warming up by dint of a chemical reaction, and we must get the board layed up and into the press reasonably quickly.  So, let's see what happens inside the board!

First we can see the mold base.  This is cleaned before every press to ensure freedom from foreign particles and residue from the last press.

First up, we put the base+rails in, applying a layer of resin.

We then apply the vibration dampening foils.  These are applied along the contact edges and under the bindings, to help reduce vibration through the board.


Next, we lay up our first layer of fibreglass, pouring some more resin on, and spreading evenly, ensuring the glass soaks the resin up equally to ensure an even distribution in bonding throughout the board and a uniform flex characteristic.


Next, the core is layed up, with a dash of resin applied.

We apply another layer of fibreglass and resin, again making sure we coat the glass with resin equally.

Lastly, we lay down the topsheet.

The board is now ready for pressing and curing which is part 5 of our series, so stay tuned and check in for the next series.  You can always subscribe to the blog feed to ensure you get the latest info to your RSS reader.

Someone asked in the last part if we would show the core creation.  This is done external to the factory, but involves sections of poplar and beech which are then milled according to the board shape we want.  So, generally speaking, we maintain cores for specific board lengths, but can alter them slightly, i.e. make a 163 wider for power, without affecting the performance or structural integrity.

In the meantime, you can check the boards out at our online store.

Technorati Tags: How to make a snowboard, Heresy Snowboards, Heresy Snowboarding, Snowboard Construction

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 3

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 3
This is part 3 in our series showing how to make a snowboard from start to finish.

In Part 1 we learned about the printing of the base and topsheet graphic and the transfer onto the actual base and topsheet material.

In Part 2 we cut the base in preparation for the next steps - attaching the rails (step 4) and cutting the core and attaching the sidewalls (step 5).

Now we're ready to attach the rails to the base and get the core ready.

Step 4: Attaching the rails
The rails are shaped and formed according to the shape of the board we are making. It is therefore possible to have many different rail shapes in the factory, but sometimes we can re-shape one shape to fit another mold.

Below we can see some rails hanging up in preparation for use.

As our boards are handmade, great attention to detail is paid to ensure the highest quality boards. Attaching the rail is a crucial part of the process, where we need to ensure the rail is as flush as possible to the edge of the base material (Sintered 7500 for 2008). The edges are Rockwell 48 steel. Basically, we attach them flush to the base, using small amounts of an adhesive to hold it in place in preparation for the press.


Below we can see an almost-complete base, ready for layup.


Step 5: Prepping the Core
In this step we take our milled core, which is made specifically for a board length and shape, and is a full wood core. We attach our sidewalls (more timber, MUCH better memory and flex characteristics than ABS sidewalls, and significantly lighter) and extend the tips, recycling some offcut base material.

In the step below, the sidewalls are being glued on.

Here, the tip fill is attached.

And here we can see Tim and Sean have had some Dr Pepper and gone sugar crazy by personalising this board. This board ending going up to someone in Western Australia. This is how personalised we get with the boards. We really care about the little things.


In Part 4, we will be checking out the fibreglass prep and the layup process, so stay tuned. In the meantime, you can check the boards out at our online store, where they will be on sale very shortly (we're about to announce a special sale).

Sea Ice Levels

Those guys over at News Weekly make me mad. In their August 30 issue, they wrote an article implying that the Climate was Cooling. The way this article was written was intellectually dishonest, so much so, that I was compelled to write a response, which you can read below.

Sir,
regarding your cover story Aug 30, 2008, titled "Global Cooling?".

Regardless of the existence of AGW or non-AGW, your front cover illustration, and the implied conclusion of cooling, is misleading and potentially intellectually dishonest.

Despite the fact that this year in fact now looks like presenting the lowest Arctic sea ice levels for many years (and worse than last year's record low), you simply cannot take a 2 year sample and declare a trend, without considering previous years data. If I have a dataset of 20 (or 50, or whatever) years, showing a steady decline in a metric, year on year, but then have one year that increases, it is dishonest to now claim that the trend has finished, and even worse, has swung in the opposite direction, simply because of an non-trend datum point. This is analogous to claiming a reversal in share market trend from one data set - clearly erroneous statistically.

Further, I find your narrow concentration on sunspot activity - which many scientists agree has little effect on this GW cycle (and some think do have an effect) - also misleading as many other factors disprove your theory.

Although I concede your right to present quotes and facts that strengthen your desired position, it is also dishonest not include dissenting opinion in order to allow the reader to reach an opinion based on all the facts. For every climate change sceptic you present, I could probably present ten well credentialled CC supporters.

Whilst I acknowledge your alignment in such issues as generally being to the Right, surely such an important topic deserves balanced and considered discussion and scientific debate, without the use of such terms as "bandwagon" and so on. It is simple not right to focus solely on narrow presentation of facts that agree with your desired outcome - that is poor science.

Moreover, I think you would do well to consider the cost of the Iraq conflict and the mooted cost of the Wall St bailout (some US$700 billion and counting), and ask whether that money would be better spent in lifting many people out of entrenched poverty, rather than socialising the capital market's losses - I think linking the world's poor to the costs associated with lowering CO2 emissions is a long bow to draw, and also intellectually base. Emphasis on cheap fuel is also counter-productive to ensuring we have adequate oil for many years to come as well as reducing our use of fossil fuels to power today's society.

I think you also fail to consider the strong benefits in encouraging a low CO2 economy; innovation will blossom as companies find ways of meeting required standards, and new industry (and thus jobs) will spring up overnight. Your arguments are reminiscent of the US coal industry when forced to improve their emission standards - they cried foul claiming widespread job losses and business failure. Instead, as they were forced to innovate, their profitability increased and more jobs across the sector were created. Surely a positive outcome.

Yours,
Tim Marsh

Whether you agree with GW or AGW or not, clearly the article was misleading in its nature. Boy oh boy.

You can go read this article by The Daily Green or this one by Tree Hugger which both contain data and images from scientific organisations which clearly refute the News Weekly's assertions and implications.

How these people get away with this is maddening. As I say in the letter, regardless of whether you believe in AGW or not, from a scientific empirical basis, not to mention from a mathematics/statistics basis, their article was poor form.

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 2

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 2
This is part 2 in our series showing how to make a snowboard from start to finish.

So, we have printed and created our base and topsheet, and cured them, in Part 1, and now we are ready to cut our bases in order to lay them up with rails.

Step 3: Cutting Base
Here you can see the cured base is layed up on the shape of the board. This shape matches the mold template outline.

The base + jig/guide are placed in a cutting bay, and secured in place. We use a router to cut the shape.
Before commencing cutting this, we would do well to remember to have a sip of Dr Pepper.



Here we can see we have nearly finished.

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 1

How to Make a Snowboard - Part 1

We've promised we'd put up a tour of our factory showing how our boards are made for some time, so, here it is; enjoy! We'll bring this to you over about 8 parts. We include the whole process include how to prepare the snowboard print, prepare the core, shape the snowboard, press, and finally finish the board including shaping the sidewalls and grinding the base.

In these photos you will see yours truly in red, and my man Sean in white. He's super-radical and I took him to Rock the Bells 2007 where we saw Rage Against the Machine, Wu Tang, Public Enemy, Mos Def and Cypress Hill amongst others. He was shocked.

So, here we go, Part 1: Print of, & Base/Topsheet creation.

Step 1: Base and Topsheet Print
In this step, we are printing the transfer for the base and topsheet graphic. This is printed on a large form factor printer in CMYK. Although the colours don't look rich upon exit from printer, this is not a cause for concern; the colours take a deep hue on transfer. To get to this point, we have designed the artwork in Adobe Illustrator (or Photoshop, or even something like Corel), to produce a file for the printer.



The finished topsheet print and base print.

That was easy eh? We now move on to the fun parts. At this point, I like to have a sip on my delicious Doctor Pepper beverage and sigh in excitement. "Why?" you ask? Because making snowboards is ace.

Step 2: Prepping, Printing and Curing the base and topsheet
After sipping from my crazy-ounced Dr Pepper, we begin prepping the topsheets and bases. Let's shorten base and topsheet to B&T which sounds suspiciously delicious (perhaps Bacon and Tomatoe, sandwich, but is really beetroot and tomatoe as I don't dig on pig so much).

Here we go laying out a length of the ISO topsheet.

Cutting, cutting.

Here, we have printed the base. Our boards use a combination of sublimation-only and sub+diecut. We have not shown the diecut process here, but basically we print the base in the same manner, but using a die, cut the shape out and replace it with an equivalent shape from a different colour - go and check out our boards to see the effect.

Here, we can see the base, laid flat, and the metal plate is a thick aluminium plate to help the base cool uniformly and in a flat manner. This helps prevent uneven cooling and thus a change in the integrity of the material.

Below we can see a printed topsheet; the sheet now has excellent saturation.

After the topsheet or base has cooled for the requisite time, we transfer it into this hi-tech holder!

So there you go, so far, we have:
-printed the base and topsheet, and
-transferred them to the topsheet and base material (ISO 7500)

Next? Next we show how the bases are cut in preparation for layup on the mold and rail attachment.

Next >> Part 2 - Cutting the Base

3degrees fundraiser report

Our first 3degrees fundraiser was held on Saturday 13th Sept, with $500 being raised to abate around 17 tonnes of carbon.  We pulled this night together very quickly so we're pretty happy with the outcome.

The money has already gone to Greening Australia. 17 tonnes of carbon equates to:
- 5 return flights to Vancouver from Melbourne; or
- 8 return flights from Melbourne to Japan; or
- 8 return flights from New York to Zurich; or
- 68 return flights from London to Zurich
That's a lot of snow-bound flying sunk.

It was a super fun night, and a massive thank-you must go everyone who attended and donated money to the cause. Equally, thanks to PeaCe and the crew at Silverski/Oishii Go! for looking after us - thanks PeaCe, Wenzel, Easy/Ez (spelling, sorry!), Cass, Jaye, Whit etc.  The night could note have been a success without their support, so thanks guys!
Drawing the winner (Dan Marsh, Heresy/Tim M, PeaCe)

Robbie is stoked. He was riding one of our demo boards and really loved it, so was very, very happy to win this (though you can't really tell).

DJ Thomas the Terror - people were stoked Tom was back (see the photos, we cut up the dancefloor so hard we broke it).

Whitney Houston - it's how we rolled. Tim ("I will mind-freak you"), Nicola, Elyse, Tommy, Brett.


I only took a couple of photos as I was flat out running around doing stuff (not drinking, I swear), here are some I snapped from the weekend and night.

Tom (left) was our DJ for the night. He was awesome.  Brett is our Falls rep.  I saw him partying pretty hard.  Ah, the life of a Heresy rep, it's all sunshine and lollipops!

I think Brett made a bad joke here. Dude, that stunk! Tom is looking at me and (probably thinking); "Dude, did that just happen?"

Then I made an actual funny joke and everything was ok.

Here we are setting up. Dan from The Red Eyes is sussing something interesting out - perhaps the overly complicated raffle book. Stevie is rocking a pretty bright Heresy headband. I think he thought it was a 70s night. Maybe he was going for the best green outfit award. Close Stevie, but the red wrecked it.

Here we see a young lady who got herself tickets to everything and an anti whaling t-shirt describe the fish she caught the other day to Packy.

Packy once again gets his head (his mum would say it's lovely, but I remain unconvinced) in a photo.

Gary and Nathan are from WA. They had a tremendous time and my rabbit spotlight caught them busting some pretty awesome dance manoeuvres.

And (I think) this is Nicola from Falls cutting the rug up with some pretty rad style.