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| Pre-1980 Vintage Gear (6027 Posts)
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8 wheelers
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On 8/24/2002
hugh r
wrote in from
(205.216.nnn.nnn)
I have a book (printed in '77) that has a pic of a very young Lonnie Toft, maybe 13 or 14 years of age, riding an 8 wheeler with what appear to be x-calibar trucks and carpet for grip... HR
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Lonnie toft 8 wheeler
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On 8/23/2002
Tony
wrote in from
(198.142.nnn.nnn)
I'm not sure about the concave that was mentioned in a previous post, but here is a prototype toft with slight rocker, although rocker was not a new innovation in '77 when this board was made by wee wily winkel, I guess it is evidence at least that he was trying diferent technologies with his boards, so who knows about the concave, it may have been in the later models.
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Toft
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On 8/23/2002 herbn
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
we went from first production to just plain old first, basement innovation.Toft's early interviews seem to be pre -sims his homemade "pigs" with internal wheelwells and adjustatracks, were not purchasable ,unless you lived down the street(more or less) from Mr Lonnie Toft.The side kicks were on his eight wheeler and may have only been conceptual. Yeah the mystery of who was first with something, is usually clouded over by lead times for ads,an ad has to be done months before it shows, and financing of production, one company may have prototypes, they may show up in pics, but someone else has them in production, they may not even be copies just different expressions of the direction in which things are progressing.
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Stroker
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On 8/23/2002
Dom
wrote in from
(80.8.nnn.nnn)
I also tried my strockers, These are the real carving trucks!! But I want to keep them Mint. So Herbn If you are ready to make severals sets of your "ULTIMATE STROKERS" I will be happy to get one. Let me Know.
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Original Sims Stripe Sticker
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On 8/23/2002
Rob
wrote in from
(209.250.nnn.nnn)
Does any of the vintage collectors have an original Sims Stripe Sticker. I just refinished a 1978 Sims Superply and I am looking for the traditional red sticker for the underneath. I am aware that these boards had the logo silk-screened directly to the board, but I am looking for the best approach to restore the board.
In a worst case situation, would you have a good photo of the logo on an existing board that I could use to get a new one made.
Thanks
Rob
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Early Wide Toft Boards
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On 8/22/2002 msk
wrote in from
(172.170.nnn.nnn)
I've seen several early pictures of Toft riding boards that were several inches wider than his trucks and wheels, with wheel wells routed completely inside from the rails. I'd guess that those boards were around 9" wide. I'll have to dig around and see if I can find any to scan...
Apparently another innovation Toft can lay claim to was concave. In an old interview ('77?), he describes one of his decks as having a nose and tail kick, as well as "side kicks", which he says he invented for that board...
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stuff
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On 8/22/2002 herbn
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
some of this stuff ainy pre 80's (sue me:);OJ super juice worn but not coned,Sims snake red lots of concrete miles,Roadrider sixs nearly mint,green cubics cherry hill and ramp miles only,Pacers no bearing qite worn,sims pure juice some wear and complete with original IKS bearings with the contact lip trimmed off the seals(silly youth:) Conical DTS rock'n rollers purple and yellow perhaps a slight flatspot due to "recent" attempt at being a slider wheel.Magnesium Extrack parts,gotta make kingpins and pivot cups,real old Thunders, somewith bullet 66's,I found a old gonz slick,with my stupidest smallest wheels still in place,along with a a set of thunders that also have a set of billet bases that i made a long time ago (92 maybe),my wood/glass 8.25 caster chris strople wedgetail. Oh wellnone of it's for sale,it's all mine ,mine, mine hah hah hah :) :) :)
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Strokers ,oh yeah
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On 8/22/2002 Herbn
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
Actually rolled them, bolted them to an old 36 inch taperkick(only two bolts each)with roadrider 4s they barely wheel rub, lien angle was not their strong point, they feel swervy but the lack of lien angle surely keeps them from having a nice tight turning circle. I only rolled them across my formica store floor. My version of the Stroker turns circles inside the originals.Now i'm sort of reinspired to maybe start my "ultimate stroker" project.
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Piglys
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On 8/22/2002 herbn
wrote in from
(205.188.nnn.nnn)
I remember seeing ads for piggy boards,even the wood was different .red gum, my photographic skate obsessive memory tells me. The wide tail bullet shape predate Biniack's board, I set up my skate museum today (high shelf at my store)and one of the boards is a Haut Lamaflex,modified "back in the day" with big DTS style wheelwells,among other stuff.Haut had Kiwi Giffords' board,and Kevin something or another,and Kevin Reed too,all wide boards with FAT wide tails,early on the pig style,five thick plys certainly made stong tough wood and can be used if you havn't got and abrupt curves in your press,something to think about.
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Pigs
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On 8/22/2002 GBJ
wrote in from
(209.48.nnn.nnn)
Well, Wesley, I'll have to take your word for it. I can only speak from my own experience, which tends to be pretty broad. There's no question though, that I don't know what was going on in every shop in every town. It definitely sounds like Pigs were ahead of their time, particularly if they were even being offered in late-'76, when the state of the art in skateboards were boards like the G&S Warp2.
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Chris Strople Pig
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On 8/22/2002
Joe & Nick
wrote in from
(167.82.nnn.nnn)
http://www.bowlrider.com/indexb.html
look at the window below the alava juice cover
Check out the refurb job this guy did on the biggest pig I've ever owned. 32.5x11.5. I sent it to him when I was in one of those pay it forward moods, now look at it. Sheesh.
As far as pigs go this guy either has one or has a link to someone who does.
Check it out.
Joe & Nick
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PIG Boards
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On 8/22/2002
Wesley Tucker
wrote in from
(64.12.nnn.nnn)
Andy,
That would depend on your interpretation of "production." PIG skateboards in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina was making and selling their PIG boards as far back as 1976. The PIG (for Paul, Isaac and Gregg, three guys at the beach,) was HUGE. It was 10" wide and somewhere between 28" and 29" long. Unfortunately, the only place I ever knew where you could buy one was in the pro shop at the Myrtle Beach Park. (Remember the one painted Red, White and Blue near the airport? The Grand Prix go-cart track is there now.)
Did the advertise in SKATEBOARDER? Not hardly. Did anyone outside of around here ever hear of them? I doubt it. Were we surprised and amazed when Dogtown came out with wide boards a few months later? No. We all looked at them and said, "huh, I guess they liked the way the PIGs ride!"
I realize this is all hearsay without any documented proof, but anyone who rode the MBSP probably saw the sign that read, "Get a PIG here and ride it home to your momma!"
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Wide Boards in '78
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On 8/22/2002 GBJ
wrote in from
(209.48.nnn.nnn)
statements like those by Bruce Walker (King of Longboard Freestyle, in my book) are why I specified Dogtown as first ten inch board available to the public. Bruce also fails to cite just how wide is wide. Lonnie Toft also made claims to personally being way ahead on the wide board thing, and given his penchant for innovation, that wouldn't surprise me. Ultimately though, they might've just been one of many people who experimented with wide boards before they hit the market, but that's all water under the bridge (as is the rest of this conversation, really). For whatever reasons they chose to not advance their designs into the production stage, they allowed Dogtown to be first on the shelves with it.
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1st wide decks
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On 8/22/2002
Scabs
wrote in from
(66.21.nnn.nnn)
Not to dispute what was posted below but have you guys read the article on Bruce Walker in ILB summer 2002?
In it shows a pic of Bruce riding a longboard of about 44" on the 2nd skatepark in the world....1976.
He also states in the interveiw...
"We made wide boards before anyone, but we abondoned the idea because they didn`t work with narrow trucks as ther was no wide trucks on the market yet. Then Lazer came along."
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12" Decks
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On 8/21/2002 msk
wrote in from
(172.130.nnn.nnn)
The Dogtown "Big Foot" was also 12" wide, and was first available in late '78, IIRC...
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10" Stuff
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On 8/21/2002
Steve in AZ
wrote in from
(192.175.nnn.nnn)
CK-Money is right-on here, and I think the word "transition" is the word that best describes not only the equipment, but also the skate scene between 1981-1984.
For whatever reason, I was also in "transition". I started skating pipes, pools and parks in 7th grade. When I entered high school (no Jr. High in AZ at the time), I was probably at the top of my game in 78-80. So along with the fatty-pigs, I discovered that there were other things that interested me...namely, cars! Girls too, but they were tougher to figure out than the Vacuum system on an 18RC.
So with the wider stuff, I bid adeu to skateboarding...for the next 20 yrs. Never owned a board wider than 8" until about 3 yrs. ago. I think the biggest lament I had was that there were too many cheap-O pig boards and some really BAD stuff produced and sold in the mid 80's.
-=S=-
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10" gear
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On 8/21/2002 BoBo
wrote in from
(151.196.nnn.nnn)
I know what Chuck is saying. For some reason I kept buying and breaking SC Stingers. Those wheel wells were crap!
Never broke another deck though. My DT's all still look pretty good to me. I have a Muir, Biniak and a Humpston and while they have a few nose scrapes they still look pretty good. The DT's were the toughest boards I ever rode. I had a Powell Beamer that de-lamed on me so I gave it to my bro Scotty. Never had a wide glass stick so I can't comment.
My new Bulldogs is holding up great. Seems like the Karma Wes has is is still in his boards. Anyone know the status of the conical wheels Bulldogs are making? The site is not working but I hear tell they are gearing up to make some.
Old's Cool!
B
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33" Z-Woody
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On 8/21/2002
Chuck
wrote in from
(67.25.nnn.nnn)
The board I was riding at the time I took a few trips to Cadillac in Pompano, FL was a 33" Z-Woody. It was about 8 or 9 inches wide, replaced my Rockit. My friends got pigs not too long after, I held out because nothing was longer than 33" (incidentally it was one of the dude's getting a Bulldog that led him to sell my brother the Kryptonics he has today...for cheap!). I finally relented and got a DT Biniak with a 'glass bottom. Snapped the tail off it before too long. Then a Powell McGill...broke it in front of the rear truck. Then a Powell LiteBeam...snapped a bit of the nose off (I still have it, but I couldn't ride an ugly board like that). Finally a Santa Cruz Duane Peters...at a full 12" wide, which I painted over and slathered with Powell stickers since my allegience was somehow still with them despite 2 broken decks. I still have (and occasionally ride) the DP.
Side question...was the DP the widest production board ever, or did any others come in wider than 12"? Not counting the 8-wheelers....
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Same Board...
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On 8/21/2002 msk
wrote in from
(172.166.nnn.nnn)
That shot is from the Friedman/Stecyk Dogtown book, but I'm pretty sure it was published in SkateBoarder arouynd mid '78 (or at least another shot from the same session was...)
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Same Board, Different Picture
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On 8/21/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
That's the board I'm looking at in this other picture. With a single Power Pivot on the tail that almost disappears on that huge tail. What's the source on that picture? I feel like I remember it, but am not really sure.
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re: Alva on a Dogtown
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On 8/21/2002 msk
wrote in from
(172.171.nnn.nnn)
A few years ago, Ray Flores told me the story behind that board. That was indeed a Dogtown. Long before the production DT boards hit the market, several people were riding 10"+ handmade DT boards, made from solid hardwood (not ply). While Tony had his own line of boards, they were still around 8" wide. Tony kept "borrowing" boards, so Muir and Humpston built Tony a board...
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pig boards
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On 8/21/2002 Patio Mendino
wrote in from
(66.168.nnn.nnn)
When Cadillac Wheels Skateboard Concourse opened in Lighthouse Point, FL...I was riding my FibreFlex Teamrider.
wide boards were just about to make the scene. The first pigs I saw were Bahne decks at the skatepark. word was, that they didn't stock too many of the "west coast" pro stuff(sims, etc), so they could sell lots of Bahnes. and sell them they did.
I got a hand-me-down Andrecht instead...
p
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Alva on a Dogtown
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On 8/21/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
Okay, home now. The aforementioned picture of Tony Alva is in the September, '78 issue of Wide World of Skateboarding, and is of TA doing a frontside air in the halfpipe at Lakewood on a board that definitely appears to be an early generation or prototype BullDog model, with pronounced wheel wells and what appear to be custom, hand drawn TA/Dogtown graphics by Wes Humpston. If someone wants to host a scan drop me an e-mail and I'll scan this thing and send you the file.
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10 inchers
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On 8/21/2002 Kevin
wrote in from
(24.30.nnn.nnn)
GBJ brings up a good point - the early DT '10 inchers were a novelty. Sims and specifically the Lonnie Toft 10.0 really brought it to the masses. I still remember how excited I was getting my first Toft 10.0. I also remember one of Brad Bowman's early prototype pig boards being thrown over the snake run at the Endless Wave in Oxnard by yours truly. He dropped in on my run....I was a local and he was not!!!!!!
Kevin Carroll
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Big 10 inch
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On 8/21/2002
C-Money
wrote in from
(207.152.nnn.nnn)
I certainly don't have the connections or the history, but reading this string of posts makes me want to comment, it was an amazing "transition time" in this sport we love, wasn't it. I mean, all serious skaters went to the wide boards almost immediately once they started coming out. Ditto for the conical wheels. A great example of innovation in the marketplace!
carl
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