The Juice System wasn't a thing yet, that heel plate was just for stability and not performance. You can see how short it was.

The original design had a recessed area for 50/50 grindplates, which was eventually scrapped in favor of standardization.

You can see the anti-rivets were designed to use the same hole pattern at the Roces Majestic 12. These anti-rivets were a small hex vs the phillips head we ended up shipping with.

The original prototypes were designed to fit the Roces majestic 12. The frame would be standard but the base plates could change to accommodate different boots.

Jon Julio was the first person to skate the frames, here at the Realm ramp down in Costa Mesa. These were the original baseplates, before the Juice System rear baseplate was introduced. (thanks Blade Museum for the DB ad scan)

The frame setup Jess Dyrenforth is testing here includes the Juice System rear baseplates. They were much wider and angled out to help lock onto grinds. The name Juice came from Jon Julio saying “I’m feeling the juice” after trying them on ledges. (Photo courtesy of Blade Museum).

The first frame ad featured Jon Julio and Champion Baumstimler. It ran in Daily Bread issue 20, which hit in January of 1998.

The frames that first hit the market were machined out of solid blocks of UHMW in California. They were made in white and grey. The UHMW proved to be too soft for skating (the axel holes would stretch out after multiple gaps) so only a few hundred were made. Thanks to Daniel Rolling Michel for the picture of his mint condition frames from the USD Classic Throne Facebook group

This was a frame machined out of solid UHMW. The material was amazing for grinding but was too soft for gaps.