I once watched a guy make a ski from balsa wood, fiberglass from a hardware store and some bootleg graphite from Kidder while waiting on ski rides. The 66"ACME produced a tournament best score of 2 @ 35 36 mph by Marc Shaw on the bayou at U of L.
I never skied on it but did R and D the first and only ACME fin bracket. I will never be the test pilot dummy for Horton again. The fin block would let the fin go at the wakes and send you flying without warning. This caused you to get bucked 40' and Horton to double over laughing for 10 minutes.