Pablo's Weekly Workshop Diary: 7th June 2026

Another busy week in the Pabloskates workshop and it's been one of those weeks that perfectly sums up what we do. From routine repairs and custom conversions to machining vintage speed skate plates back to life, there has been plenty going on.

If you've ever wondered what happens behind the scenes in a custom skate workshop, here's a look at what we've been working on this week.

Cutting Mounting Bolts and Preparing Custom Builds

The week started with one of the less glamorous but essential jobs: cutting mounting bolts to size.

Every skate build is different, and properly sized hardware helps ensure a clean finish while preventing unnecessary protrusion beneath the boot. It's a small detail, but attention to details like this is what separates a custom build from a rushed conversion.

Bringing Vintage Australian Crucian Plates Back to Life

One of the most interesting jobs this week involved a set of vintage Australian Cruciani speed skate plates.

Unfortunately, the original aluminium kingpin threads had stripped, making the plates unusable in their current condition. Rather than scrapping them, we decided to engineer a solution.

The plates were carefully machined to accept a more modern reverse kingpin setup. This allowed the customer to retain the original plates while benefiting from modern hardware and improved reliability.

Jobs like this don't come along every day, but they're always satisfying when you can keep a piece of skating history rolling.

Flexlite 2 Repairs and Carbon Fibre Reinforcement

Anyone who follows our builds will know we work on Bauer Flexlite 2 boots regularly.

The Flexlite 2 remains one of the most popular hockey boots for quad conversions, but over time many of them require sole repairs due to age and use.

This week we repaired and reglued another pair before fitting carbon fibre strengthening plates.

Carbon reinforcement helps distribute load across the sole and provides additional support for the mounting hardware. It's a modification we recommend frequently on older Flexlite boots and one that can significantly improve longevity.

Playmaker to Avanti Magnesium Upgrade

We also upgraded a customer's skates from Playmaker plates to Sure-Grip Avanti Magnesium plates.

While Playmakers remain an excellent entry-level plate, many experienced skaters eventually look for something lighter, stiffer and more responsive.

The Avanti Magnesium is one of the most popular performance upgrades available and offers improved power transfer, increased rigidity and exceptional durability.

It's always nice seeing a good pair of boots receive a serious performance upgrade.

Bauer Vapor II Conversion with Pilot Falcon Plates

Another project completed this week was a pair of Bauer Vapor II hockey boots fitted with Pilot Falcon plates.

The lightweight aluminium Falcons paired beautifully with the Vapor boots and produced a responsive setup that should provide excellent performance both indoors and outdoors.

The finished skates looked fantastic and demonstrated once again why hockey boot conversions continue to grow in popularity.

Custom 3D Printed Heels for Flexlite Boots

Not every repair can be solved with off-the-shelf parts.

For one Flexlite project we designed and printed custom heel pieces to match the colour of the original boot sole.

Using our workshop 3D printing setup allowed us to create a solution specifically tailored to the boot, ensuring a more professional finish.

It's another example of how modern manufacturing techniques can help keep skates setups looking fresh.

ROM Plates Out, Playmakers In

We also completed a plate swap on a pair of old Bauer Vapor X boots.

The original ROM plates were removed and replaced with a set of Playmaker plates, giving the skates a fresh lease of life while improving parts availability and serviceability for the future.

Sometimes a straightforward plate swap can completely transform how a pair of skates feels.

New Builds Leaving the Workshop

Several complete builds were finished and shipped this week.

These included:

• Bauer NSX boots fitted with red Sure-Grip Rock plates

• Bauer 22 boots fitted with Rock plates

• Bauer Vapor II's

• Bauer X:01s

• Bauer Nexus N5000's

• Bauer X-LP's

• Various custom conversions and repairs completed throughout the week

The NSX build in particular looked fantastic with the red Rock plates and proved once again that a simple colour combination can make a skate stand out.

Sales This Week

It wasn't just workshop work keeping us busy.

Many of our skates found a new home through our selling channels which headed out to customers around the country.

Every sale helps fund the next project and keeps more quality skates rolling instead of gathering dust in lofts and garages.

Until Next Week...

Weeks like this highlight why we enjoy what we do so much.

No two days are ever the same. One day we're machining vintage speed skate plates, the next we're designing custom heel supports or building a completely new conversion from scratch.

Whether it's a repair, upgrade, custom conversion or a full skate build, we're always looking for ways to keep great skates on wheels.

We'll be back next week with another workshop diary and another look behind the scenes at life inside the Pabloskates workshop.