Published on: February 11, 2022
Written by Camila Avery / Fact-checked by David Rowan

Longboarding is the most popular variation of the outstanding adventure sport called skateboarding. It is the extreme skating ride that people derive the intensest exhilaration and gaming ecstasy from -in its every form- namely Cruising, Freeriding, and Downhill speed rush.

Whatever the longboarding games you want to practice or master, the board components must be industry-grade. Therefore, the right and best longboard trucks are the most crucial component for any longboard to ride ably, stably, and swiftly.

longboard trucks for cruising, freeriding, and downhill thrill

One thing that is very basic for any and all kinds of sports is that the greatest fun and benefit comes only when it is played with the best equipment. After that, comes the expertise of the sportsman that too is backed by the premium quality instrument of that particular game. And without the right longboard trucks, you can no way have the best skating instrument for cruising, sliding, freeride, and downhill adventures.

But the best trucks for longboarding are determined by what type of skating you want it for. After that, you just need to know a little bit of geometry to weed out the wrong ones and grab your fit. This is the reason we covered all the crucial factors of what a truck mechanism includes the informative parts of this longboard truck review guide. And finally, we have suggested the top 5 products of longboard trucks highly recommended by professionals and most admired by customers.

All the Key Components of a Longboard Truck Mechanism

It is rightly described when we address the longboard truck as a mechanism rather than a single longboard component. This mechanism is a combination of six parts – baseplate, kingpin, hangar, axle, bushing, and riser (optional).

Baseplate

This is a thick and flat metal piece that combines the truck with the deck. It usually has 6 or 4 mounting holes through which the screws clamp the board with the truck. The plate is engineered with the purpose of applying more pressure on the board essential for riding.

Kingpin

The kingpin is the most crucial part of a longboard truck. It holds the major parts of the truck together. Kingpins are replaceable and so don’t require a whole truck installment if the pin is broken. This joining bolt is of two categories – Traditional Kingpin and Reverse Kingpin.

Traditional or Standard Kingpin: This type of kingpin faces the center of the board and sits at a smaller angle with the baseplate. The angle common between a traditional kingpin and a baseplate ranges from 40-44 degrees. This orientation of the truck slant makes the board closer to the ground. The longboard with a traditional kingpin truck enjoys more stability but suffers from stiffness and wheel bite at turns and twists.

A longboard having a traditional kingpin truck is a preference for downhill longboarding where the board rushes down the hill with break-neck speed and requires the best stability to avoid mishaps.

Reverse Kingpin: Reserve kingpin sits facing the board ends and maintains a bigger truck-deck angle than that of the traditional kingpin. And a bigger angle raises the board higher. Thus reverse angle lessens the friction or corrosion between the wheels and the boards.

It increases the maneuverability of the longboard and the border can exercise even more control while riding with speed. Cruising to weave through the busy urban streets and freeriding to play more tricks and showing amazing stunts are done by longboard having a reverse kingpin truck.

Bushings

Bushings are rubber cushions that vary in hardness to provide the board with different levels of reactions to affect the ride. Reverse kingpin takes both softer and harder bushings to exercise command over taking turns and twisting and traditional kingpins match with a harder bushing to keep the downhill rush on track. Harder bushing offers stiffer turns and less flexibility. Each truck comes with two bushing one sits in the pin hole and the other sits in the pivot cup where the pointed hanger end rests.

Hangar

This is the T-shaped metal alloy beam that holds two pieces of axles to its ends. Those axle rods hang the longboard wheels. This is actually the body of the truck that bears the tension and pressure of longboarding.

Riser

A longboard truck is well complete without a riser. It is an optional part of the truck mechanism necessary only when you need to raise the height of the board for enhanced maneuverability and flexibility. Besides increasing the board’s height, it resists vibration while riding. A longboard riser sits between the baseplate and the board and is available at a nominal price.

Longboarding Levels or Orientations Define the Truck Type

Longboarding itself is a variation of skateboarding and it has three popular orientations – Cruising, Freeriding, and Downhill. It is the kingpin nailing the truck body parts together that plays the most crucial role in that variety in longboarding. Let’s examine the truck type each variation needs.

Cruising Trucks

Cruising is what a longboarder does on the city sidewalks and even in public streets. You need to cut through the traffic and passers-by and to do that you take turns and twists frequently. Therefore, a cruising longboard should have a truck endowed with a reverse kingpin.

The reverse kingpin offers a bigger angle and a high raised platform to ensure flexibility and control while skating. That flex and control will enable you to enjoy the lean and apply tricks needed for the dexterity cruising board merits. But a traditional kingpin can give the needed cruising control if the deck board features a kicktail.

Besides the bigger 50 degrees angle between the kingpin and baseplate, four softer bushings are also needed to enable the kingpin to respond to the turns and swiftness.

Freeriding Trucks

The difference between freeriding and cruising is the freedom the rider enjoys in freeriding. In cruising, a rider exercises the flex when needed whereas in freeriding the flex and control are applied at will. This willful longboarding includes – tailwhips, sliding, tech sliding, manuals, and a slight downhill. So here the border comes with towering expertise to take the extreme advantage that a high-raised platform and flexible kingpin presents.

In freeriding too, the longboarder needs softer bushings and reverse kingpin and a traditional kingpin is a deal breaker in this case. But most freeriders choose the lower angle between the kingpin and the baseplate – 40-45 is their chosen angle range. They think this angle is fit for the stability and smoothness they need while taking aggressive turns.

Downhill Trucks

This variation of longboarding merits the stability and safety to be superior to all other conveniences. The downhill rush involves nearly the highest and most unstoppable speed encountering less curving, turns, and road breaks. So the most important longboarding factor is riding stability that a traditional kingpin with harder bushing can provide.

That kingpin will ensure a longboard to rest closer to the ground and so even more stability. A regular truck with a traditional kingpin offers reduced speed wobbles. Along with that, the harder bushing will restrict the twisting and turning capacity of the board crucial for avoiding downhill mishaps.

But expert longboarders prefer the opposite as they think the downhill longboard truck should be more responsive to exercise maneuverability and flexibility to prevent mishaps. They give more importance to the safety gears – helmet, knee, and elbow pads – than the stability factors.

Truck Width

The geometry of another part of the truck is critical along with the one of the board and kingpin angle. That is the width of the deck board – 150mm and 180mm – two available widths of the longboarding deck. The board breadth will determine the breadth of the truck and they should share equal breadth. The thinner board will match the 150mm truck and the broader one will match the 180mm.

Things to Consider When Choosing

To make the long story short, I can confidently advise you to go for any of the longboard trucks reviewed here and you will end up making a good deal. Because you will notice with extreme surprise that three of the five truck products offer unique and extraordinary features – Gullwing Sidewinder, Paris V2 Amanda, and Bear Grizzly. But they claim near the regular truck price.

In line with their fellow guide member in this article, the other two trucks present no extraordinary design but come with the truck mechanism backed by an upgraded RKP kingpin, quality pivot point, and high-quality bushing. They too assert a reasonable price.

So go for any of the trucks to enjoy any variation of longboarding as all five products are designed to be the most versatile. And the materials used by the manufacturers are industry-grade. If you are an expert level boarder, take the trucks with unique engineering and the starter should opt for the other high-quality trucks only lacking an extraordinary feature.

Quick Solutions

What Are the Materials of Longboard Trucks?

As many as four materials are used to make a longboard truck. They include aluminum alloy for the hangar, iron for the kingpin, baseplate, and axle, and for the bushing rubber and urethane.

Does Geometry Determine the Type of Longboarding?

Yes, to a certain extent. The amount of slant between the kingpin and baseplate or longboard determines the riding convenience. The more angle the truck offers, the more flexible the ride will be. The highest angle is 50ᵒ and 40ᵒ is the lowest.

The second geometry is the width of the truck and the deck should be equal. The traditional or available widths are 150mm for the tiny board and 180 for the larger one. Some manufacturers offer decks even wider now.

Can Longboard Surfboard Trucks also be used for Cruising, Freeriding, and Downhill Thrill?

When it comes to longboard surfboard recommendations for various styles of riding, the trucks are an essential part of the setup. While longboard surfboard trucks are designed for surfing, they can also be suitable for cruising, freeriding, and downhill thrill. Just make sure to consider the size and flexibility for optimal performance.

What Are the Two Stand-out Features of Bear Grizzly and Gullwing Sidewinder?

Gullwing Sidewinder is marked by the unique feature of coming with two kingpins. That extraordinary design enables the Gullwing Sidewinder owner to go freeriding and cruising with a raised height supported by two kingpins. You can enjoy a stable and closer-to-the-ground downhill ride with the middle pin removed.

And Bear Grizzly features two orientations truck kingpins – by a mechanism very close to one another. There too the platform height will increase when the kingpin faces the board ends and thus provide more flexible riding. And the trucks set to face the board center will cut the riding height matching speedy and safe downhill rush.

Our Selected Top 5 Longboard Trucks Reviews

1. Gullwing Sidewinder II Longboard/Skateboard Trucks

Gullwing Sidewinder Trucks offer a set of two trucks. To our utter surprise, Gullwing trucks present a customizable baseplate. To get clearer, it offers two kingpins and so two pivot points. When joined and enforced by two kingpins, it gives us the carving scarce in the skateboarding scene. The cool and smooth ride matches surfing and snowboarding.

This is the reason Gullwing Sidewinder has taken the skateboarding market by storm and it has been the flagship product of Gullwing. The two pivot points will turn even a novice into a super freerider as they can ride faster and sharper than any regular truck longboard.

You can enjoy the custom base plate slant as you can remove the middle one that will give stable height and hard bushing will give the rigid turning. Besides the custom slant height, it provides you the wider board maneuverability and added stability.

With Gullwing Sidewinder, you rule over all the longboarding orientations – Cruising to carve at need, freeriding to exercise flexibility to show tricks and stunts, and the most stable, safest, and able downhill exhilaration.

2. Paris V2 180mm 50° Longboard Skateboard Trucks (Set of 2)

Paris V2 Amanda Powell is the upgraded version of the original Paris Raw Trucks. The components that work out the mechanism of this longboard truck are branded grade coming with this latest version of Paris Amanda. The bushing seat offers excellent clearance to carve even more freedom to have a cool and smooth ride. And the bushing is featured with 90A hardness that offers a vibration-resistant ride.

The reverse kingpin offers the 50-degree baseplate slant inviting free-riders to emulate the tech sliding, tailwhips, and downhill with ease.

The stronger than regular and 180mm hanger will endow the rider with the stability needed to embark upon a downhill and the reverse kingpin maneuverability will help exercise tricks and protection while cruising and freeriding. Backed by this stronger build and wider hanger, the harder urethane bushing will allow the longboarder to cross over the track strewn with debris.

Paris is so confident about the quality and durability of its product that they have declared a lifetime warranty for the product. With such feature-rich and excellently designed trucks, you are more than likely to excel in all the longboarding orientations.

Isn’t it a worth-grabbing opportunity not to miss it?

3. Atlas Truck Co. Reverse Kingpin Ultralight Longboard Trucks

Atlas Truck Co. longboard trucks are a worthy part of this review guide with the basic and advanced features of a premium-grade truck. Let me explain why.

As a longboard mechanism, it is among the best but all the tracks included in this review guide feature at least an above-the-common design.

On its top, the signature trait of the longboard trucks is affordability. They have captured the longboarding market with high-end products at a low-end price.

Moreover, These trucks are the new standard for inverted Kingpin longboard trucks. The A356 aluminum we make is more grounded and more accurate than other trucks in the classification.

Our precision ball turn, 8mm hub faces a machined holder that rings the internal motion. The Strong Self-Cleaning Turn Cup offers a ride that is virtually unobtrusive at 5x the cost of a truck. Finally development.

4. VJ Longboard Skateboard Trucks for Downhill, Pintail, and Freeride

This is another truck mechanism that emerged with the unique feature that can mount the truck in two reverse ways. One set is facing the board end and the other is turning to the center end.

It is somewhat very close to the double-setting kingpin of Gullwing. There too the two truck settings reward the rider with two platform heights – i) stable at the lower radius turning with the center-facing kingpin orientation and ii) flexible at a higher radius turning with the board-end kingpin orientation.

This is an above-the-industry-grade design to offer versatility so that longboarders of any variations opt for this unique truck mechanism. With VJ Truck, you can both master the tricks, flips, and carvings and show amazing skating feats like an expert master longboarder.
Finally, a truck designed to support you for all the riding styles ranging from downhill pintail and freeride speed to professional-grade freeriding is a go-to option.

5. Caliber Trucks Cal II 50° RKP Longboard Trucks

Another company-standard flagship product of longboard trucks is Caliber 50 RKP Trucks. What makes it a party to the best longboards trucks review is the reverse kingpin facility and more than a regular breadth of the truck – 184.

The reverse kingpin will bring cruising and freeriding smoothness and the wider truck will supply stability and momentum. The rarer combination – of the bigger baseplate slant, wider even than the regular wide size, ultra-hard bearings, and above all the brushed aluminum built- has rendered it the beside-the-basic status.

These are the features to make special mention of and all other features are industry-grade as well. I have avoided being verbose about those premium-grade but common features as these are very well-covered elsewhere in several sections of this article.

Wrap Up

You are reading the concluding part of the article now means that you have by now read the rest of the article. So you have known everything about the longboard truck mechanism and part-by-part orientations of the same.

One thing that must have surprised you is that several products reviewed here present such mechanical designs that are yet to be accepted as the standard features or they are far ahead of the time. That is a sign of the fast-forwarding skateboarding industry. With them, it has been now possible to accomplish any longboarding with a single truck.

Now it’s totally up to you whether you go for industry-grade trucks or innovative trucks. With the best longboard trucks, you are now most welcome to go ahead of time with unique features or to go with industry-level premium features.

Best Longboard Trucks for Cruising, Freeriding, and Downhill Thrill