Having your skateboard trucks adjusted correctly is critical in determining how your board performs in certain situations. There’s no wrong or right way have your trucks set up—it all comes down to preference, which generally matches your style and the type of skateboarding you want to do. To help you determine how much to tighten your trucks, we’ll first go through the benefits and drawbacks of different truck setups.
Note: all the below information applies whether you have a longboard with top-mount trucks or drop-through trucks, or a classic double kick skateboard.
Benefits of tight skateboard trucks
Tightening your skateboard trucks will offer plenty of advantages, especially for beginner skateboarders. The tighter your trucks are, the more stable your board will be, making it more forgiving when it comes to correctly distributing your weight. This will help with pushing as your board will naturally hold more of a straight line if your balance is slightly off centre.
Downhill longboarders will often have relatively tight trucks as it means the board will remain stable at high speeds and be easier to control.
Drawbacks of tight skateboard trucks
The main drawback you will experience from tight skateboard trucks is their lack of manoeuvrability.
Tight trucks will make your board much more difficult to turn as the turning circle is reduced, and you will be forced to try and kick-turn, (lift the nose of the board using your back foot on the tail) to make sharp turns. This can work on a cruiser or classic skateboard but on a longboard with no tail kicker, it’s not really a solution.
Benefits of loose skateboard trucks
Having loose skateboard trucks will make the board incredibly manoeuvrable, allowing you to easily lean into sharp turns and be agile in the skate park or when cruising through town.
This is often a setup favoured by street skaters on classic skateboards who need to make small adjustments easily, as well as longboarders who perform tricks, cross-steps and dancing manoeuvres on flat ground.
Drawbacks of loose skateboard trucks
Loose trucks mean a less stable ride. This will make your board more difficult to ride at speeds and can lead to speed wobble. Speed wobble is when your board begins to wiggle side-to-side under your feet due to losing your centre of gravity. Usually, speed wobble is very difficult to recover from, especially on steep descents. Loose trucks generally aren’t recommended for downhill riders.
Another downside of a loose truck setup is that it makes you more prone to wheel bite. This is when you lean your deck over hard and the bottom of the deck makes contact with the wheels which can easily throw you off. However, this is not a concern if you have a deck with wheel cut-outs on the underside or are riding with drop-through trucks.
How to adjust skateboard trucks
As you’ve probably gathered, truck tightness is very subjective and you’ll only find your preference with skateboarding experience. The more skating you do, the more you will come to learn how you like your set up to be.
Luckily, loosening and tightening your trucks is very simple, so you can easily make adjustments on the go and continually tweak it. All you need is a skate tool, socket set or spanner to turn the kingpin nut on the underside of your trucks.
The kingpin is the screw on which your bushings and washers sit and by turning the nut on top, you can dictate the pressure on the bushings. By applying more pressure, you restrict the movement of the trucks as a whole. By loosening the kingpin nut, it opens up more space between the bushings and allows the truck to lean more as you skate.
Turn the kingpin nut anti-clockwise to loosen the trucks but do so in small increments and test as you go so as not to loosen the trucks too much. To tighten your trucks, turn the nut clockwise. If you want a really tight feel, you can turn as far as your tool will allow but it is likely you’ll lose all manoeuvrability so this is not ideal.
If you’re at home, you can test the tightness by tilting your trucks from side to side using your palms, but the best way to test your trucks is to go for a skate. Just grab your skate tool and pocket it for any adjustments to the kingpin on the go.
Over time, and depending on how much you’ve been skateboarding, you may find your trucks gradually loosen off so it’s important to maintain your setup. Here at Two Bare Feet we sell all of our skateboards as completes so they are ready to ride out of the box and you can also buy skate tools from us for any adjustments.
If you have any further questions about truck setup or anything else skate related, please give us a call or send an email and one of our experts will be more than happy to help.
