Upgrade priority's

Hi, I’ve recently built my ESK8. Very satisfied and all that, but now it’s time to slowly upgrade it to an even better one!

My question is, what are the most important things to upgrade, looking to it’s benefit <-> price ratio. As I’m not familiar with longboards or anything alike other than my recently made ESK8, I’ll rely on input from you guys on what the best upgrade priority should be. I’m thinking about following things:

  • Upgrade Paris clones to Real Paris trucks
  • Upgrade china bearings to some brand specific quality ones
  • Add another parallel 2x4S LIPO
  • Upgrade deck from china deck with torsion to quality deck

Already done:

  • Upgrade china bushings to quality riptide bushings
  • Upgrade remote from winning to benchwheel remote for better reliability
  • Upgrade bulky enclosure to plant tray enclosure

This is my current setup:

Anyone knows what would affect the performance, reliability and use of the board the most :)? Thanks in advance!

I’ve wondered the same about trucks. Clones vs authentic I mean. I have calibre clones and real ones too. I can’t tell the difference to be honest. I wonder if you could improve your ride by upgrading the bushings instead of buying anew trucks. I have yet to try it myself.

I would go for bearings first, Bones Super red ftw! What battery setup are you using? I would prob save up for a nice li-ion pack if I were you after that :slight_smile:

1 Like

:joy: Hehe, I think we are all equal! When something is finished we start to rebuild or upgrade.

Nice Build you did, looks good!

Definitely you need better bearings (e.g. Bones RED as @karma mentioned.) And buy Bones Speed Creme, you’ll need it after cleaning every now and then) I don’t know Paris clones but the difference between different standard trucks and Paris is huuuuuuuge! I’m selling used Paris trucks for cheap, PM me if you are interested. If you need more range you could add Lipos in parallel but the charging could be annoying if you use balance charger. If you plan a bigger upgrade some day go dual! More torque, better acceleration and stronger brakes :wink:

I just got orangutan purple nipples for my Paris clones, in fact, they’re not even clones, they’re just cheap crap that came with the cheap board, but they’ve improved my ride so much!

1 Like

I would definitely go for a nice flat li-ion pack, makes a whole world of difference to convenience…

1 Like

I’ve never used “speed creme”, is it a lubricate to use after cleaning the bearing? Won’t use any ball bearing lubrication work nicly? :slight_smile:

Yes, it is a lubricant but it’s very thin fluid so only 2 drops are needed for 1 bearing (ceramic bearings 1 drop). So there is less resistance inside the bearing compared to more viscous lubricants so the wheels spin longer and downhill you can go faster, I think that’s why they call it speed creme.

I wonder if you could improve your ride by upgrading the bushings instead of buying anew trucks.

Can’t say anything about the trucks, but the bushings are a MUST. They made my board so much more stable, yet very turn able. I went for advice in a great local longboard shop to buy the correct ones for me.

I would go for bearings first, Bones Super red ftw! What battery setup are you using?

You think the new bearings will benefit me much? Like will it give me another few km’s to my range due to less mechanical friction or simply a longer time till stop? And I’m using a 8S LIPO setup (2 x 4S 5000mah 30C) which gives me 20km range and enough power.

Have you skated with some cheap ass bearings vs som good bearings? There is a huge difference in rolling resistance and feel imo.

1 Like

Amen brotha!

I’m going to take that advice. I’d like to loosen my trucks a bit and get good rebound instead of slop. Thanks. I agree with bearings making a big difference. If you can afford it then I would use ceramic.

I think, in a general sense, the first thing g to upgrade are…

1 ESC to VESC - if you don’t all ready have a VESC 2. Batteries - higher MAH, higher AMPS or C rating (look at lipo 60c or lion 30q) 3. Bearings and Wheels - ceramic if have the scratch, get real ABEC 11s or something 4. Trucks, deck, etc. - nice to upgrade but prolly won’t have a huge impact unless you have crap trucks or a brick heavy deck

1 Like

I think in terms of ride quality

  1. ESC -> VESC
  2. Abec11 wheels (I would do this before upgrading bearings or deck even)

I already have a VESC, with the controls and ridefomfort of my board is nothing wrong or bad :)!

I do wonder if a new board with Les torsion would be better. I’ll go and get some reds tomorrow, I suppose that won’t hurt :wink:. I also don’t see the point in getting a Li-ion pack, as my lipo’s work just fine. Also charging is easy and convenient.

You can get reds ceramics from Ali for about 1/5 of the price. A couple of years ago I bought a set. They seem to be the original reds ceramics and definitely ride very good, but then again, I have no comparison to verified originals. Still might be worth a shot. Depending on your current deck, this might be the next thing you want to upgrade. Decks can make a huge difference in feel, stability and board control.

Can you elaborate on advice given to you? I’m struggling with my bushings I have hard black ones from Independent ( cones on top and "straight " on the bottom) and board is bit stable but hard to turn.

Well I originally had cheap Chinese bushings, they were also black hard bushings, total shit tbh. In the shop they suggested me to put a chubby 93a Krank at the deck side and a APS 90a magnum bushing at the bottom. I’m 80kg - 1.92m so those values will change depending on your weight.

I also could have used other ones, different shapes and although they were even slightly better, I had wheel bite while using them so this was the most viable option as I don’t want to raise my deck.