And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Friday, July 25, 2025
Do you think the engineers at the skateboard company built that to take that speed at all, or for very long?
I worked a Mountain Dew commercial, and the talent were a bunch of literal hillbilly good ole boys who'd made aluminum body-mold ground luge frames with skateboard trucks on the ends, and used to jump on them on the hills of Kentucky and W VA on the interstate, and pass semi trucks on the downhill. This latent insanity is what go them into the X Games.
They were upset that the skateboard truck companies wouldn't make skate trucks that wouldn't melt above 90MPH, but they understood why those companies would not, for liability reasons, make wheel trucks that could go >100 MPH. But they knew the trucks would melt at >90MPH from personal experience.
We towed them around the Willow Springs race track with a camera truck at 60MPH, with them in full leathers, and then slowed the camera truck down to make it look like a swig of Mountain Dew made them accelerate.
A few times they ate it on turns at speed, and their brakes were Flinstone Model 1 (drag heels, try not to set feet on fire) type, but when they tumbled, they just got up, dusted off, and went back at it.
Bearings rated for 90mph? Maybe. However, we used skate truck bearings on an encoder device, as replacement parts. Speeds were measured in feet per minute, somewhere in the area of 250-300 fpm. (Elevator). Last about a year, then went south. Dust usually. Chinesium, garbage, but cheap. My point; no way would.I want.to.be going fast on those bearings, at all. Pure.junk!
Back when I was 12 in 1973 we had a vacation in Ashville NC. At Biltmore at the top of the hill I jumped on my board. Dad followed me down the hill in the car and he said I reached speeds of 45 mph. I would drag my shoe to slow for the corners but I made it down the hill. The open bearings were red hot at the bottom. I needed new bearings and wheels after that run. I went through a number of wheels on that board. The technology of that board was fairly archaic compared to today's standards.
As long as the bearings hold up. Sealed bearing nowadays. The urethane wheels are more kindly when rolling over pebbles.
ReplyDeleteI used to bomb down long hills. Straight, built for speed. Faster than what this guy looks to be doing.
exactly, bearing are the weakest link
Deletethats not strange, it looks like a suzuki 413
ReplyDeleteI think I hear Huey Lewis in the background…
ReplyDeleteIf you went back to the future, you'd find a better version with the same rider.
ReplyDeleteIt's all fun and games until somebody hits a rock in the road. Then it's all road rash and scars.
ReplyDeleteI'd be surprised if the skateboard company actually had 'engineers'.
ReplyDeleteIts all good until you get the death wobble. Then it's time to tuck and roll.
ReplyDeleteNo, they aren't.
ReplyDeleteI worked a Mountain Dew commercial, and the talent were a bunch of literal hillbilly good ole boys who'd made aluminum body-mold ground luge frames with skateboard trucks on the ends, and used to jump on them on the hills of Kentucky and W VA on the interstate, and pass semi trucks on the downhill. This latent insanity is what go them into the X Games.
They were upset that the skateboard truck companies wouldn't make skate trucks that wouldn't melt above 90MPH, but they understood why those companies would not, for liability reasons, make wheel trucks that could go >100 MPH.
But they knew the trucks would melt at >90MPH from personal experience.
We towed them around the Willow Springs race track with a camera truck at 60MPH, with them in full leathers, and then slowed the camera truck down to make it look like a swig of Mountain Dew made them accelerate.
A few times they ate it on turns at speed, and their brakes were Flinstone Model 1 (drag heels, try not to set feet on fire) type, but when they tumbled, they just got up, dusted off, and went back at it.
Too many potholes around here to try that shit.
ReplyDeleteBearings rated for 90mph? Maybe. However, we used skate truck bearings on an encoder device, as replacement parts. Speeds were measured in feet per minute, somewhere in the area of 250-300 fpm. (Elevator). Last about a year, then went south. Dust usually. Chinesium, garbage, but cheap. My point; no way would.I want.to.be going fast on those bearings, at all. Pure.junk!
ReplyDeleteTom762
Back when I was 12 in 1973 we had a vacation in Ashville NC. At Biltmore at the top of the hill I jumped on my board. Dad followed me down the hill in the car and he said I reached speeds of 45 mph. I would drag my shoe to slow for the corners but I made it down the hill. The open bearings were red hot at the bottom. I needed new bearings and wheels after that run. I went through a number of wheels on that board. The technology of that board was fairly archaic compared to today's standards.
ReplyDeleteDad tells me that as a kid they built wooden go carts and used the wheel bearings from scrapped B-17 bombers as wheels.
ReplyDelete