Sunday, May 27, 2012

What's Bruce Lee's favorite drink?

The board is a Rayne Demonseed Long Treks Limited Edition. I painted the top red and fading into the black over the trucks. I ride this board just about every day. I set it up with caliber trucks and 75mm orangatangs.

What's Bruce Lee's favorite drink? What taa!


Saturday, May 26, 2012

Support The Troops

The board is a Longboard Larry Drop Pin. I love this board. I currently ride this one with Bear 10mm Grizzlies with 97mm flywheels. The huge wheels just eat up any cracks and potholes. Super smooth ride.  Heavy to push, but the cruise lasts forever.

This board was a lot of fun to repaint and grip. I totally stripped it down to the bare wood.  Resanded it for paint.  Painted it a bright white with high gloss clear coat so the armor would have some gloss. I made some TIE fighter stencils and spray painted them onto the bottom. I then did the imperial seals at the top and bottom. A little spray of the black from far away gives it some nice little speckled stars.

For the grip,  I first found a nice storm trooper stencil. Then I resized it twice more,  positioned them,  and cleaned up the stencil lines. Next, the lettering. I first cropped all the letters I needed from my alphabet stencil and spelled out my words.  Resized the whole thing then adjusted the placement. Three days later with a razor blade and voila!



Friday, May 25, 2012

Dots

Here's a Bustin Strike I polka dotted awhile ago. The circles were a pain to cut out well. If I ever have to do circles again,  I'd use a circle cutter instead.

I also didn't do a very good job cleaning the board before I put the new grip on. Now I use goof-off to get the old adhesive gummy stuff off.


Dragonfly

Here's another early grip I did. The board is an Envy. I've never seen another like it.  One of my best friends got the board in Florida when he was a kid.

This was the first longboard I ever rode.  I went down a puny little hill at my friend's house and wiped out.  Tore a huge patch out of my left forearm and I was hooked.  That road rash on my arm didn't heal all summer since I would tear it open every time I would slam, which seemed to happen fairly often.  I was much more brave and stupid then. Mainly the latter.



Wednesday, May 23, 2012

BANNED

Here's another early grip I did a few years ago. The board is an old beat up Sector 9. I think this was the second one I did. I should have taken more time with the alignment of the circle crosses. I kind of cringe posting this for the world to judge as I think I did a really sloppy job. I have learned to not rush now though.... As much any way...

Monday, May 21, 2012

Turf's Up!

This was just a fun little project I did with a broken Bustin Complex that I had laying around.  I made a putt-putt course on our patio last summer, so I had some leftover astroturf. Naturally, some found some onto this board. It actually rides rather well with enough wedging on the front. I may have to do a nice long putt putt board this summer. Perhaps real grass next time...

Sunday, May 20, 2012

240 Baht board

This was my second attempt at building my own longboard. Not my greatest success, I admit. Or a success at all, for that matter.
I made the board with two 1/4" layers of Baltic birch plywood and laminated them together into a 1/2" thick piece. I then cut out my board shape from that. I was experimenting with a rocker shape. It didn't ride very well, so it lives on the wall for now.

On the plus side, this board will always be worth the 240 Baht that I glued to the bottom,  then sealed over. (also an experiment with mixed results)  Right now 1 US dollar is worth about 31 Thai bahts.

I'll be working on some more boards this summer. Chalk this one up as a learning experience.





Tribal Penguin

Hello and thank you for checking out this blog. I created this page so I could start a portfolio of my custom grip tape art I've been making for the past few years. I'll start posting more as I go. If you like 'em, share this page with your friends and if you want your own, just send me an email. I may put some up on eBay if I see some demand.


I just finished this tribal penguin for a cool dude in Perth, Australia.  The board is a Rayne Demon Seed Long Treks Limited Edition.

I painted the top of the board with two layers of epoxy enamel white paint, followed by two layers of high gloss clear coat. The high gloss clear coat is the easiest to wipe clean, especially since white is hard to maintain.
 I use Jessup extra gritty grip tape for all my boards. I've never slipped off the stuff, though I have cheese grated my leg with it on a couple of occasions.

Thanks for looking and check back for updates!