In my search for better crawler tires for my 1/8 scale Mad Torque crawler I was given the opportunity by Pitbull Tires to give a product review of the Pitbull Rock Beast XL tires. My current tires are the stock Exceed 2.8" tires and although they performed ok, I was looking for something with a little more grip. We installed Pitbull Rock Beast XOR tires on my son's Everest 10 and I can't believe the difference it made on his truck. It made me realize how much my tires were lacking. I've had some time to put a few hours on the new tires and hope to be able to give everyone a good summary of what these tires are capable of on a crawler.
First of all, I don't think the original intent of these tires were to be used on a low speed crawler. They have heavy ribbing on the sidewalls and underside of the tread for high speed stability. The rubber isn't hard, but is not soft either. For my test I had the foam entirely removed from both the stock wheels and the rock beast tires. They are both firm enough that I felt foam was not needed and the stock foam was very firm. Both tires are also vented through the wheel. I used Axial 3.8 beadlock wheels for mounting the Rockbeast xl tires and had to cut them down to narrow the wheels so that the tires would fit properly.
Immediately I noticed the tires offered a significant increase in overall clearance vs the 2.8 tires. This extra clearance allowed me to navigate larger boulders with ease and handle larger step-ups than before. At first the tires looked huge on the mad torque, but when I switched back to the 2.8 tires, the stock tires just looked ridiculously undersized on the truck.
On steep rock climbs I immediately noticed the Rockbeast XL tires did not offer anywhere near the grip of the XOR tires (as expected). I did a test of both tires on a steep rock climb and also compared them to my son's Everest 10. The XOR tires on my sons everest allowed him to crawl right up the incline without much slippage. I found that the stock mad torque tires could make it up the climb with some difficulty and I had to rely on speed rather than sheer tire grip to make it up the rock, but it did make it. With the rock beast tires I tried over and over, using speed, bashing, different angles, etc and could not make it up the incline. It would just slip and slide all over.
Although the stock tires have better grip, they also have less clearance and the truck does get hung up on rocks a little more than with the 3.8 sized tires. Both tires offer advantages in different areas, neither performing better in all areas.
In summary I think my search for a better alternative is still on. I sure wish that Pitbull made an XOR tire in a 3.8 size. I think that tire would make the mad torque truck almost unstoppable.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1cP89tb28DGPc0GYGC73iEZE95dkrGNOH
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1mK3MKxRP3HFURAcjkdSc9KUL-ez6A9lq
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1XaXs1PuF09sF7RaUEg4RtrF-d7oXmc5b
First of all, I don't think the original intent of these tires were to be used on a low speed crawler. They have heavy ribbing on the sidewalls and underside of the tread for high speed stability. The rubber isn't hard, but is not soft either. For my test I had the foam entirely removed from both the stock wheels and the rock beast tires. They are both firm enough that I felt foam was not needed and the stock foam was very firm. Both tires are also vented through the wheel. I used Axial 3.8 beadlock wheels for mounting the Rockbeast xl tires and had to cut them down to narrow the wheels so that the tires would fit properly.
Immediately I noticed the tires offered a significant increase in overall clearance vs the 2.8 tires. This extra clearance allowed me to navigate larger boulders with ease and handle larger step-ups than before. At first the tires looked huge on the mad torque, but when I switched back to the 2.8 tires, the stock tires just looked ridiculously undersized on the truck.
On steep rock climbs I immediately noticed the Rockbeast XL tires did not offer anywhere near the grip of the XOR tires (as expected). I did a test of both tires on a steep rock climb and also compared them to my son's Everest 10. The XOR tires on my sons everest allowed him to crawl right up the incline without much slippage. I found that the stock mad torque tires could make it up the climb with some difficulty and I had to rely on speed rather than sheer tire grip to make it up the rock, but it did make it. With the rock beast tires I tried over and over, using speed, bashing, different angles, etc and could not make it up the incline. It would just slip and slide all over.
Although the stock tires have better grip, they also have less clearance and the truck does get hung up on rocks a little more than with the 3.8 sized tires. Both tires offer advantages in different areas, neither performing better in all areas.
In summary I think my search for a better alternative is still on. I sure wish that Pitbull made an XOR tire in a 3.8 size. I think that tire would make the mad torque truck almost unstoppable.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1cP89tb28DGPc0GYGC73iEZE95dkrGNOH
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1mK3MKxRP3HFURAcjkdSc9KUL-ez6A9lq
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1XaXs1PuF09sF7RaUEg4RtrF-d7oXmc5b
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