Skimboarding: What it is and how to make your own board

Plain and simple: I love Skimboarding.

My brother introduced me to it about 5 years ago and since then i have not looked back. Not having the funds to buy a skimboard, i followed my brother and constructed my own out of wood.

I am writing this hub just to share one of my favorite hobbies with everyone on hubpages and hope it will be informative, interesting, and helpful.

Whats in this hub:

• What is skimboarding?
• Different types of skimboarding - flatland and beach
• How to make your own skimboard
• resources

 For those of you out there who do not know what skimboarding is, or are unsure of its distictions, here is some basic information about skimbarding.

Skimboarding is done with a slightly curved board that has a completely flat bottom. A skimboard is similar to a surfboard, except it is shorter and has no fins.

To skimboard, a person will hold onto the board while standing on land and then run, drop the board on shallow water, and jump onto it and ride standing on it until it slows and stops.

skimboarders usually go to beaches, where the water breaks on a soft sandy beach, or long shallow puddles to skimboard. (more information below about beach and flatland skimbarding)

Skimboarding is a more recent phenomenon. I will not go into the history of it, but only to say it has only recently become popular.

There are two very different types of skimboarding. One is Flatland skimboarding. It is called flatland skimboarding because it is usually done on level ground with a long shallow puddle to skimboard on. Slow moving shallow rivers or even puddle covered fields are common locations.

Beach skimboarding on the other hand is, as its name implies, done on the beach. A beach skimboarder will try to skimboard on the part of the beach where the waves are breaking and leave a shallow layer of water over the sand. Beach skimboarding is a little bit trickyer because you have to time you skims with the waves. Some beach skimboards will skim parrallel to the beach, while others go striaght at the waves choosing to either ramp off them or turn and come back into shore riding them.

I personally have tried both flatland and beach skimboarding. They each have differences and which ever one you choose to do probably depends a lot on whether you have a beach or puddle availible to skim on.

I enjoy beach skimboarding because it is more difficult and more unpredictable. You do not know what the waves will do and you can sometimes catch some really crazy ones.

However, flatland skimbarding allows you to work on your technical skills such as tricks and spins. I do not think i will go into that here but i will say that i enjoy working on new skimboard tricks while flatland skimboarding.

I have made my own skimboards and even made some that i sold to others. I would say that you could probably make your own skimbard for much less than what it costs to buy a good one, but it does take a fair amount of time and energy. There are lots of great skimboards out there that you can buy so weigh your options.

For me, i simply did not have the money to buy a good skimboard, and i felt adventurous enough to make my own. So here are the basic steps to make your very own wood skimboard.

8 Steps on How to Make Your Own Wood Skimboard

Step One: find a peice of wood about 1/4 in thick to 1/3 in that is at least 5ft by 3ft or so. Plywood often works great. You have to find a good balence between your board being to heavy, and too weak so test different thicknesses out to find what works for you.

Step two: draw the shape of the skimboard on your plywood. Look online at various designs and choose a simple one you can cut out. Be creative if you want, i have been and sometimes i have come up with some great designs. You basically want some sort of water drop shape - a point for the front that widens at the middle and then tapers off again.

Step three: cut out your design. You can use a band saw, or anything that will cut it cleanly and straight. Make sure you are careful!

Step four: sand down the board. At this step you want to round the edges of the top of the board, and leave the edges of the bottom of the board as they are. Give the whole board a good sanding.

Step five: give your board some Rocker. What this means is bend your board so it curves up at the nose, curving up towards you if you were standing on it. What you do not want is for it to curve downward which will cause it to dive into the water everytime you try to skimbaord. So to give it this curve, soak the board in water for several days, then take it out and put a small piece of wood or something under the nose and then stack a fair amount of weight ontop. you want the board to sag in the middle and for the nose to curve up.

Step six: when the board is all dry, sand it again. This is your final sanding, so make it smooth!

step seven: paint your board. use oil based paint to cover your board. you want to seal the wood and provide a protective layer. I use spraypaint and my board has a lot of layers on it.

Other Options besides painting your board: You can also lacquer your board or but a finish or stain on it. what you want is just something that will keep it watertight and protect it. I have also used resin and fiberglass on some of my boards and this works really well, but it is a bit more costly and difficult.

step eight: Test it out! go and try out your board! if your first board is not all that great, thats ok! mine was not! just take what you learned and make a better one. I found that the more boards i made, the better i made them. so do not worry if your first is less than perfect.

Finally, Good luck and i hope you get to enjoy skimboarding as much as i do!

 If you are looking for more information, you can post a comment and i can get back to you, or you can simply look it up online! There is tons of information on a bunch of great sites so just google it and i am sure you will find an answer.

But leave a comment if you want anyway!