Broken Knuckle FingerboardsComplete Review by Xi Jin
I have been fingerboarding for 11 years, finally picking up a sponsorship from Close Up in the last half year. I have been involved with the online scene on FFI, FBHQ and YouTube; Currently, I am a moderator on FBHQ. I have written fingerboard product reviews before as I am genuinely interested in fingerboard products and want to share the information. This is my 10th review.
As for experience with decks, I have had 26 different types of wooden fingerboards and have tried many more.
This board is a complete built with the original parts in the pack. I started using the board in November 2011 for over a month as a non-main board. The period of time elapsed since first using it is more than enough to write a review on it.
I pretty much just copy and paste this same format for all my reviews to save hassle. I personally prefer text-based reviews as opposed to video reviews as the reader can choose to read it at their own pace instead of being forced to follow the speed of the reviewer and who can often trail-off topic. I like to write my reviews detailed with enough information for potential buyers to know everything about the product before purchasing.
I apologise for using webcam pictures in the review. At the time of obtaining the product, my phone's 8.1MP camera, which I normally used, broke. I know both are low quality and I intend to buy a better camera this year.
Board setup - All from BKF
Company ProfileBroken Knuckle Fingerboards is a company usually percieved as a "China company". Their mass produced mass produced Chinese products they distribute include tape, bearing wheels, screws, nuts. I believe their trucks are custom painted to the non-standard colours. I am unsure where the truck tuning sets originate from but their decks are made in the USA. They have many different molds for their decks. They also have stickers. BKF primarily sells cheap complete boards that are attractive to newcomers, partly with the Chinese products to keep prices low. BKF regularly holds online contests, usually requiring videos for entries. This way, they can give out lots of boards to different people instead of having a regular team that gets all the free products from the company.
Website:
http://www.brokenknucklefb.com/Deck graphic - "OREP"
Deck StatisticsDeck Length: 101mm
Deck Width: 29mm
Nose and Tail concaves (dips): low
Rail to rail concave: low
Ply Construction: 4-ply, top to bottom - natural, natural, dark red, natural
Kicks: medium, 30-30, medium-short length
Asymmetry: no, it is symmetrical
Kingpin holes: none
I should note that this is the 30-30-05 mold deck, BKF also do decks in different molds.
Top of deck
Transaction DetailsPrice: -
Shipping cost: -
Time to arrive: -
I personally won this board from the BKF End of Summer contest in August. I was one of 4 winners in the contest and my prize was that I could select any deck, trucks and wheels for a free complete board. They also sent an extra 3-pack of tape and some BKF stickers.
I cannot really comment on shipping time but it was a long time for them to send it from the US to my home in the UK. Unfortunately, they took a few extra weeks than I anticipated and I left the UK to work in China. After waiting for this package and another package, my mum posted everything to China which took around another month.
Picture of the packaging
PackagingThe packaging is reasonably well designed. Everything is put into suitably sized baggies with a printed card stapled on top with information on what is inside each packet.
Another angle of the top
Deck shape from side
Set up
Deck CraftsmanshipThe deck I personally received was OK in terms of craftsmanship.
With my deck:
The rails are perfectly perpendicular.
The kicks are perfectly shaped and round.
The lacquer is adequate and covers the entire board.
The mounting holes are countersunk but I think the countersinks aren't wide enough for the China screws; the screws go in but stick out a tiny bit. The positioning of the holes are also inconsistent and I could only manage to mount 7 screws after some effort but it's not disasterous and still works.
The bottom graphic appears to be a sticker or some kind of paper graphic and with a layer of lacquer over it. This was very disappointing to discover after sessioning the deck for a couple of weeks, the graphic started peeling up. Whilst the method of applying the graphic had no faults, the quality of this type of graphic application is not very good and people using one as a main board would suffer a peeling graphic much quicker than I did.
The top ply is very clean and smooth. It also has a nice combination of 3 stamps in different colours for a complete top BKF branding.
The plies are done nicely and are more colourful than the previous generation.
I personally think that the deck I chose was an old deck and they are probably able to make decks with better holes now but I wouldn't guarentee it.
Holes & 7 screws
Foam Tape - China tapeThis is a short section, reviewing China tape for people who have not used it. China tape isn't all that bad although I would much rather recommend other tapes if they are available to you. China tape is a smooth style tape, grippy and is very thin. The thin attribute of the tape gives you better feel of the deck but is much weaker. If you are applying the tape, you should be careful or you could cut it wrong like I did. It might tape a few uses of the tape to get used to applying it. Also, putting the board unprotected in my pocket with my keys has the potential to really destroy the tape.
I do understand BKF are using the tape alongside the decks to produce the low priced complete package though.
Wheels - China bearing wheelsFor the same purpose as the previous section, these are my thoughts on the China wheels included in the BKF package. Note, there are many types of China wheels although this is the most common type. The wheels are more square compared to most fingerboard wheels but it isn't too bad of a shape. The main criticisms of China wheels lie in the quality control of the bearings, which often have wheels with bad bearings. Next is the material of the wheels which feels like some kind of cheap plastic and the sound and feel of rolling these wheels almost reaches the level of ew that makes me cringe... but it's still usable and much better than non-bearing wheels. Another point is that the wheels are molded rather than lathed so they aren't perfectly round and have marks from the mold. One of the things I quite dislike about these wheels are that they aren't backless when clearly they are mainly used with standard China trucks; this means that the backs of the wheels will have a lot of friction against the hanger, wearing the wheels and makes rolling difficult. Many BR/Y edition wheels can be like that but China wheels are clearly not for use on those types of trucks so this positioning of the bearings is a very poor design. It was also strange that I could not tighten every nut on every axle to allow each wheel to spin, some had to be superglued.
Wheels + Trucks
Trucks & TuningNow, these trucks are standard China trucks and I am sure most of you are familiar with China trucks so I won't go into detail about them. However, this is a custom "O-GLO" paint job. I chose the trucks to match the deck graphic but also wanted a colour that was a little different from the standard colours you get with China trucks. The colour is very vibrant and bright but I am not sure if it shows in the pictures. The paint retains quite well and it's not too different from other painted trucks.
The tuning is in the form of a steel inverted kingpin with a phillips head, a large and small bushing with a large and small washer for each truck. Fortunately, the kingpin hole on the baseplate is already enlarged to enable easy application of the inverted kingpin. Unfortunately, whilst these appear to be good tuning, it just doesn't work. The thickness of the bushings in addition to the thickness of the kingpin head make it impossible to have the kingpin head lower than the truck hanger, even if you tightened the kingpin extremely hard. This means the kingpin heads will get in the way of pretty much every grind.
Overall PerformanceI've skated the board for over a month and it's not that bad. People assume that BKF decks are China decks so this one reason why I decided to review it. Performance wise, the deck is almost comparable to a Redemption MMC but without the mellow qualities. The feel of the kicks, response of the pop and general shape remind me of the Redemption. In any case, this board ranks low on the decks I have tried but it's not a bad deck. It was also let down by the holes although they are still functional. I think it is a viable option for beginners to use but still, I believe there are better options for the same price range. I have had much better responding decks with better performing shapes which is why this deck ranks below many others. I detailed the problem with the kingpins sticking out over the hanger which get in the way of all grinds and the wheels are some of the worst bearing wheels there are (although much better than non-bearing wheels). With these issues and the wide availability of other options at a low price, I would not recommend buying the complete as a main board. If you happened to break something from your setup and had very little funds, I suppose you could buy parts as a temporary replacement.
I must mention that this review is just what I think about the board. Reading/watching multiple reviews by different people is definitely recommended.
Where to purchaseYou can buy BKF completes directly from their website,
http://brokenknucklefingerboards.com/Current prices at the time of writing this review are:
Decks - $17
Trucks - $8
Wheels - $6
Tape - $1
You may use this review and pictures, in part or in full, as long as you credit it to me and get permission from me in a PM.
Konata sneaks up on Miku!
If you have read this review and it was useful, please reply! Review threads don't always get a lot of replies, even if they are read. If you didn't like this review, please tell me why so I can improve! I am available to review other products should you have any products you want reviewing. Otherwise, I will continue to review whatever that takes my fancy.
Next review - Tech Deck Expert Sk8, Enjoi graphic, high concave/hard wheels.
Coulda saved me $5 ahha
