Saturday, August 1, 2009

the longboard skate







about 10 years ago now (hard to believe) some friends and i saw a peculiar looking 5 foot plank of wood in a surf shop. Some guy was trying to pawn it off as a longboard skate deck. collectively, we found the concept enticing but his outline was just plain ugly. so we got to the wood shop and worked out a few templates of our own. The final versions, 12ply birch, 60" long- i should know the wheel base but i'm too lazy to check the garage, maybe 53".

we used to ride the hell out of these things. this was before the whole sector9 craze and after we showed ours at ASR they came out with a very similar Luke Nosewalker. bastards. i was taking orders and designing ea one by hand. custom artwork, colors, pin stripes, hawaiian fabric inlays, even the odd dingle berry (tasseled fringed). i even teamed up with legend jerry madrid for a while in an attempt to mass produce... a very frustrating venture.

anyhow, i found some old photos that friend/shooter laura doss snapped in the hills of PV. these things really helped my surfing. drawn out lines, foot work, drop knee turns, etc. they have some flex and do better on the strand than on hills. i custom hand painted about 200. i now have some blank decks lying around if anyone is interested. painted or blank- they should be enjoyed. i'll try and post photos of the blanks soon. cheers, baffa big board.