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Saturday, December 3, 2011

Longboard 4 Kids: Outreach Project



For my custom deck I did a drop deck longboard for Longboard 4 Kids charity. For the graphic I wanted to stay really simple of course and have the charity name on the board considering I’m donating it to their charity. Instead of doing a heavy layer of paint I did light misting so you could still see the grain of the wood through the paint. I drew this idea from a board that my friend gave to me after he was done skating it. I left some exposed wood because I wanted to reflect the natural aspect of longboarding in general.

Ted Hunter was my mentor for this project and he took me step by step on what exactly needs to be done to make a custom board. The first step was to choose 7 layers of Canadian maple and the middle veneer for me was stained purple. I had to make a mold by sanding and shaping a piece of Styrofoam. After that I put clear packing tape on the mold and glued and pressed the board in a Roarockit plastic vacuum bag like how we make all our boards. After that I cut out the shape of my board and started the shaving and sanding process. After that I lightly sprayed the board. For the font on the graphic side I printed off the writing and did a graphite transfer then cut out the letters and sprayed with black paint. On the side there is my company name, EXTRADITE written in black paint marker.

I strongly believe in donating to charity. I thought this would be a great way to donate by making a completely 100% custom drop deck longboard for the charity’s prizes at the end. This project doesn’t look anything like what my usual graphics are because I had to stick to a more G rating that every age would find enjoyable. I really hope that when someone wins this they really enjoy the deck I made!