# Wall Ride?



## mtnbikerride (May 11, 2007)

Does a wall ride have to be at a certain angle to be considered a wall ride? 45degrees, 20degrees? What is standard for the professionally build wall rides? Thanks


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## jhn (Dec 27, 2007)

Doesn´t wall is vertical? so you can make what you want:thumbsup:


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## Skookum (Jan 17, 2005)

i think so, but i doubt there's a technical line between a big berm and wall ride. Kind of like what defines a rock between a stone. Each extreme end is pretty obvious, but inbetween is pretty gray and why shouldn't it be.


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## FM (Apr 30, 2003)

There was lots of debate about wall ride vs. wooden berm when we built this sucker.

Who cares, as long as it's fun to ride! :thumbsup:

This one is 65 degrees at it's steepest part, flattening out about 5 degrees every 4'. It's about 30' long. It came put pretty much perfect- it could be steeper or taller, but probably not both unless the radius was tighter too.


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## dburatti (Feb 14, 2004)

mtnbikerride said:


> Does a wall ride have to be at a certain angle to be considered a wall ride? 45degrees, 20degrees? What is standard for the professionally build wall rides? Thanks


As far as I know, there's no professional standard for wall rides. If one were to use a drawing or a written instruction that shows exact measurements, etc., then that gives the lawyers something to litigate about.

Here's a wall ride I drove a few nails into in Burns Lake, BC, while helping Jay Hoots and the local club build it.










D


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## Streamline.by.design (Apr 27, 2007)

If I were to talk about the differences between the two in simplest terms I would say: A berm is fast paced curb that flows with the trail, a wall ride is a stunt involving going airborne for at least a moment of time. 

You could have a berm base to a wall ride but they would be two different things.
That is just my opinion.


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## jasevr4 (Feb 23, 2005)

FM do you have any advice for building a wooden berm like that?

It would be a bit of a shame to build something like that, then ride it and find out that it is all wrong..


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## mtb777 (Nov 6, 2005)

I ve seen some secret photos of excellent constructed wood work by a top notch trail builder and they were using round timber for the horizontal members instead of the 4 x 4 types in the photos and they seem to make the transitions and joints fit an flow way better! Just a stolen thought. That work looks really cool though. I personally haven't done much wood work for TTF's, but work in the construction field and know that complex curves and angles work on curved surfaces way better than a non- matching angle. You get a more bearing on a curved surface than a flat unless they match perfectly.


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## FM (Apr 30, 2003)

jasevr4 said:


> FM do you have any advice for building a wooden berm like that?
> 
> It would be a bit of a shame to build something like that, then ride it and find out that it is all wrong..


for sure! Well, a few things we learned and a few things that worked well..

The first thing we did was put in the back row of vertical 4x4 posts, which are spaced about 4' apart and define the outside radius. Once these were in place, we modeled the entire wall ride out of string to figure out where the inside footings needed to go. Some people thought this was a waste of time and we lost a few volunteers while we did this but it really helped me see where things were going. So bring a ball of string!

if you look at those pix and think about it, you'll see that the diagonal 2x6's (which are parallel to the rungs) which the stringers are mounted onto aren't really required at all. We could have just post-holed the vertical supports and mounted the stringers right to those. But that would have made it really difficult to visualize the angles before we decked the stringers with rungs. So basically, don't hesitate to use some extra wood and "over-build" if it helps you visualize the end result and troubleshoot as you build.

This one's hard to explain- you have to be very careful about changes in steepness. use and angle finder. we did 5 degrees every 4'. If you try to make an area steeper, the bottom of that area needs to move outside as well, or you end up with a "lump". Again anything that helps you visualize is a good thing.

There's some good info on www.nsmb.com too, the wall ride on salvation (mt. seymour) was definitely an inspiration for this one. I like ours better though!


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## jasevr4 (Feb 23, 2005)

Thanks FM. We are starting off with a dirt berm but I doubt it will be "enough". We'll be pulling some serious speed into it and changing direction 180 degrees in a small space, so the potential angle of a wooden berm would definitely help.


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## wookie freeride (Apr 10, 2007)

*Here is ours*

The set up feature is a wood drop to wood lander that leads to the wallride. Hopefully this gives you some ideas. It is 8ft tall and 24ft long.


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## mbmb65 (Jan 13, 2004)

Plywood?


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## AMMAROO (May 6, 2007)

Ghettto


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## wookie freeride (Apr 10, 2007)

*yes*

plywood and get-oooo... I agree, but you gotta start somewhere


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## spotthedogg (Oct 30, 2004)

I was like "is that **** chip board?"


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## thumpduster (Nov 19, 2008)

It's OSB, as in Offley Shittey Board. 

Plywood everywhere takes offense when the two are confused.


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## Trail Ninja (Sep 25, 2008)

You know that could last a few years if they want to keep slapping deck coating on it. Like every 3 months or so. It looks like a pretty low traffic area.

I have an almost flat roof on a shed that's OSB and it's ten years old. Every time I have paint left over from something, it goes on the shed roof.


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## PepperJester (Jan 2, 2003)

One thing we've talked about in school - in regards to wall rides - is to make sure the spacing on your boards is really tight. The last thing you want is space for some ones fingers to get stuck, would be really bad times.

I just checked the Whistler Standards and there is no mention there of wall ride specs.


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## quietcornerrider (Jun 6, 2009)

Trail Ninja said:


> You know that could last a few years if they want to keep slapping deck coating on it. Like every 3 months or so. It looks like a pretty low traffic area.
> 
> I have an almost flat roof on a shed that's OSB and it's ten years old. Every time I have paint left over from something, it goes on the shed roof.


The reason the roof is still there is that, believe it or not, OSB USED to be decent stuff. Not great, but decent. When I worked in the lumberyard, we watched the quality of OSB degrade in less than 1 year. The mills use a lot more sawdust, less glue, and less time compressing the board compared to what they used to. So you end up with a sheet of OSB that soaks up moisture like a sponge.

You can see the difference if you take a sheet of no name cheap OSB and a quality product like, Advantech (No affiliation, just the first good brand that came to mind), and drop them both in a bucket of water, the Advantech hardly absorbs any moisture at all. The other stuff is pulp by morning.

So you could use a GOOD OSB product and it would stand the tests of time, but the cost would be astronomical.

This is all speculative, and I'm sure different mills in different parts of the country make better of worse stuff, this is just based on the eyeball test from working in the lumberyard.

Someone here will no doubt work in an OSB mill and set me straight.


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## herbn (Sep 17, 2005)

walls are vertical.if it's a natural wall, i'd consider it a wall at maybe 75+ degrees. There has to be an open gap between the approaching ramp and the "wall" or i consider it a vertical berm.Air on, air off, or at least a kink(on the way off) that you need to pull up on the bars for. There is some grey zone. Fewer people will commit to a real wall ride, the easier it is the more likely it is that it's a vertical berm. Hhmm just thought of this, maybe the proportions of the arc that you make determine the difference between a wall ride and a vertical berm. A wall ride might be four feet up a vertical wall with a distance covered of less than 10 feet,compare to a vertical berm where you might go 4 feet up a vertical wall on a 20 or 30 foot carve.


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## Trail Ninja (Sep 25, 2008)

Here, I meant to put this link up a few days ago. This is 2 years of building by one guy. (not me)

http://bb.nsmb.com/showthread.php?t=46318&page=43


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