Getting a grip on longboarding

I recently switched jobs and with a shorter commute skating became a viable alternative to cycling, so I browsed the web to get an overview of longboards in general and bought a used one for cheap on ebay.

Landyachtz drophammer, only marred by inexperienced users

Learning to skate has been a pleasant experience so far, but this is not what this post is about. My underlying motivation was that once I am able to longboard safely, I can take it with me on the subway and other public transport as a range extender, even in rush hour. And while the board is easy to grip on either side to carry, I saw a couple of other boards online which had a cutout grip in the middle. Since I got my board cheaply anyway, I saw no reason not to retrofit one onto my board.

The process was pretty simple:

• tape off everything on the board. If you have nice deck art, ensure that your grip won't fall into a nice part of the artwork
• draw a line parallel to the board side on the tape as a guideline
• grab the right diameter of the hole saw for a comfortable fit for my sausage fingers and guesstimate a good between the holes. They should overlap but not too much. In my case 2cm turned out to be a good distance. Mark 4 spots for drilling.
• ensure board lays flat on some stable offsets and doesn't move while drilling. Also add a cardboard box or similar to catch saw dust beneath where you want to drill
• predrill the holes with a 4mm wood bit, but it is optional
• predrill about halfway through the wood from one side with the hole saw. This breaks the surface more cleanly than if you drill through from the other side. If you predrill all four holes at once, you only need to flip the board once
• flip the board
• drill all the way through with the hole saw

Drilling through the board

• sand off any sharp edges between the holes of the hole saw
• sand until smooth, from coarse to fine grit. Wrapping the sandpaper around an Edding proved to be very comfortable to reach into the hole

Sanding the grip to be comfortable

• oil the sawn edges. Use a small piece cut from a sponge held by self closing soldering tweezers to feel real professional while doing so without getting your hands dirty.
• sand again to get rid of the grain which stood up
• oil again
• use a clean part of the sponge to spread the oil which leaked into the grip tape around so there is a smooth transition between the hole and the rest

Finished product

The grip is comfortable to hold and so far I haven't noticed any difference in the handling of the board, so it was worth it in my opinion. Since Landyachtz have a pretty wide logo up top, the Z got cut away. I just blacked it out entirely and now have a Landyacht instead. Let's see if anyone will spot the difference in the wild.