The Anatomy of a Skateboard

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The skateboard may look like a piece of wood with a couple plastic wheels, but its more than meets the eye. The skateboard consists of 3 main parts each with “sub” parts; The Trucks (axles) The board (the wood) and the wheels (plus bearings)

First; The board, what makes the board so light, flexible and maneuverable yet so strong, rigid and enduring? In fact the deck (the board) is made from up to 11 different layers of wood mostly maple. The characteristics of maple wood are; strong, flexible and light. The Ideal material for a skateboard. The 11 layers of wood are first put together and layered with glue then they are super-compressed to form one solid wooden board. The average maple layered board can take up to 200kg+ This makes it perfect

Next; The Axles, more often known of as the trucks, consist of several different parts; the Kingpin, the pivot pin, the base, the main part and all the screws and bolts. Ever since skateboarding started evolving 40-50 years ago companies have been making their parts lighter better and more maneuverable this also goes for the trucks. The skater depends on the trucks to turn smoothly and lean. The trucks also have to take a lot of landing impact and other hard stuff. This means they have to be solid as rock, but simultaneously as light as possible, the trucks now have a special alloy of metals in them. The trucks also have a unique super effective system that makes the board turn without turning the base of the board away. At first the trucks were maneuverable and strong but they were heavy as crap and when the era of grinding came they were slid down faster than you can imagine. So companies tested new alloys and designs and they have come up with the best you can get, so far.

The part that everyone thinks is the most simple and easy to make, The Wheels. The wheels are often thought of as couple round pieces of plastic and something metal inside. This is quite the opposite, when skateboarding started there was no such thing as skateboard wheels. The first skaters made homemade wheels out of clay. which sucked, that’s basically hard mud… That would not be good for doing anything. Soon skaters attached roller skate wheels and scooter wheels to make a slightly softer and less “wheel braking” ride. Companies started making Skate wheels they were basically the same old plastic crap the roller skaters used except a bit deformed, but after a loooooong time some guy decided to experiment with poly-carbonate (i think that’s what its called) and started producing this type of wheel, companies used his idea for their wheels as they were lighter, stronger, smoother and had a lot more grip plus they didn’t get grinded down like crap. The wheels have been experimented and elaborated on to make them stronger and better. 

Now for the second, inner, part of the wheel. Yes the ball bearings. What the hell are ball bearings? (NOTE: the animation at the top is a ball bearing moving) That’s what most people say when they first hear it. Many people have no idea what ball bearings are, they are like these metal rings with balls on the inside that reduce the friction of the wheel between the trucks and inner part of the wheel. The bearings are a very important part as without them you wouldn’t go further than about 1 meter. If you want more detail on bearings check wikipedia or something.

Well that’s basically the whole skateboard, broken down into bits, i hope my article helped you understand some more about skateboards, their history and their structure. Please comment below and if you liked my article i would really appreciate if you pressed the like button its only a click away enjoy…