Inexpensive Skateboard Ramp or Half-pipe

Skateboarding has come a long way since we were kids with our skinny short boards. Kids have turned it from rolling down the drive to a competitive sport. With more and more kids involved the police and building owners have all but banned boarding in all but the most dangerous places. Today we are going to look into some of the options that you have and how they can turn your backyard into the place to be. A few years ago, my boys got into skateboarding. Since I was into spoiling my kids at every turn, I decided to build them a half-pipe. I decided to build them a twenty-five foot long, eight foot wide half-pipe with a landing eight foot high on each end. Sounds tiny doesn’t it? Once I had decided on such a large project, I did a materials estimate along with a preliminary plan. (Insert your favorite expletive here) was this going to get expensive. At the time I was working for a company called AMPS (Americas Music Production Services) where we built sets for traveling productions.

While trying to make more storage space for all of the supplies we had at work, we decided to get a bunch of free pallets and spread them out on the lawn. After we spread the pallets out, we screwed plywood sheets on top of it and presto, we had a surface that we could drive a tow-motor on. This gave me an idea. The next week we went to our local newspaper publisher and took all of the free pallets from behind the building. (several different types of business will give you their left over pallets just for hauling them off) We took them home and made a base twenty-five feet long and eight feet wide, then we proceeded to screw three quarter sheets of plywood on top of them. After we had a decent flat base, we took four pieces of three quarter inch ply and cut them on a radius to make our ramps on either end. Once these were cut, we screwed two by fours across from one side to another, (picture a electrical spool cut in half) which gave us our framing for the ramps on either end.

Now that we had our base and our framing for our ramps, we built a platform on either end using pallets for the framing. It all went together simple and quick. To make our ramps on each end solid, we took half inch plywood and leaned them against the ramps and kept them wet for a couple of days. This allowed them to warp to the curve without breaking the layers in the plywood. Gently over the next few days we gradually screwed down two layers of the half inch plywood on the radius. Then we proceeded to cover our platforms with three quarter inch plywood. Once we finished, ta-da we had a twenty-five foot long half-pipe with a eight foot high platform on either end and two ramps to reach the platforms (we left the ends open and used it for storage, however you could install doors so that your kids can store bikes or boards etc.) My kids loved this monstrosity, they had the largest half-pipe in three counties and as a result, every kid in the country wanted to come over and skate. The one thing that I required was that each child had to have their parents sign a waiver.(which a lawyer can make up for you for next to nothing, do not neglect this step as you don’t want to loose everything because some kid is clumsy) (by the way, no one ever got hurt on ours)

The project that originally was going to cost me a couple thousand dollars ended up only costing a few hundred. The stroke of genius was using the pallets as the base for the framing. The pallets also keep the whole thing off the ground where it is less likely to rot. If you build one the same as ours or you decide to go smaller, I would suggest that you have all their friends come over and have a paint party. This way they can personalize the project and protect it from weather damage. If you have soft spots anywhere in the ramp, take the material out to the framing and replace, covering it will only delay the ultimate result. My kids got about five years out of their half-pipe before it deteriorated to the point that I had to take it down. Considering that it cost next to nothing to build, it didn’t bother me at all. By the time it was finished, they had pretty much grown out of that phase in life.

Using this system, you can build flats, half-pipes, ramps and even install piping for grind rails. ( I had a welder friend of mine make grind rails for my boys which cost me about fifteen dollars each compared to the store bought variety which can go for two hundred dollars or more) This method will give your kids and their friends a safe place to skate without costing you a fortune. It will also prevent them getting into trouble for vandalism or property damage. It is worth every penny. One of the great things about it is that it absorbs their landings as they fall compared with concrete. If you cannot figure out how to build a half-pipe or some other combination for your kids simply by reading this article, feel free to contact me and maybe we can get you a plan. Stay tuned for more information on everything from spoiling your kids to spoiling yourself…..same bat time, same bat channel…..