On 9/11/2002 Dan Gesmer / Seismic wrote in from 152.163.xxx.xxx:

                    At risk of repetitiveness, I thought there might be some value in posting my Spring
                    2000 International Longboarder article on speed wobbles. Others have recently
                    shared very detailed and interesting thoughts on this subject. My article was
                    intended to provide a general overview of the territory, but it also includes
                    information that some may find interesting. Thanks to all for the in-depth dialogue!
 

                    "THE LOW-DOWN ON SPEED WOBBLES"
                    By Daniel Gesmer
                    printed in the Spring 2000 issue of International Longboarder Magazine

                    High-speed wobbles are an extraordinarily complex phenomenon that even leading
                    professors of mechanical engineering can’t fully explain. They’re simply a fact of life
                    for any type of flow-motion sports gear.

                    The only skateboard that might be immune to speed wobbles is one that is
                    completely incapable of tilting, turning, and flexing. Beware: Any manufacturer who
                    claims that a steerable skateboard product is totally resistant to shimmying is
                    either lying or ignorant.

                    Any skateboard that can turn or flex will also be subject, under certain conditions,
                    to speed wobbles. For extreme velocities, it is always recommended that you
                    tighten your trucks, or use stiffer bushings or springs. If your trucks make tight
                    turns easily, you should also consider slowing down their steering response with
                    angled risers, or switching to trucks made specifically for high speeds.

                    Speed wobbles can occur whenever something starts a vibration that matches a
                    resonant frequency of your skateboard. A resonant frequency is one at which your
                    skateboard will vibrate very easily; a particular skateboard may have multiple
                    resonant frequencies. The impetus may be a bump in the riding surface, a rough
                    patch in the road, an unlucky movement by you, or some combination of these
                    factors. Other potential contributing factors include the small torques resulting from
                    wheel rotation and the tiny lateral oscillations that spinning wheels make if they’re
                    not aligned with absolute perfection.

                    If you start wobbling at speed, the standard advice is to crouch and try to grab the
                    deck. Touching the deck presumably lets your upper body absorb some of the
                    vibrations and probably also changes the resonant frequency of the skateboard,
                    since you’re "connecting" your upper body to it.

                    In 1979 racing legend John Hutson assisted in a presentation made by the Stanford
                    Mechanical Engineering Department, in which the stability of skateboards at
                    various speeds was compared with that of aircraft. What emerged is that like
                    aircraft, skateboards go through various "zones" of oscillatory stability and
                    instability as they accelerate up to their highest speeds. One might even compare
                    this to musical notes or octaves of relative vibrational resonance. For example, a
                    particular setup might be stable up to 30mph, prone to wobbles at 40mph, but
                    stable again at 50mph.

                    However, this absolutely does not mean that if you start wobbling just go faster and
                    things will smooth out! It may be the case that a given skateboard will be unstable
                    at all speeds beyond a certain threshold. Be careful out there.

                    Skateboard design factors which effect vulnerability to speed wobbles are
                    numerous and extremely complex. Obviously the trucks’ steering geometry and
                    control system play a central role. Trucks which steer more slowly, with stiff
                    suspension elements, are better at rolling with the punches and absorbing a wide
                    variety of vibrations.

                    Trucks with neutral or even "trailing" caster, as opposed to "leading" caster, may
                    also help fend off wobbles. Without going into excruciating technical detail, caster
                    relates to the position of the wheel axle relative to the steering axis. Trailing caster
                    means that the deck’s center-of-gravity actually has to rise a bit in order for the
                    deck to tilt. Thus gravity itself lends a hand in stopping wobbles before they get out
                    control.

                    Your deck’s torsional flexural characteristics also play into the skateboard’s overall
                    vulnerability to speed wobbles. There are at least two factors to consider here:
                    torsional flexibility and torsional resilience (the "snap" with which your deck
                    rebounds from a twisted state). Others may have more to say about this, but for
                    pure balls-out speed the theoretical prescription would be a deck that offers good
                    torsional stiffness and excellent torsional dampening (the ability to absorb
                    deck-twisting forces without throwing the energy back in your face).

                    The most skateboard engineers can do is minimize a specific deck-truck-wheel
                    combination’s vulnerability to wobbles on a specific downhill course. It may be
                    theoretically possible to "tune" a skateboard to wobble at certain speeds and not
                    others, to increase its stability at higher velocities. However, the mathematical
                    models needed to drive that sort of R&D would have to be extraordinarily
                    sophisticated and would need to account for not just the skateboard’s numerous
                    design parameters but also specific riding surface characteristics and the rider’s
                    body mass distribution and racing technique. Good luck!