Designing Your Own Skateboard

Designing and building your own skateboard can be a satisfying, challenging task. It can also be an expensive, frustrating ordeal. Which experience you end up with depends in large part on what you hope to achieve. Although you can't build the perfect board for pennies, there are options that will allow you to create a skateboard that suits your style and budget.

  1. Define Your Style

    • Before you can design the perfect board, you must decide what that means. The answer depends on the kind of riding you like to do and your personal style. Downhill, carving, cruising and street: each requires different boards, or at least different trucks, bearings and wheels. Off-the-shelf boards — sometimes called completes — are generally designed to accommodate a broad range of riders. The idea is to design a board that more closely fits the type of riding you do. In other words, design a board that suits your style.

    Build-Your-Own Complete

    • Nearly all board manufacturers and shops offer the option of building your own skateboard. Once you decide on the type of board you want, you may choose the deck, trucks, wheels, bearings and set-up that will best suit your needs. The shop will then sell you all the parts or assemble the whole thing for you. This is the way to go if you want a more personalized board but don't really have the time or inclination to physically construct your own.

    Kits

    • A more ambitious skateboard design path begins with the purchase of a kit. Unlike a complete, with a skateboard kit you do it all, from laminating your own deck to designing the graphics. A good kit generally consists of the wood veneers, high-strength glue and necessary forms, plus your selection of skateboard parts and everything else you need to create your own board. If you're the hands-on sort and would like to get a taste of the manufacturing process, this is the option for you.

    Start from Scratch

    • Scratch-built boards appeal to skateboarders who love woodworking or woodworkers who love to skateboard. Manufacturers employ a lot of different techniques in building skateboard decks, and do-it-yourself board-makers experiment with all of them. If the thought of using a specialized clamping press or working with foam molds and fiberglass composites sounds like your idea of fun, then you're in good company. There are many online resources dedicated to building custom skateboard decks from scratch.

    Considerations

    • Successfully designing your own skateboard requires several key decisions. Don't build a board that doesn't suit your style and abilities. Choose parts based on what you need them to do, not how they look. If you want to start from scratch, be honest about your skill level and be willing to experiment and learn from your mistakes. This is the kind of project that can give you a few headaches, but rolling along on a board you designed yourself is worth the effort.