Friday, July 10, 2009

Griptape Eraser


Was just reading this Ryan Gallant Welcome to Circa interview and he talks about cleaning his griptape a lot.

A friend of mine had gotten a Vision Grip Brick back in the late 80's, which was this tan block of soft gummy stuff. It was extremely good at removing dust from your griptape and the stuff lasts forever. If you step in dog shit or get bird crap or wet mud/dirt on your grip, this thing is not going to help remove it. I ended up inheriting the grip brick and had it for several years and it barely had a dent in it. I told myself that I wouldn't quit skating until the day it wore out. I ended up losing it at some point in the early 90's, which totally sucked. Several years later, I was at my local skate shop and they had this giant sander in the back room for sanding the bases of snowboards. Turns out the grip brick is just a belt sander cleaner. They had a bunch of these and I ended up with a new griptape cleaner. Stoked! Now with this one, I told myself I wouldn't quit skating until the day it wore out. The pic above is the sucker today. It's 15+ years old. Pretty sure my body will reject skateboarding (due to the abuse it puts on it) before the griptape cleaner wears out.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was actually trying to get my hands on one of those for a bit. Thanks!

Karoumy said...

i still have one of the little blocks you left in the trunk of my old car years ago.

33% God said...

I've used that pup...

Evan said...

nothing better than seeing your clean grip again after a dusty session at the park. thanks for the tip.

Gig-e said...

Dude, that was my OG block of Vision Rip Grip!!! Used to stash it in the G&S skate pouch along with the Elephant skate wrench, the Tracker tool an extra kingpin and some keys and change. Those things were an open invitation to some bruised kidney action!!

Keith said...

yeah Gig-e!

How's the golf this year? I've been playing here a lot lately. Lots of water but the greens are seriously the best in the Lower Mainland.