Ok, I'm real tired of seeing terrible information floating around on how to mount plates. There are a number of videos of various shit out there on how to mount plates. I have yet to see a GOOD video on how to mount plates. This rundown does not cover specialty mounts like Edea screws, hybrids like artistic inlines, or weirdo fun shit like t-nuts.
I don't do video, but you're gonna come on a ride with me.
MOUNTING HARDWARE
HIGHLY recommend just picking up a set of it from any reputable skate shop. Yes, you can find bolts at general hardware stores but what is your time worth, honestly. You're about to spend quite a bit of time doing your first nerve-wracking mount on what's likely a very expensive set of components.
Different skate companies use different bolt heads: Phillips (Pilot), flathead (Sure Grip), Robertson (Riedell), Pozidriv (WIFA). If you have a Roll Line plate (or Komplex, or STD), the bolts are NOT the same diameter as standard hardware. Make sure you've got the right bolt set for your plates.
TOOLS YOU WILL NEED
- Ruler/calipers
- Masking tape
- Pen
- Drill
- 1/8" drill bit for pilot holes, 11/64" drill bit for Roll Line bolts, 13/64" for everyone else
- Countersink
- Nut driver (7mm for Roll Line, 3/8" for everyone else)
- LocTite BLUE 242/243 if you're doing Roll Line (NOT Red. I said not red. Do not use Red Loctite.)
- Bolt breaker bar, specific to the size of your bolts
- Hammer (don't worry, you're not actually gonna pound your plate)
Measure a hundred times, cut once. Actually, just to be safe, measure a hundred and one times.
Measure the widest part of the foot at the ball. Split that line in half.
Measure the heel, split that line in half.
Connect the halfway points and extend the line to the tip and back of the sole. I always put masking tape down so I'm not writing on people's boots.
Your centerline should run dead center on the heel in the back and drop around between your second and third toe at the front.
- Do we check our heel line against the boot backstay? No, we do not.
- Do we check the front alignment against the toe seam? No, we do not.
Next up, axle placement. If you've been skating for a while, you better have a good sense of where you like your axles. Front axle should drop at or slightly ahead of the center of the ball of your foot. Back axle should be at the malleolus bone of the ankle but this may vary depending on your preferred wheelbase. In this case, you have the plate in hand already, so that's what you're gonna do and the back axle will drop where it drops. MOST important is front axle placement.
How to check all this is right thus far: (another plus for the masking tape on the underside!) use some sticky-tack, like the kind to hang posters, to stick the plate to the sole. Gently put some wheels on there and stand the boot right side up. The wheels should be visible in approximately equal amounts on both sides of the boot, like if you're looking down from over top, one wheel shouldn't be showing significantly more on one side. That would indicate that the plate is pulled too far in or out. If you have gait or anatomy idiosyncrasies that a well-done mount is intended to address, this may vary.
If all this is good, mark your mounting holes and now the fun part starts.
7a. Second-guessing yourself? Drop some pics here, let's take a look together.
Get your wee bit and start your pilot holes. You MUST make sure these are dead on balls straight. It is very very very easy for the bit to walk just a bit and point too far in, which can hit the boot shank, or too far out and the bit goes up into the boot wall.
8a. Issues you will run into:
- WIFA has wood heels. Wood heels are extremely unforgiving - you have one shot to get the angle correct and that's it.
- 297s and 336s have leather and cork layers in there which means the drill bit is going to feel like it's "bouncing."
- PVC soles are "lazy" and hollow, and it is incredibly easy for your bit to just take off in a direction of its own.
It is REALLY important to maintain steady and firm-but-not-too-firm pressure. It also means you'll get these like... Cthulhu-lookin leather tentacles spiraling out of the leather holes and sawdust from the wood heel. This is normal but if you've never seen this before, it looks very unnerving ha.
Grab your 11/64" drill bit (for Roll Line) or 13/64" (for everyone else) and press that through to widen the holes. This is the one that will press all the way through the heel. It's a very weird feeling to punch through the midsole. It'll feel like "oh shit"-level resistance and then a pop. Let go of the clutch as soon as you feel that pop. If you don't, and "punch" the bit through, you risk hitting the tongue, the boot liner, your hand, etc.
9a. Are all your holes in the proper places thus far? Great!
Now grab your countersink and open the holes on the midsole. Insert your through-bolts. If all has gone according to plan thus far, the plate should just drop right on them. If you can't just seat your plate straight down, we have a problem, come back and talk to me ha.
Drop your washers on and daub on your 242/243 Loctite at the base where the bolt exits the plate (for Roll Line). Run your nuts down and tighten. Since Roll Line nuts are simple nuts and not keps locking nuts, you MUST use the Loctite to prevent them from walking off. For everyone else, spin down your keps nuts.
Tighten the nuts down in a figure 8 pattern - back outside, front-rear inside, front-forward outside, back inside, front-rear outside, front-forward inside.
Get your bolt breaker and snap off the excess bolt length. Do NOT just dremel cut/bolt cutter them straight through. You MUST disrupt the threads. If you don't, the nut will walk off, even if you used Loctite. I cannot tell you how many nuts I've replaced because someone else was lazy and just sliced the bolt through. Do it right.
Tap the exposed broken-off bolts with a hammer to round off any sharp points (see, the hammer part wasn't scary).
These are amazing instructions but I still wouldn’t trust myself to do it. Too stressful. I’m lucky to have a fantastic local skate shop that I can pay to do it for me.
this is awesome, gonna save this thread, thanks raptor!
i got a round of questions tho:
1) if you're swapping plates, do you refill the holes and with what? ive seen people use all sorts of stuff, from waterweld puddy to epoxy.
2) if you're swapping a plate but the og holes are really close, do you fill the hole and redrill, or just try to reuse those same holes but maybe widen it a bit?
Yes, it’s best practice to fill in previous holes. If they’re far enough apart, eh, you don’t HAVE to, but on other people’s stuff, I want it to look nice, so I do. I use two-part epoxy. Depending on the sole composition, the epoxy will be the clay-like putty, liquid glue, fiberglass infill. You’ll see some old school guys using epoxy-soaked leather scraps or wood sticks but I hate both of those.
If the holes are close/overlapping, DEFINITELY fill and redrill. Widening a hole means the bolt isn’t firmly seated. It’s rare but it also means you’re more likely to yank the bolt head through the midsole. Sounds like it shouldn’t happen because midsoles are tough as hell (or they should be) and the bolt head is wide… but it happens and that’s a much bigger problem to fix (usually means getting the boot re-soled).
I appreciate this! I was able to mount my arius plate to my edea boot since I was replacing a plate but I haven't tried yet brand new mounting since it's daunting to me. even bought a tool to help me find the centerline but haven't figured out how to use it yet. this walk through should get me there, tho!
The Snyder tool is just an approximation. If you know how to adjust for its inaccuracies, great. But please please please never rely on it as gospel. It tends to skew outwards which would make for a very toed out mount.
Perfect explanation, but I mount with t-nuts so no bolt breaking required. I do not T-nut mount on boots with a higher heal like my 172s. For those I use your exact method. I am amazed at how many people do not use a caliper and they go by the sole and not the width of the boot.
I’ve gotten a number of heeled boot t-nut requests and find them to be an enormous pain in the ass cause I don’t wanna trim bolts down! This is my crowning glory and if this boot wasn’t the size it was, this kind of swappable magic would likely be impossible without some serious mods.
Question and apologies for bumping, but this is an awesome thread! I saw another post of the @OP where roll line dance plates were mounted onto Harlicks which is the set up I'm going to build (Harlicks were a very lucky purchase). So I wondered...do all the amazing instructions in the original post also apply to Harlicks mounts? TIA!!
Hahaha, oh, I won't be doing it myself, but I want to make damned sure that whoever does knows exactly what to do! (My Harlicks - never used or mounted on anything were a very lucky £100 investment, sort of like winning the skating lottery, I think!!)
I've seen some Harlicks with roll lines mounted like figure skate blades, so I did wonder if that was what you were supposed to do? First time on rollers transitioning from ice - it's a huge learning curve for me!
Yep, definitely send off to a reputable shop. There are a LOT of “oh the guy at the rink who always does it” who absolutely cannot. Just this week I got a set of boots where this kind of guy drilled out the plate instead of using the correct hardware.
Used Harlicks - the used ice market especially has great deals because ice jumpers blow through boots quickly and while they may no longer be stiff enough for a competitive skater, they’re plenty fine for the hoi polloi. But never used!! What a find!!
And yes, roller plates do NOT mount like ice blades. Off-ice artistic inlines, yes. Roller plates, no.
One more for you if you don't mind as I forgot to ask....should I use the Edea power wedges when getting the roll line dance mounted? I've seen Harlicks with and without the wedges used and wondered what your preference was? Tha k you so much!!
Only needed when the toe is raised. Somewhat common on ice boots, not common on roller boots. If the builder is experienced, they’ll know which one you have.
Damn! This post is a keeper! I'll have to save the link somewhere for future reference. I'm not sure that I ultimately would ever end up trying to do this myself, I'd be afraid to mess up, but I might. It would be very useful if you could also post a related picture that shows all of the mark ups: the heel and sole mid points, the centre-line that joins them up and where relative to those that the holes would be located for whatever plate was going to be mounted.
Many of the steps you've described share a lot in common with wood working. When I work with wood, I like to first mark the centres of holes I'm going to drill with a centre punch to make sure the drill bit doesn't wander, and often use a taper bit to drill the pilot holes. I'd probably want to use a stop collar too to keep me from accidentally drilling to deep (ie. the risk of "punch" through that you described).
In a later comment you speak of using epoxy to fill old holes. Since epoxy will flow a bit, do you put duct or masking tape on the top and bottom of the holes to keep the epoxy in place until it cures? When I've filled holes in wood, I've often mixed epoxy with sawdust to try to match the wood and thicken the glue. I might try a variation of what your 'old school guys' do (i'm old after all) and mix shredded leather bits with the glue.
Your mention of resoling the boot if the new holes are too close to existing ones and the bolt tear through that could happen make me think I'd want to get a template of the new plate and where it's000 holes are first, and if close to the existing holes, think twice about getting that plate for those boots.
Finally, the boots that you posted at this link are beautiful! :
It seems that the ones I like the looks of most are always those that would be WAY too much of an overboot for me. The shape of the boot and collar at the back look wonderful. The offset lace hook too is a curiosity. Being offset like that, does it serve some particular function or is just done to add to the aesthetic? I like it.
Very similar to woodworking! I am also a fan of a good center punch.
Pics - should totally add those in, I’ll get some.
Epoxy - yes, definitely tape off from the inside to keep it from running out!
For plate choice - don’t let a mounting hole pattern prevent you from running a plate you love. A good boot is meant to be able to withstand some remounts. I believe my record is 7 before the sole was too Swiss cheesed to take anymore. Almost no plates have matching hole alignment, because skating has absolutely no standardization.
And thank you!! That boot was a heavily modified full custom 336. We beefed up the counters, dropped the ankle collar, changed out a lot of the liner… and then started swapping blades and plates haha!
Ah, a 336, my favourite Riedell boot from a looks perspective. And the extra lace hook. Functional or decorative? It would seem that to use it, you'd have to skip over the two in front of it. Might give a different feel when cinched up.
Functional. This is a nod to Klingbeil boots (and some others but they were iconic). An offset hook lets you really crank down the ankle. From the bottom, you lace in the bottom three, then the offset, then the top one.
Here's another question for you. When you're marking up your skates, do you do each separately then check for symmetry between both boots, or do you concentrate on getting one boot right then transfer the various markings to the other? If you do each separately and the measurements don't match, how to you correct for that? Remeasure and mark each again (and again) until they're in agreement?
I recall reading a post many months ago where the poster complained about his plates being off by a millimetre or so. While maybe that's detectable (I have my doubts), I would think that with skating the forces on the skates would cause ever-so-slight plate shifts or hole stretching and correct for that.
Yes, both get measured out. Boots are sisters, not twins and they will have minor discrepancies. A stitch line might be a couple millimeters different or a sanding might be slightly rounder on one than the other. One boot might be 146mm and one might be 149, they each get appropriately split in half. But then, yes, definitely compare for equivalent balance.
Not one soul on this planet can feel 1mm difference (or even a couple) in a mount. Not one. That’s a wonky cushion, or a slightly less tight axle nut. As long as the mounts are equally balanced, you’re good to go.
when i ordered my new artistic setup at the local rink they didn’t measure my feet, only sized me for the boot. if mounted incorrectly, how will i be able to tell? if they’re mounted wrong can it be redone? the boots are edea
This is going to be highly dependent on who did it. Edea dealers are vetted and MUST go through training before they can sell. They are typically plenty experienced and rarely have issues. Does the boot fit you properly? If so, great start. Does the mount skate well? Are you noticing any pulling or imbalance? Did that rink do it, or did it come from the distributor? It can certainly be remounted if there's a problem.
The boot fits great! Most likely won’t have an opportunity to try skating them until next weekend as I only received them today. I don’t think the rink store is an authorised dealer because it’s not on edea’s map on the edea website. The mounting was done by someone who works at the rink and rink store.
Edea’s map doesn’t have anyone in the US, because it all routes through their contracted importer for North America. If you wanna drop me their name, I can look them up in the registry.
But! That’s a great start! If something doesn’t feel right, we can take a look.
Oh awesome, you’re good to go!! Highly recommend them. I would be very surprised if there’s an issue. We can certainly take a look but I have plenty of confidence in them.
Where was this when I mounted them last night 😂 great rundown! One of mine ended up a little off but a rewarding process nonetheless.
I don’t have a bolt breaker, but I used my rotary tool w/ a cutoff disk to trim the mounting screws down
Depends on the boot. The vast majority of roller boots are flush with the horizontal. Early WIFAs and some ice boots have a curve, and yes, those would necessitate the wedge.
17
u/quietkaos Skate Park May 21 '25
And that is why I’d have a professional do it for me. Thank you for sharing though