Canterbury student comes up with rough-and-ready skateboard

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Fri, 14 Oct 2011 6:00a.m.

Waterhouse wanted a board that could bust through broken ground

Waterhouse wanted a board that could bust through broken ground

By Kloe Palmer

If you're wandering around the University of Canterbury these days you may have seen a new kind of skateboard.

It was designed by an engineering student simply to make getting between lectures quicker.

It has a few extra features that help it to cope with the city's quake-damaged terrain.

For instance, it has twelve wheels as opposed to the traditional four. Four's faster, but twelve can take trickier tracks. 

“I came up with idea for being able to go down stairs on a long board with these trucks and now I can go over stairs, across curbs, I can go over potholes since it’s Christchurch and all the holes now,” says engineering student Adam Waterhouse.

This board works on a simple three wheel rotation design, sliding down steps with ease and reaching destinations quicker and slicker.

Waterhouse wanted a board that could bust through broken ground without bucking. 

“Every time you get on it and have a ride everyone seems to crowd around and really love it, just because it's something new every time you carry it around everyone asks what it is. Yep you get quite a bit of attention from it,” he says.

Right now the campus cruiser is just a prototype, but Mr Waterhouse is looking to sell it for someone else to perfect.

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Comments

14 Oct 2011 09:36p.m.

Adam Waterhouse wrote:

Thanks Dariius, Am going to look into introducing it to skate companies to find if there is any interest, and currently finishing filing a Patent for the idea so i can do this safely.

14 Oct 2011 03:32p.m.

Dariius Lorenz wrote:

Brilliant idea! An almost all terrain skateboard. Maybe if your looking for someone to perfect/refine on it, Mr. Waterhouse should look at approaching some of the board makers to see if they would take it on for their lines?