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| Pre-1980 Vintage Gear (6027 Posts)
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lamination lamentations
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On 9/7/2002 Tim
wrote in from
(64.157.nnn.nnn)
I'm trying not to include the taperflex style boards because I think it's less directly related to what we have today. That's not to take anything away from what companies like G&S and Hobie did for skateboard development. My earliest Skateboarders have some missing issues and pages, so I really don't know what came first. The Duralites and Warptail 2 sound like good candidates. There's something more primitive (nothing more than a hunch) about the Superlight that makes me think it's earlier. Let me know what you find.
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Laminated wood
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On 9/7/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
I have to presume, without intending to further split hairs, that you are also not including some of the mid-60s vertically laminated boards that Hobie produced... I am researching your question in my old Skateboarder magazines, but, off the top of my head, G&S' transition from the solid wood Warptail to the laminated Warptail 2 strikes me as a potential answer to your question, although I'm biased, having made the transition right along with 'em. It also seems to me that the Logan Dura-Light series was a pretty early entry to the laminated board market. I'll let you know if I come up with something more definitive than my personal recollections.
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Splitting Hairs
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On 9/7/2002 Tim
wrote in from
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I'm not being a s clear as I should (probably a dumb question anyway), but I'm not talking about a piece of plywood cut into a surf board shape. I'm trying to place the beginning of modern skateboard construction. I seriously doubt that any of those first boards were glued and pressed one ply at a time. So who was the first to build a board from separate plys? G&S or Hobie could have tried it first...
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Old Plys
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On 9/7/2002
Brady
wrote in from
(66.21.nnn.nnn)
Tim,
Most of the original steel wheeled boards had plys so you`d have to look a lot further back than the Sims decks.
Scabs
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Another history question???
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On 9/7/2002 Tim
wrote in from
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I've got another one that you history buffs might know. Who made the first laminated multi-ply wood (not stringer or fiberglass and wood) construction board, and what was it called? I have my guess: Tom Sims - the Sims Superlight (which had 3 plys: two thicker birch/oak(I'm not a woodshop guy?) with a thin 3/32 dark-stained cross lamination sandwhiched between.
Were any of the other guys doing it first? Logan Earth Ski? This may be a hard one to figure out.
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Road Riders
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On 9/7/2002 Tim
wrote in from
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I believe that the issue with Road Riders and bearing size boils down to this: Road Rider was the first to use sealed bearings and when they designed the wheel, they chose to go to a standard 608 (much more so at the time with machinery than a 607, and therefore more economic) bearing which fit a 8mm axle instead of the standard 7mm axle of the roller skate industry. All skateboard trucks up to that point were modified roller skate trucks or actual roller skate trucks that had been produced by companies like Chicago trucks for skateboards. So until Bennet and Tracker came along (just months apart from the release of the Road Riders) Road Riders had to be retrofitted for the 7 mm axles on roller skate trucks. Of course, 8 mm axles became standard in both the skateboard and roller skate/inline industry.
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Roller Sport Urethane
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On 9/7/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
We're glad you approve of this conversation, Herbn. Come to think of it, how can almost any discussion of pre-1980 skateboard equipment be important? Anyway... Are you saying that Roller Sport's urethane wasn't good? Personally, at the time, I found my Stokers to be exceptional wheels. I even kept them around for some time after newer wheels were available, specifically for downhill. Back then, one of the very first specialty downhill wheels with which I was familiar was the RSI (Roller Sport) Surge wheel. As a kid, I couldn't afford to purchase a single-purpose, high-ticket item like a set of Surge wheels, but realizing I had the same urethane in my Stokers (and what I perceived as the run-to-run ability to work with, hyper-lubricate, etc. the loose ball bearing system), they were used as my downhill wheels well into '78. The other thing I'm wondering about is your speculation about the development of Road Riders. We've already determined that the Roller Sport lines and the Road Rider lines are linked via Richard Novak. Since that's the case, and since they had the Roller Sport wheels to the mass market before Cadillac, why do you presume that somehow it was Cadillac's success that inspired Road Riders. My guess is (and it is just a guess) that the early Road Rider 'thanes are not that different from the Roller Sport urethane, except for the addition of the red dye, and any effect that dye might've had on the compound. I also seem to recall that there were some standard bearing size issues with the early Road Riders that made many of my friends turn to Sims for their first sealed bearing wheels.
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1965 kryptonics
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On 9/6/2002 herbn
wrote in from
(152.163.nnn.nnn)
i don't really doubt the 65 claim,i've heard of early urithane wheels,just not good ones. Either they were rock hard and slippery, possibly worse than clay,or soft and dead and slower than clay on most surfaces ,not to mention fast wearing and more expensive than clay.Cadilacs were the first urithane better than clay,not really a major accomplishment,just the first to do it,roadrider came along soon after,most likely one of those parallel developements,ok maybe they might have been inspired by the money being made by cadilac.This discussion really has no importance in the big sceem of things,but on this page it's kind of alright. Kryptonic came along and one upped every one.I didn't look up any of this just my impressions and speculations of the history of the wheel.
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RSI
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On 9/6/2002
Brady
wrote in from
(66.21.nnn.nnn)
More fuel to the fire...
I had a lexan molded Proline made by Roller Sports Inc and it was manufactured in Jacksonville, FL. It has since been donated to the Kona skatepark in Jacksonville.
Not sure if this was one of RSI`s first boards but the deck was near mint, wheels, bearings and all, I was impressed. The wheels had great resiliency for over 26 years old and the bearings free spun forever.
So FL had the first skatepark. Maybe the first urethane wheel too?
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urethane, etc
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On 9/6/2002 SSofS
wrote in from
(193.130.nnn.nnn)
Thanks for turning all this stuff up, Tim and Andy, Ive been following this with great interest!
I think the 1965 thing is a red herring thrown in by K's (maybe when they produced their first fork lift truck wheel?:-) which doesnt seem to fit in with any of the evidence, looks like they can be written out of the 'first to make urethane skateboard wheels' mystery... But Id love to know the truth of how this 1965 date was arrived at.
Anyone from K's reading this..?
Anyway, back to you guys!
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Kryptonics first?
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On 9/6/2002 Tim
wrote in from
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So you think that Krytonics was making urethane wheels in 1965? If that's true, then I don't see the point in mentioning any of these other people. I really doubt that Kryptonics was 5 to 10 years ahead of everyone else. Have you ever heard of a Kryptonics wheel prior to the Star Tracs (which didn't appear until at least '76)?
I have a mint set of Roller Sports and they are anything but hard. When you press your fingers into them, they become somewhat oblong, and the shape takes at least 10 second to return to normal.
From what I can tell, Roller Sports was around the skateboard scene for a while. As late as '76 (you need to scroll almost halfway down the page to an entry by Jack S.), Novak/Roller Sports sponsored the first skateboard trek across the USA. Another mention of the early days of urethane wheels comes from Florida's Bruce Walker. I don't think there is anything out there now that will totally clear this up, but it seems clear that Roller Sports was involved in both the skateboard industry and roller skating. I'm not sure where Kryptonics fits in, but I've never seen any mention of them in skateboarding until the mid 70s. Anyway, thanks for helping me try to figure this all out.
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urithane
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On 9/5/2002 Herb
wrote in from
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i have an early rollersports cataloge (light blue) with transparent boards ,even some with sealed bearings. The rollersports wheels were HARD, cadilacs were just s bit softer,slightly grippier,resilient enough to have thin flex lips. Rollersports were to brittle ,i think, to have flex lips. Roadriders were one step better, they had flex lips that were thick. Kryptonics; were soft,soft but not necessarily better in 65, i never saw them at that early,i have a feeling that they were soft,but chaulky and fast wearing,not grippy and not fast,in 65. So i'm not really sure how you rank each companies importance in the development of our wheels,kryptonics seems to have done the most ,later on,if your definition of "later on" is 1978:)
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Heitfield
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On 9/5/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
I think that if you look at just how "behind the scenes" Creative Urethanes has remained over the past 30 years, you have the answer to why Nasworthy receives the lion's share of the credit in the skateboard market... Vernon's company could only have remained as anonymous as they have over all those years on almost deliberate purpose. Being "the guy who invented the urethane skateboard wheel" is obviously a title in which Vernon Heitfield has little or no interest, when compared to the best interests of his business.
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Confusion
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On 9/5/2002 Tim
wrote in from
(64.157.nnn.nnn)
Honestly I have no idea what that means, but its pretty clear that Roller Sports was selling to both roller skaters and skateboarders (through certain surf shops) before Cadillac had wheels to sell to anyone. It's seems that Novak beat Frank to the punch, and then did him one better with the Road Riders sealed bearing design. I'm not sure why Nasworthy has recieved so much of the credit, when it appears that Heitfield made the first wheels and apparently (although there may be room for discussion or argument) Novak sold them first.
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RSI
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On 9/5/2002 GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
While I admit I had no idea that Novak was the owner of Roller Sport (great tidbit, further completing the picture!), I'm not certain that what I just read says that he brought the wheels to the public first, unless we're assuming that he did so as a roller skate wheel before Nasworthy did as a skateboard wheel. Futher, what does that article mean by "Unfortunately this is where Richard Novak - owner of a company called Roller Sports - stepped into the picture and bought up all of Creative Urethanes' stock."? In this first place, I'm curious about the use of the term "unfortunately" (written by some enemy DicVak made along the way?), but am really wondering about the concept of buying up all of the stock. What is this article saying? Is it saying that there were a bunch of wheels already made that Roller Sport bought up, or is it saying that Novak made a financial investment in Creative Urethanes by buying up all available shares of Creative Urethane's stock? Heck, I don't even know if Creative Urethanes is a publically-held company. Tim, I really appreciate you research, but, in many ways, some of this new information just adds to my confusion. Oh well... the first time I had the whole Frank Nasworthy/Cadillac/Roller Sport-confusion conversation was either in '76 or '77. What a treat that there is finally some new information!
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NHS connection?
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On 9/5/2002 Tim
wrote in from
(64.157.nnn.nnn)
A little more digging connects Richard Novak (then owner of Roller Sports, Inc.) of NHS/Santa Cruz to the very same urethane producer in Purcellville. So while Nasworthy may have found Creative Urethanes new wheels first, he was second to Novak in selling them to the public.
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Kryptonics
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On 9/5/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
...and to the best of my knowledge Kryptonics is NOT one of the skateboard wheel "manufacturers" that has used Creative Urethanes as an OEM. Most of this information tends to stay deep "under wraps", but my understanding has always been that Kryptonics (at least the older, Colorado-based Kryptonics) produced its' own urethane.
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Urethane OEMs
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On 9/5/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
Tim, It helps to have been the international distribution manager for East Coast Urethane for awhile. At that point (several years ago), most of the Nicotine and First Division wheels were being poured at Creative Urethane. I don't believe that Roller Sport was a brand name for Creative though, since Creative Urethanes has always resolutely remained an OEM and far from the actual skateboard market itself. So far, I've been unable to find any specific information on Roller Sports Industries that might tell me at what point they started marketing Vernon's wheels to the roller skate market.
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Park Riders
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On 9/5/2002
Kevin
wrote in from
(209.179.nnn.nnn)
Is this the right place to see if anyone knows
where on Earth can I buy a set of Park Rider IV's ?
or similiar. I demoed an old building and found an
old glass case to hold the wheels that says
"Break glass in case of emergency"
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Vernon Heitfield's wheels
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On 9/5/2002 Tim
wrote in from
(216.181.nnn.nnn)
This is the information I was hoping to find. Thanks to GBJ for doing a better search. So 1970 was the year, and Cadilac was selling pretty much the same wheel (with different markings) 3 years later. Did Kryptonics get their wheels from Purcellville too? Probably.
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Frank Nasworthy's "discovery"
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On 9/5/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
According to the OEM that Frank Nasworthy "discovered" in Purcellville, VA, and that continues to produce a significant portion of the skateboard wheels in the world, they've been producing wheels for rollerskating and skateboarding since 1970. Perhaps the name Vernon Heitfield is a name we should all come to know.
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K's
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On 9/5/2002 SSofS
wrote in from
(193.130.nnn.nnn)
Feeding the addiction to lifting heavy loads since 1965..?
Thats got a ring to it!
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Kryptonics
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On 9/5/2002
Dan Hughes
wrote in from
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Wasn't Kryptonics a fork lift wheel manufacturer before it was a skateboard wheel manufacturer?
dan
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RSI, Kryptos, urethane
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On 9/5/2002 SSofS
wrote in from
(193.130.nnn.nnn)
Andy... any idea when RSI actually began producing urethane wheels for said quads? How far ahead of skateboarders were the rollerskaters with their wheels?
Another side issue that Ive asked about before and never really got to the bottom of...
When did Krypto's begin producing urethane wheels? I know they say 'since 1965' on the logo, but never seen any evidence of them pre the 'Star Trac'ads of 74 or 75.
What exactly were they making in '65?
Rollerskate wheels? And if so were they urethane?
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Roller Sports
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On 9/5/2002
GBJ
wrote in from
(68.49.nnn.nnn)
I don't know if it's because of a mid-Atlantic perspective and our proximity to Purcellville, VA, but I've always understood that Roller Sports Inc. (RSI) was producing urethane wheels first. I'll also admit that as long as it's been a topic of discussion (as far back as '77 in my recollections), the history has been vague and confusing. Based on detail coming out now from a wide range of sources, it seems to me that RSI had urethane wheels for roller skates (quads) first (and a rare few skateboarders who saw the potential), but that Frank Nasworthy was first to market them directly toward skateboarders as Cadillac Wheels. Therefore the confusion seems to be that the company that had urethane wheels first was the not first in marketing them to skateboarders.
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