Random thoughts/post from a slow night at work…
I religiously ride IV stamped decks. I have a small stock pile of them. Any time I’m near any skate shop (my local core shop, or even a Zumies), if they have an 8.25/14.38/IV in stock, I’ll buy it. I usually keep about three of them “on-hand,” because sometimes they can be hard(er) to come by.
Tactics was recently having a sale on a few There 8.25 decks ($49 each). Normally I won’t by decks on-line, because I might end up with the horrific “I” stamp. But, for $49, I •had• to role the dice. They had two decks in stock, and I got both. When the box came, I was scared to open it. I ended up with a IV (score!) and a III.
I set the III up last week, and I’m actually loving it. Maybe even more than the IVs. This is great news, because it’s expanding my available deck options by 25%. That’s awesome.
I've legit compare numbers in a shop before where they had several of each and often times a II would be steeper than a I or whatever. Also different DLX shapes seem to vary more- an 8.4 is almost always a I or II, but more mellow than the 8.25 III and IV I had before.
Yes definitely seen this before too.
I put it down to different presses - some being more mellow than others - so a I stamp from a mellow press might still be more mellow than a IV stamp from a regular press, as I have had with some 8.38 eagles and a couple of other graphics on 8.38 sized boards, all seemingly with teal top stains too, I think.
Also many of the 8.38 sized boards I get generally seem to be more mellow than the 8.25 sized boards that come through my hands, but again that might be just what we end up with here.
Of a dozen or more of each, some multiple boards of the same run, same graphic, etc, there were definitely differences in the same stamps. Even small differences in the widths too, but I don't really worry about that side of things too much.
Sure the angle of the kicks on I stamps might be a bit more than IV stamps, but most of the III stamps still work well for me too, even the I and II if I flatten the kicks out a bit, as I have done more recently with getting whatever random sale boards when I could.
I would be curious to ask anyone who had more than a few boards, put them all together and compare concaves in them and see if they come up a bit more here or there, even between different stamps, etc.
There have only been a couple of DLX boards I just couldn't ride due to too much side to side concave including a Grosso 9.25 with a I stamp, (as I could always flatten out the kicks on anything regardless of stamps) but there seem to be a lot more BBS boards with higher concave coming out now, including the Black Label 8.5 boards, BBS shop boards (Generator sticker or not) or some smaller brands I bought on sale which have BBS wood and dimensions I am used to.