For the past 8+ years, I've only skated Alien and Habitat boards. This is primarily because of the Schmitt wood and shapes, which I seem to get along with quite well. I have two Alien boards at the moment that I got via mail order and one of them has a PS Stix serial number while the other has this Made in Mexico sticker. It appears Alien/Habitat is having their boards pressed by more than one wood shop. I used to be able to just pick out any Alien board with a given width and not take any time to adjust to it. They just felt perfect to me. Those days appear to be gone.
Every time I stop by a skate shop, I'll check out the Alien/Habitat decks and I'm seeing fewer and fewer with PS serial numbers and more and more with the Mexico sticker. Not good! I've yet to skate my Mexican Alien board. The primary difference I see is the Mexican one has a noticeably steeper nose and tail.
Strangely, at my last shop visit, the company that had the most PS Stix boards was Flip. I'm sure all that has changed now that they are under the NHS/Santa Cruz umbrella.
2 comments:
people make too big a deal out of board wood nowadays. i'd almost rather ride chinawood. reminds of the light flimsy world boards back in the day.
let rednecks worry about american craftsmanship, i'll ride crap over some canadian maple anyday.
I dunno about that. It's much better for me to set up a new deck from the same woodshop as my old one and not have to get used to it or make any serious adjustments.
Jumping from brand to brand, different concave/kick/pop, things can get pretty messed up for me and it takes me a while to get used to it and seeing as I get to skate twice a week max, I'd rather not.
Post a Comment