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Are you looking to decide on cruiser vs longboard?
As a sport or as a source of getting from one place to another, skateboarding is always popular. Modern skateboards are more advanced and have more gears and options. These features make this sport more enjoyable, convenient, and exciting.
In skateboarding, you may be thinking if you should purchase a longboard or a cruiser. It depends on the way you use the board. However, after getting all the details you will be able to make a choice easily.
In this guide, we will compare the two most common types of skateboards cruiser vs. longboard and will help you in choosing the best one.
Normally, longboards are longer than skateboards with bigger wheels, trucks, and decks. Due to their large size, they are more comfortable and easy to ride.
On the other hand, a cruiser is generally shorter in size, and the only thing that differentiates the two types may be their wheels and deck.
Lets look at an in-depth comparison between longboard vs. cruiser.
Cruisers are in the first place in the longboarding market because they can be used as street skateboard and as a full-sized longboard.
Many skateboarders like to skate to move from one place to another in a city on daily basis. Street skateboards are always quick-moving, inconvenient, and lighter to carry around in the streets and sidewalks of crowded and congested cities as compared to longer longboards.
If you have experience riding a street skateboard, you will know that they are slow and uncomfortable. Its reason is the strong vibrations and shocks due to small hard wheels and rigid deck.
You can get rid of this problem by using a mini-cruiser because it is quick-moving and portable like a skateboard, but provide a comfortable ride. It is because it has larger wheels than a street skateboard and have a more easy shape.
Normally, a cruiser is used for short-distance transport such as moving through the city, steering around things and people on footpath and busy roads. Due to its small size and lightweight, carrying it everywhere is easy such as carry at a restaurant, on a bus, at a office, or into a store.
On the other hand, full size long boards are heavyweight and larger. However, you can easily ride them over long distances smoothly and firmly with higher speeds, such as on country roads.
Generally, it can be pushed efficiently and effortlessly. They take up speed quickly and can go fast due to their size and weight.
Also, their performance is good at handling the higher speed, that’s why most people choose it for riding downward. Despite that, the turning radius of bigger boards is larger, so they are not as quick-moving as cruisers move.
The main difference between a cruiser and a longboard is its deck size. Normally, the length of the cruisers is between 28” – 32” and their width is less than 9”. The great example of a well-known mini-cruiser is Loaded Ballona and its deck size is 27.75” x 9”.
On the other hand, longboards are 36” – 42” long and 8.5” – 10” wide.
Deck size is important to know because the board’s ability to turn is influenced by deck length and wheelbase.
Wheelbase is the distance between the front and rear trucks of the board. Due to the short size of decks, the cruisers can turn directly, so avoiding the obstacles and cracks are easy. Bigger longboards are difficult to turn.
A cruiser is not so stable as full sized longboards mainly at high speed. When going downwards, the short wheelbase combines with loose trucks often leads to speed vibrations. Whereas, due to the longer wheelbase of longboards, they are more stable at speed.
In general, the movement of longboards varies while bending; however, some bending makes the ride of cruisers more comfortable on rough land, uneven areas, and easy on the seams. Often cruisers have a firmer deck which makes the kicks easier.
The shape of many cruisers is like surfboard and its front nose is pointy-ish. They often have a small nose kick and kick tail. Its purpose is to do kick tricks and to turn over small cracks.
Mini-cruisers are so lightweight and small that you can do tricks on them while riding through the city like skipping on or off edges and kick turns.
Some cruisers are made with more free styling compared to the others such as Loaded Poke with noticeable freestyle features like clear-cut bowl-shaped and full-sized kicks.
On the other hand, long boards are available in various shapes, but most of them are pintail shaped or cutout shaped.
Many longboards also have features of free styling or dancing tricks. In general, the tricks that can be done on cruise are not possible on longboards. And, a regular longboard is not able to carry on skate pool.
To reduce the risk of wheel problems, a cruiser has wheel flashes and narrower nose. For fast turning, the trucks of cruisers are very loose. So, good wheel clearance is necessary when riding in small areas.
Most of the longboards are designed mainly for distance pushing to ride fast and faraway on straight roads, but not on turns. So, their wheel clearance is more limited.
The design of the board’s truck on the deck highly influences the ride while cruising.
In a topmount design, the trucks are bolted beneath the deck, while in drop-through design, the trucks pass through the deck by holes.
Many mini-cruisers are topmount. This makes the cruisers hard to push on while riding downward.
Due to their higher center of gravity they provide less stability at speed. These are the reasons that cruisers are best for short distances and with their top mount design and small wheels long distances rides are difficult for them. For downward speed, cruisers are not the best choice.
On the other hand, longboards designs can be top mount or drop through. A topmount longboard will be difficult to push on for long distances and its speed will be less stable at speed compared to drop-through longboards.
However, drop-through longboards are fast-moving and are more stable at downward speed. Generally, a longboard is rarely as quick-moving as a typical cruiser because of its size.
Traditional kingpin (TKP) trucks are street skateboard type trucks and mini-cruisers typically runs them. On the other hand, regular skateboards run reverse kingpin (RKP) trucks.
TKP trucks are made to react to very small movements of the feet, so this makes them perfect for boards with kicks riding at lesser speeds.
As compared to RKP, TKP trucks are more dive. This means when you start leaning into a turn, the board started turning greatly and when you go on it turns slow.
The wheels of cruisers are often small in size around 55 – 65mm. The smaller sized wheels keep the weight of the board down. Usually, its size is bigger than street skateboard which have size of around 50mm.
On the other hand, a full sized long board has bigger wheels with size of around 70mm. The big sized wheels can roll faster that’s why they increase the speed.
Generally, a longboard is more steady as compared to the cruiser. The deck of the longboard is large in size, so the wheelbase is also longer. Hence, they provide more space for foot placement and higher shock absorption while turning over cracks and gaps.
If you have to ride far away, then longboards are better. They also provide a comfortable ride for beginners. While skateboards are difficult to ride and are used for technical tricks.
The most comfortable ride is provided by cruisers and is used for short distances. All of these three are made for different purposes.
Cruisers are lightweight, short-sized, and quick-moving to ride in tight spaces and short distances. On the other hand, a full-sized longboards are not easy to move on turns, but their speed is higher.
Longboards are the best choice for long distances and riding downwards.
The most comfortable ride is provided by cruisers and is used for short distances. All of these three are made for different purposes.
A cruiser longboard is best for beginners. A 30” long and 8.5 “ wide cruiser is best for beginners. A long and wide deck is easy to balance.
Tricks and Ollie can be done on cruisers but they are not made for these things because they are heavy with soft wheels. This is why they are very bouncy and unsteady while you land on Ollie.
That was all about cruiser vs longboard. If you are a beginner, a longboard is better due to many reasons. As it is more stable, so it gives you more assurance to set your bases and grow to learn more tricks.
But, you will not be able to ride in a city with tight areas until you have learned skating. If you start learning from cruise, it can be dangerous.
You can do skating with different styles using longerboards, but with cruise boards, you can’t do anything more than cruising from place to place.
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