I’ve been utilizing 1" mdf for a spoil board which gives you an additional 1/4" to surface before replacement. You can order 4/4 or true 1" mdf trim like 1"x3" to 1"x12" or order a piece of 1" mdf 4’x8’ and rip these down. The 4/4 which is called Four Quarter in the building and wood working world can be acquired at any contractor supply house, cabinet shop or hardwood/sheetgoods store. Cautionary warning a sheet of 1" mdf is a beast to move around. lol I like this because I can get a quite a few resurfaces out of the spoil boards so not replacing them constantly.
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My SO3 XXL has an MDF spoilboard. It has been replaced a few times. However since I started using bottom of the material my spoilboard seldom gets any scaring. I have not had to replace for quite a while. The only scars were caused by me and not because of using bottom of material.
The only caveat to using bottom of material is if you are using rapid positions for X and Y that works fine but the Z+6MM you have to off the project or your bit will crash into the material if it is more than 6MM. Just jog off your material before issuing the rapid position Z+6mm and you will be good. Using the bottom of material I never have onion skin left at the bottom of pockets. I also use painters tape and super glue to hold most projects down.
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I decided to replace my spoilboard for my SO3 XXL. I make mine 29" x 32" and have written up why it is that size. I was able to reuse the tee nuts from the last one. After machining the new spoilboard I flattened it. I had to run the flattening file twice. The front was somewhat lower than the back half.
The very front two corners still had pencil marks. I likely wont run the flattening program again but I might. It is just too hot today to run it again.
I put pencil marks all over the spoilboard so I would know when it was completely flat.
As stated above my old spoilboard is about 3 years old. I have not had much scarring on it since I started using bottom of material instead of the top. I did have one bad one that was my fault but kept using it. I had bought a sheet of mdf about 6 months ago and cut it to gross size and was tired of moving it around. So now I have a new flattened spoilboard.
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Thanks for the great tip. I still haven’t surfaced my spoil board(s) but will soon, and when I do I’ll definitely keep this in mind.
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