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So...
Yesterday, about 7/8ths of the way through a session, I snapped the tail off of the 8.5” Clutch Z4 blank I had set up. I was on the other side of the bay & didn't have a 2nd set up w/ me, so I was a little bummed that I was going to call it quits, as I was still trying to get a combo-trick when I broke my deck on a flatground ollie.
The good homey, Ori from Florida, had an unused, but already gripped, Blockhead Hard Times deck in his trunk. He handed it over without reservation & told me to go land that shit. I set it up on the spot & handled business, despite the complimentary extra 1/4” of wheelbase that came with the free deck. THANK YOU, Ori. I owe you one.
I don’t know the dims, and I didn’t bother to measure anything beyond the WB (14.75”) and the width over the trucks (to insure I wouldn’t be “magic carpeting too much with these Thunder 149s. About 8.7” over the front truck, & 8.5” over the rear, so good to go.
Put in about 15-20 minutes on it so far & the turn felt crazy slow/lazy compared to the 14.5” WB I had been on moments prior, so much so that I swore up & down that it must be a 15” WB, but when I got home the tape said otherwise.
Threw a few stickies & some paint (via stencil) on there when I got home & here it is, while it lasts.
Blockhead Hard Times 8.8”(?)
Thunder Team Edition 149s
Spitfire F4 Conical 54mm
Bones Swiss
Some old Shortys or Roughneck hardware (I dunno, not really keeping track)
Unknown grip that was already on there.
I have the 8.37 hard times....same thing just scaled down to 31.75 and 14.5 wb with the flat concave/medium kick mold Watson seem to use for most of their "modern" decks. Surprisingly functional shape, I bought it thinking it would just be a cruiser/conversation piece (since they're small runs they're not super common) but it pops and flips like a popsicle. It was my first Watson deck and I was surprised at how good it felt since I'd read on here that Watson wood was bad nowadays. Had I not tried that deck I'd probably never have gone for one of the Foundation oval reissues they put out last fall which ended up being one of my favorite decks in recent times.
Curious what you think of the wood.
@Buttfart Rapedick,
Offhand, my summary based on my limited time on it so far is that both the concave & kicks are mellower than I'm accustomed to. The mellower tail angle means my pop isn't as steep, requiring more speed & downward force in order to create more lift to get the front end to the same height as it would be at with a steeper tail. I found this a bit tricky at first, because... old. And with that, slower moving and the lot. I started to grasp it towards the end of the only session I've had on it (about 20 minutes,) so time will tell if I adjust well.
I noticed that the same mellow tail that stymied me initially, also made rotational tricks easier to scoop. The mellow concave, however, feels like it requires more flick for flips.
As for the wood itself, visually it appears to be a hair thicker than, say, the BBS or PS decks I have on hand, and has a mild/moderate flex. Once I got it to pop properly, it felt
fairly lively, but keep in mind: while it was still "new," I have no idea how old this deck actually was when homey gifted it to me. He was already the 2nd owner, as it was. Perhaps you've got a better idea of when this
modern-repro series initially dropped.
I generally get accustomed to whatever I'm riding pretty quickly, and beyond the concave/kick issue and those semi pointy tip profiles, this thing isn't much different than my current preferred set up, so I'm pretty sure I'll gel with it.
I used the excuse of snapping the tail on the Clutch Z4 to grip up another deck anyway, and I went ahead & ordered me up yet another 8.5 in the form of a Theories UFO shape, so I've got both of those to look forward to, even if I don't wind up caring much for the Watson wood.
Topic: The Set-up Thread (Read 5890392 times)