tony hawk skateboard - worth improving it?

Hi everyone, I am getting back into skating after 18 years, and I bought a cheap Tony Hawk complete board online for £30.

I’m happy with having a bit of a basic board just for using the local skate park. But it arrived in the mail today and none of the wheels spin for more than 5 seconds, and one of them barely at all!

Maybe serves me right for buying cheap but as I say, not looking for top quality. I was never a great skater, I just wanna be able to go up and down the smaller halfpipes, hop around the boxes, hopefully learn to grind the rails… maybe one day learn to kickflip!

I just want to know whether people here think it would make sense to buy some slightly better bearings?

This is the spec:
APEC 3 bearings
54mm 95a PU injection wheels
Aluminium & PU cast bushings - trucks
7 ply hardrock maple concave deck

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I would:

  • Loosen wheel nuts off by a quarter turn each
  • Maybe start worrying about how much wheels spin after a couple months
  • Get the cheapest bearings you can as you won’t notice much of a difference between those and high end bearings

And please god just don’t ride in the wet or any puddles. Basically never get your board wet/damp

Welcome to the forum :heart:

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Thank you for this advice!

Even though it has his name on it, it’s not a great board, it’s aimed at starter kids and they are fine for this as many kids won’t take to it so it’s not money down the drain.
It will be slow which is probably better for someone that has zero experience standing on something that moves back and forth at will. If you start to love skating and progress, you’ll soon realise what is holding you back and you’ll need to get a whole new setup.

Hmm! Yes, this makes sense too…

It does have a returns policy. Would people say any of these alternatives was any better?

or this one?

Just mess about on this one for a couple of months and if youre still enjoying skateboarding after that, go and get a proper one (from a proper, reputable Independant skate shop).
At this stage you’ll more than likely just be learning to roll around, and a few other basics.
Welcome to skateboarding :slightly_smiling_face:

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All of those are going to be of the same quality, much of a muchness.
You’re not going to get any better unless you start paying closer to £100.
Depending where you shop you can get complete deals with decent parts but they’re not going to be much under £100. £80 at the very least I imagine.

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Some decent bearings will improve that for sure. Mini logo bearings are pretty good for about £10.

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