Inexpensive Saftety Gear

**blahblahx** · 10-25-2009 11:20 AM

Hey guys. As I get more into longboarding, I was looking to get some pads/slide gloves (I already have a nice helmet).

My parents will buy the pads, but they don't want to spend too much money. Could you guys recommend some decent quality inexpensive knee pads, elbow pads, and slide gloves?

**urbanasultvehicleuav** · 10-25-2009 11:43 AM

187 pads are always a good choice

**AGENT WD-40** · 10-25-2009 11:43 AM

Well that depends on what your price range is. If you are talking really cheap, you might want to scope out a used sports store or thrift store or something, they usually have random pads you can pick up for real cheap. If you have the money to spend a little more than the next step up would be some Pro-tecs. They arent the best pads, Ive always noticed that they slip around a little bit when you fall on them and they arent the highest quality but you can pick them up for a reasonable price if you look around. However if your parents are willing to spend a little more money for higher quality pads than I recommend the 187s all the way. Yeah they are going to be a bit more expensive than some other pads, but you get what you pay for. They are great quality, almost everyone I know that wears pads uses them and loves them and its a great company to support.

As far as slide gloves go, Gravity makes some very decent half-finger gloves that work very well in every skateboarding aspect. Ive used mine for almost 3 years now and aside from a little wear on a few places, they are still holding up strong. The wrist strap is awesome too because it not only makes the glove feel secure when you wear it, but it also gives your wrist some support at the same time. The half-finger design allows you to easily carry your board, reach into your pockets, open doors, etc..which you cant do with some other glove designs. The delrin pucks that come stock on the gloves are unreal too, they slide better than any other puck Ive ever tried. If you are looking for a high quality glove at an affordable price than I would say go with the Gravity half-fingers.

Hope this post helps man, good luck in your search.

**seabass101dg** · 10-25-2009 11:54 AM

Pick-up some pads at Big5 for dirt cheap.
Make your own slide gloves (search this).
Cheapest solution.

**SlyTX** · 10-25-2009 12:37 PM

Jeez, some of the answers I see on here are like they were posted up by a sales person for the company. The guy specified he needed something cheap, and the first response is for the second most expensive knee pad out there. Not exactly helpful if you ask me....

For all practical purposes, pro tec pads are gonna be the bottom of the barrel for longboard safety. Any of those "X games" and "industry" pad kits at K mart will be next to useless in a hard slam. The good news though is that pro tecs are not that much more expensive. You can get full knee pad and elbow pads for 45-55 bucks total.

Just make your own sliding gloves. Im not sure how to respond about the half finger gravity slide gloves recommendation, No way would I wear gloves without full fingers, but thats totally up to you. One last bit of advice, get the sliding gloves before anything else, youll be using them a lot more.

**SirKale** · 10-25-2009 01:10 PM

Originally Posted by SlyTX

Jeez, some of the answers I see on here are like they were posted up by a sales person for the company. The guy specified he needed something cheap, and the first response is for the second most expensive knee pad out there. Not exactly helpful if you ask me....

For all practical purposes, pro tec pads are gonna be the bottom of the barrel for longboard safety. Any of those "X games" and "industry" pad kits at K mart will be next to useless in a hard slam. The good news though is that pro tecs are not that much more expensive. You can get full knee pad and elbow pads for 45-55 bucks total.

Just make your own sliding gloves. Im not sure how to respond about the half finger gravity slide gloves recommendation, No way would I wear gloves without full fingers, but thats totally up to you. One last bit of advice, get the sliding gloves before anything else, youll be using them a lot more.

listen to this guy.
slide glove thread: http://www.silverfishlongboarding.co...thread-26.html

**AGENT WD-40** · 10-25-2009 01:52 PM

Originally Posted by SlyTX

Jeez, some of the answers I see on here are like they were posted up by a sales person for the company. The guy specified he needed something cheap, and the first response is for the second most expensive knee pad out there. Not exactly helpful if you ask me....

For all practical purposes, pro tec pads are gonna be the bottom of the barrel for longboard safety. Any of those "X games" and "industry" pad kits at K mart will be next to useless in a hard slam. The good news though is that pro tecs are not that much more expensive. You can get full knee pad and elbow pads for 45-55 bucks total.

Just make your own sliding gloves. Im not sure how to respond about the half finger gravity slide gloves recommendation, No way would I wear gloves without full fingers, but thats totally up to you. One last bit of advice, get the sliding gloves before anything else, youll be using them a lot more.

Come on man, yeah we might have suggested 187s but wouldnt you rather pay a little more to get knee pads that actually work?? Ive seen at least 3 of my friends wearing Pro tec knee pads and watched them slip right off during a knee slide. Which in turn resulted in some of the nastiest road rash I have ever seen. Yeah they might not be the cheapest, but they will last much longer if you take care of them and they will work better than Pro tecs. No doubt about it. Elbow pads arent as important though, Pro tecs will work fine.

As for the half-finger gloves, have you ever tried them? I dont get why everyone is so scared to use them, all you need to do is raise your fingertips and you will be fine. They are 10x more functional than most gloves on the market and your hands can actually breathe while wearing them. I agree it is much cheaper to make your own gloves, but he asked about stuff he could buy, which is why I suggested them.

**SlyTX** · 10-25-2009 03:39 PM

Originally Posted by AGENT WD-40

Come on man, yeah we might have suggested 187s but wouldnt you rather pay a little more to get knee pads that actually work?? Ive seen at least 3 of my friends wearing Pro tec knee pads and watched them slip right off during a knee slide. Which in turn resulted in some of the nastiest road rash I have ever seen. Yeah they might not be the cheapest, but they will last much longer if you take care of them and they will work better than Pro tecs. No doubt about it. Elbow pads arent as important though, Pro tecs will work fine.

As for the half-finger gloves, have you ever tried them? I dont get why everyone is so scared to use them, all you need to do is raise your fingertips and you will be fine. They are 10x more functional than most gloves on the market and your hands can actually breathe while wearing them. I agree it is much cheaper to make your own gloves, but he asked about stuff he could buy, which is why I suggested them.

Well you should really ask, is it you that would really pay the little extra to get better knee pads? The OP already stated his limitations so it implies he doesnt even have the option of paying a little more, 187's pro's are like 65 bucks.

I started off with pro tec's street knees and wore them for like 14 months. Finally the strap totally shredded so I decided on new knee pads, and went with 187's. I cant say im dissapointed in the 187s at all because im not, I just feel that the pro tecs I had before were sufficient in comparison between the two. I never had my knee pads slip in either pair, maybe its because they fit and I wore them properly. Also the 187's are pretty bulky, as in huge, and I prefer the lower profile of my former knee pads. $20 vs $60

I stopped wearing finger pucks a long time ago and sub-conciously raise my fingers when sliding, but there have been falls when in some way im putting weight on my hand and can feel my fingers dragging for sure. If there were really no safety issue, fingerless gloves would be a lot more common.

**stringtheory** · 10-25-2009 04:06 PM

Triple 8 park pack.

**AGENT WD-40** · 10-25-2009 05:33 PM

Originally Posted by SlyTX

Well you should really ask, is it you that would really pay the little extra to get better knee pads? The OP already stated his limitations so it implies he doesnt even have the option of paying a little more, 187's pro's are like 65 bucks.

I started off with pro tec's street knees and wore them for like 14 months. Finally the strap totally shredded so I decided on new knee pads, and went with 187's. I cant say im dissapointed in the 187s at all because im not, I just feel that the pro tecs I had before were sufficient in comparison between the two. I never had my knee pads slip in either pair, maybe its because they fit and I wore them properly. Also the 187's are pretty bulky, as in huge, and I prefer the lower profile of my former knee pads. $20 vs $60

I stopped wearing finger pucks a long time ago and sub-conciously raise my fingers when sliding, but there have been falls when in some way im putting weight on my hand and can feel my fingers dragging for sure. If there were really no safety issue, fingerless gloves would be a lot more common.

Well I guess every rider and every situation are different, I wore Pro-tecs for a couple weeks and after cheese-grating my knee I stopped using them. I have seen two of my friends also grind their knee down pretty bad after taking a knee slide with Pro-tecs so after that I decided it was worth it to spend the extra money for quality pads. It really just comes down to what the buyer wants and what kind of skating they are going to do with the pads. 65 bucks really isnt that much when you think about how long the pads will last for and how they will protect you from alot of injuries.

As for the gloves, same thing. I love the feeling of the fingerless gloves because of the manueverability and freedom you have.. I totally hear you that they must sacrifice a little bit of safety for the extra mobility, but some people like that.

**Bookworm** · 10-25-2009 05:38 PM

price only matters in terms of comfort and convenience for knee and elbow pads.

hard plastic and duct tape could do the job, bu hot damn I love my $60 smith scabs with their soft cushioning and fat straps.

**SlyTX** · 10-25-2009 06:54 PM

Originally Posted by Bookworm

price only matters in terms of comfort and convenience for knee and elbow pads.

hard plastic and duct tape could do the job, bu hot damn I love my $60 smith scabs with their soft cushioning and fat straps.

Reguardless of how comfortable and fat your smith scabs might be, or how protective the 187's are, it still doesnt assist the poster with his original question because they aernt inexpensive. I hate to sound like an asshole, but all of the above answers are all coming from your own perspectives in what you are looking for from a pad, not the OP. He might be looking for peoples opinions on pads based on experience, but as he stated only if they are affordable to him. 65 bucks may not be a lot in comparison to knee injuries, but 65 bucks is a lot compared to 20, thats over 3 times as much.

**Understanding In a Crash** · 10-25-2009 07:07 PM

Originally Posted by SlyTX

Reguardless of how comfortable and fat your smith scabs might be, or how protective the 187's are, it still doesnt assist the poster with his original question because they aernt inexpensive. I hate to sound like an asshole, but all of the above answers are all coming from your own perspectives in what you are looking for from a pad, not the OP. He might be looking for peoples opinions on pads based on experience, but as he stated only if they are affordable to him. 65 bucks may not be a lot in comparison to knee injuries, but 65 bucks is a lot compared to 20, thats over 3 times as much.

I agree with this but at the same time I'd spent the money to save my knees from serious injury.

**Daniel M.** · 10-25-2009 07:10 PM

187 pros, its such a worthwhile investment. I along with many others swear by them.

**KingKang** · 10-25-2009 07:17 PM

if you only fall on you knees and not the side, triple eights are pre sweet around 30-40 bucks
have decent padding and double straps on the back just dont fall on the sides of them
they'll get destroyed

**assumeivan** · 10-25-2009 07:24 PM

black velvet slide pucks

**Barf** · 10-25-2009 07:55 PM

Whichever pads you get (I love my 187pros, BTW), have a look here:

The 187 : YourCornerStore

They've got good deals on helmets, too.

**Cann0n** · 10-25-2009 07:59 PM

Duct Tape and wood.

**Bookworm** · 10-26-2009 12:59 AM

Originally Posted by SlyTX

Reguardless of how comfortable and fat your smith scabs might be, or how protective the 187's are, it still doesnt assist the poster with his original question because they aernt inexpensive. I hate to sound like an asshole, but all of the above answers are all coming from your own perspectives in what you are looking for from a pad, not the OP. He might be looking for peoples opinions on pads based on experience, but as he stated only if they are affordable to him. 65 bucks may not be a lot in comparison to knee injuries, but 65 bucks is a lot compared to 20, thats over 3 times as much.

the first sentence answered his question. plastic will protect your elbows and knees from getting scraped up when you bail. black velvet slide pucks on your jeans and a big PVC elbow cut up on each elbow, you're protected. problem solved.