AWD “Displacer” suspension board

[Titoxd1000]

AWD “Displacer” suspension board

“There is no replacement for displacement” was the motto for this build. Heavily inspire by Psychoframe by @NoWind , once I saw it, I knew I had to build something similar with a focus more towards road riding.

This board features a metal construction with pieces cut by Sendcutsend and welded together by me. The two swing arms at each end allow the truck angle to remain the same throughout the shock travel. There is about 2 inches of travel now with even more travel planned down the line. The shocks are 150mm with rebound/compression adjustment. The tires are 10-inch Kendas.

The trucks are similar design to Liquid Fyre trucks with two pivots at each end of the hanger. This makes the trucks precise and allows you to run soft bushings. I’m running wfb tall fatcones with bigger end towards the hanger, this gives a strong center and a deep carve while riding. The angles are 45/30. These turned way better than I had hoped and make RKP feel unrideable in comparison.

I really like it so far, this platform has so much potential. A big part of building this board is my right knee (goofy stance) is not 100%. Riding E-boards has really taken a toll due to high impact on joints, especially at higher speeds. I have been easing back into skating after a couple of months hiatus and hoping this board can take me out of retirement basically. An X-ray did not show any obvious injury so that is good… What I recommend to my fellow riders is to stay away from stiff decks, (rode a CF deck, got rid of it asap), use big tires, and maintain a healthy weight. Going slow also helps, but ain’t nobody got time for that.

There are so many ways to design a board with suspension, different geometry, suspension travel, parts, materials. I would like to see what other people can come up with. There is room for improvement in this design. This build was a proof of concept for me, and I see areas where I would like to improve, mainly the overall weight of the board. I think this style of board is the direction we need to be heading in, even if my old school mentality might not want to agree.

[tech.shit]

Well there’s bajaboard, propel and etoxx as you’ve seen. Otherwise the only other suspension I’m aware of is something like this: Diy Skateboard Spring Rear Shock Absorber Bridge Skateboard Trucks Suspension 8Inch Long Board Suspension Spring| | - AliExpress

Edit: I saw your pics on IG, I want one of these displaces once they’re available. Dang cool stuff.

[Titoxd1000]

Thanks. That would be goal to get these in peoples hands, it’s a fun platform and much easier on the joints. There is a lot of R&D left to do to get to that point.

[tech.shit]

Does this require a specialized deck/chassis or can the system be retrofitted to existing truck mounting standards?

[sleepless]

Always awesome to see homebrew innovation, especially as far as suspension goes! There’s tons of opportunity to steal from other sports with wheels, frames, gears, suspension.

I’d love to see build photos if you got em

[Titoxd1000]

The plan is to use a wood deck for the next version. This is a metal frame deck currently, it is much easier to do prototyping this way. I do have ideas to make suspension truck package that bolts on to a “mountain board”. It will probably need to be on the stiffer side to handle the extra leverage.

[Titoxd1000]

Agreed. I like to call this a scooter with 4 wheels and no handle bars haha… I’m using shocks designed for scooters. I’m shopping for scooters tires with 6 inch wheels I want to try next, need to figure out the wheels. They even have 10 inch PMT tires which are premium race tires. Cartridge style suspension is also interesting, that would make things more compact… The possibilities are endless.

[Titoxd1000]

Here are some pics

[jack.luis]

Can we see a video of the suspension compressing?

[mr.shiteside]

This build is really cool but I also wanted to ask about that middle board with the carbon topmount enclosure strapped to the board. Is the builder/owner on here as well?

[DEEIF]

I don’t think Geoffrey is on the forum, he’s an EUC guy whose getting into Esk8. That’s a NorthCamp with a custom cutout and enclosure by @computers

[Titoxd1000]

I’ve been meaning to make a video of that. Going to try to get a clip focused on the trucks while offroading this weekend. Crazy seeing the hanger going side to side over bumps while riding, difficult to see how the suspension is doing.

[ApproachCautiously]

It is cool to see someone else trying to figure out adding more suspension to boards. Personally all of my ideas ended up thrown out since I don’t currently have any way to get custom cut metal and other hardware I would need.

My current best solution is to keep my board tall and use that extra height as an added buffer so I can jump right as I am about to hit a bump. That way my muscles take the impact more and my knees are spared. Doesn’t really work for continuously bumpy surfaces though. Also the height of the deck is important and I can’t get it to work on a lower/ normal height deck.

Do you not have any issues with your left knee? I ride the same way as you (right foot in the front) and I always feel the bumps the most on my left leg.

[Titoxd1000]

I don’t have any issues with my left knee. I do ride with more of my weight in front to combat speed wobbles… What helped me was switching to a flexy deck, 8 inch tires, losing weight, but the damage was done. Do not recommend riding a “raceboard” on the street even for relatively short amount of time. I do try to deweight the front over bumps but the ones I didn’t just added up I guess. I did ride areas I didn’t know a few times and those stand out having bumps I didn’t avoid.

[ApproachCautiously]

My deck is supposed to be flexy and you can clearly see it flex in videos of other people using it, but it doesn’t flex much under my weight. I wouldn’t want to try and get one that can flex on my weight though since there is a reason they don’t make decks that flexible.

I guess the difference might just be unrelated to skating then. Figured I’d ask since there is a chance my surf adapter adds a bit of extra suspension but I would need to draw out an entire force diagram to know for sure and I don’t really want to do all that work tbh. Might also just be how I shift my weight since I’m either centered or more weight on my left I think

[Titoxd1000]

My left leg gets fatigued, not from impacts I don’t think. I could see it being from impacts depending on riding style… It’s not easy making a good flexy deck. I made my own. Some of the mountain boards seem to be pretty flexible.

[tech.shit]

I ride regular and my right leg does get sore and tired, but mostly from accelerations and not as much from bumps. My front leg takes most of the bump impact but also just riding the terrain well and keeping a good stance helps a ton.

[nsteph]

Age and health is a huge factor that youngin cant appreciate. Even just hitting thirty makes a world of difference. My body was so robust and no matter the abuse i aimed at it, i just ate it uo healed up and moved on. Will definitely see, and i remain hopeful thay the simple trick of maintaining a healthy body weight goes, cus although im only about 20lb over weights, i definitely feel it in a way i didnt when i was younger. Theae days, i cracked my knee with a car door the other day and havent even thought abouy riding for two days, well see how it goes today or tomorrow. But yeah, my joints… dont like skateboards anymore.

[Titoxd1000]

Age is a factor definitely, I turn thirty this year. When you’re young it feels like nothing can stop you… Skateboards are higher impact on the joints compared to other high speed PEVs like a scooter or EUC. It took years to feel any negative effects. My concern for other riders is the potential long term effects, anything you can do to minimize those impacts will help you in the long run.

[ApproachCautiously]

I just don’t weigh enough for it to flex significantly when I’m on it. If I ever let someone else on it then it’ll flex a good amount. I wouldn’t really want to risk making a deck flexible enough to flex a lot under my weight tbh.

As for age and health my bones and muscles are basically the only part of me that acts my age. My old PCP was treating people 3x my age as his standard patients because the rest of my health is a dumpster fire. On the plus side all of my joints either are hypermobile or have the potential to be so I don’t have to worry about common skate injuries like rolling an ankle or any other breaks caused by rotational force on a joint.

I also had an orthopedist give me approval for riding my electric board as well as a physical therapist. The physical therapist didn’t approve of manual boards but that was due to it building muscle mass unevenly and not due to it being unsafe for me.