(Another) DIY wakeskate thread... UPDATED finished skate.

Tassieskater · Faceplant Joined: 11 Sep 2012 Posts: 2

Hi guys,

Sorry in advance for long post...

After being a long time lurker I finally decided to register on here. I'm from Tasmania (Australia) and got into wakeskating last summer with a few mates. This site has been really useful in terms of learning a bit more about it all.
We have a problem here in terms of availability and pricing of skates - despite our dollar being about the same as USD skates are easily double the price here!! Because of this I have decided (after doing some research on this site – yes, I have used the almighty search button MANY times!!) to build my own skate. I was hoping for a bit of advice from you experts on here!

The design I have gone for is as follows:
Length = 42" (i'm 6'5" and 200lb)
Rocker = 3 stage, 14.5" flat spot, rockers are 63" radius curves which gives a total rocker of 1.5", maybe a touch more.

Here are a few pictures of the mould I've made (again, thanks to a few guys on here for the ideas):

My main concern is about the rocker - do you think 1.5" is enough? Or should I alter it to 2" before I go any further? Looking for good speed but also good pop.

I intend on making it from 3mm (approx 1/8") marine ply, probably 5 layers giving 15mm (0.6") total thickness. The plan is to use West System 2 part epoxy to glue the layers, then another all over coat for toughness/sealing. I may also add a urethane spray or something as a second sealing coat. I intend on building up the concave/kicktails by layering ply then hand finishing as others on here have.

Do any of you more experienced board builders have any comments/advice before I get stuck into the actual board? Any info appreciated! Do you guys put channels/fins on? The board I have has no channels and small fins, I like how loose and easy to spin it is. What are the different effects of channel and fins?

As a bit of background, I have only had one very short season on wakeskate/board, I can only ollie, do flatspins, w2w etc. This year hoping to step it up and try for my first kickflip, shuv, 180, 360 etc. Maybe optimistic but hey whatever. I currently ride a really cheap DoupleUp yeh 43" flat, continuous rocker board, i.e. the cheapest beginner board I could find. It's great fun for carving and consistent for w2w but I'm hoping the new board will open up a few more things for me.

Thanks in advance for anything helpful guys. If it turns out well I'm happy to discuss what I did and if anyone likes the design I can put up high res (full scale) images of the rocker for tracing onto moulds.

Cheers

UPDATE

So I finished the skate, here's a few pics from the process. The graphic is my custom job, epoxy over permanent marker/crayon on ply, breaking new ground in the art world there... for those of you who don't recognize him... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3iOROuTuMA griptape is a bit over the top, will prob go to plain black at some point if the skate lasts long enough.

Going to try running with no fins, will prob whack some on there later. Might try routing some channels or something at some point too.

Anyway there it is.