Best skateboard wheels for dolly?

Tim O'Connor · August 28, 2008

I know that this has been discussed a lot so I searched the forum and the seemingly most

concise thread of the consensus on this topic, or lack of consensus, seems to be summarized in this

thread

I would like to make a skateboard dolly this weekend. In the above thread, people start out discussing using wheels that are rated with a hardness from 85 or so up to a 100 on the durometer scale.

A manufacturer responds saying that his company had researched the issue and had found that a much softer wheel, a 60A, works best.

I can get a good number of the soft wheels, designed for film industry use, fairly soon. Since this thread, have any of you developed new and or stronger opinions about what wheels work best. I want to use wheels that are ideal for 1 1/2" track, steel or PVC.

What hardness would you recommend and what size?

Also, here is a picture of some 1 1/2' PVC track that the production rented. I'd love to know how they made these curves. I know that there was a thread a week or so ago about heating, bending and baking the track. Has anybody found a good way to do that?

Ira Ratner · August 30, 2008

What a coincidence, since I'm headed to Home Depot in a few minutes to get the rest of the parts for mine.

It turns out that before starting "production" of my masterpiece, I learned that my skateboard wheels are a total bust. The engineer at work pointed out to me that they didn't have real bearings (they were from kiddie skateboards) and wouldn't consistently turn correctly. He suggested wheels from in-line skates, and since I had a brand-new pair with great bearings that have been sitting in my closet for 5 years, I'm using those.

I has this crazy idea about EXERCISING way back then, but fortunately, I got that out of my head after one cruise around the park. (My ankles STILL hurt.)

You're probably right about softer wheels.

My dolly is going to be T-shaped, not rectangle like the one you pictured. (You won't be able to ride on it, which is okay, because I don't have anyone to push me anyway!) The outside leg, the bottom of the T, has the two pairs of wheels only a few inches apart to ride on the outside track. I'll then cover the entire T with a felt-covered triangular piece of plywood.

Here is the bare bones basic on bending PVC:

http://www.wgsc.com/pvc/how-to-bend-pvc-pipe.htm

The trick is doing the math and making a jig. In other words, if I was making an 8-foot diameter or 16-foot diameter circle (we'll just talk circles for the example here), your jig for each would still be, for example, 24" long by 12" wide. The jig is just a piece of ply (like 3/4") with either wooden pegs sticking out of it to the correct curve, or a raised piece of material (could be layered ply or even metal) that follows the correct radius/curve. You then heat with the gun slowly and move your long piece of PVC little by little, bending it to the curve.

Hopefully, BOTH of our arsenals will eventually contain several jigs at various radiuses, all of which will make a correct circle. For me right now, I want to make an 8' radius semi-circle. But damn if I know how to do the math to figure out the radius to make the jig. I don't have a clue.

At the office, I have a link to a guy who works in metal, and he gets really deep into jig-making, except for that elusive math. (I'll send it to you Tuesday.) The thing is, his stuff is a lot of overkill, because since he's bending all kinds of steel, his jigs are made like tanks, whereas ours can just be wood.

Edited August 30, 2008 by Ira Ratner