Stock, or aftermarket?

[Crippledcrawler]

Hello everyone! I'm new here, so I hope I'm posting in the appropriate place. Anyway, I have been into r/c since I bought my first Tyco turbo hopper, and then the frog, and rc10 in the 80's! But I only very recently got into crawling, and am still pretty ignorant. So, that being said, I recently bought a trx-4 79 bronco, and have made a few upgrades, but my question is about shocks. I keep hearing that the stock trx-4 shocks are great, but are they really better than aftermarket? And if not, what aftermarket shocks perform better? Thank you for any advice anyone can offer. BTW, I use my crawler, as a crawler, not a basher, or bogger. Thanks!

 

[CruisinE2W]

I'm certainly no expert but shock setups seem to be a personal thing based on variables like driving style, terrain, etc.

I replaced the stock shocks on my SCX10ii with a set of TRX-4 GTS shocks and have loved their performance so far. Even took them a step further during a recent rebuild and upgraded to the red piston and white x-ring spacers outlined in this article: https://traxxas.com/news/gts-shock-pro-build

From what I've seen so far, the GTS shocks offer pretty decent tunability. I'd play with things like spring rate, shock oil etc. before replacing them all together.

 

[Greatscott]

Two questions, what performance change do you want out of your shocks, and how much tuning have you done. A new set of shocks will not improve your performance out of the box, and will likely cause you problems; they, like the stock shocks, have to be tuned.

A lot of tuning can be done by just movie the shock collar, making the spring stiffer or softer. After that, change out the fluid to get the desired effect; want them to react faster, go with lighter weight fluid, react slower, heaver weight fluid. Stock the shocks come with 30wt.

There are always "better" aftermarket shock you can spend you money on, but most of the time you don't really need to.

TRX4 shocks are very good, and they do their job very well. They are very tunable for whatever driving conditions you are running it.

 

[King Dork]

Cripp, a lot of guys put Traxxas shocks on non Traxxas crawlers as an upgrade if that tells you something. I have a TRX4 Tactical and 2 Sports. I removed a ton of dead weight from the rig (inner fenders, spare tire, etc). Was better, but still not where I wanted it. After looking at both manuals I noticed that the Sport has different shock pistons and springs. I rebuilt the shocks on my Tactical with the Sport pistons and springs, but I went one spring rate higher in the rear because the Tactical’s body has a bigger ass than the Sport but still softer springs than the Tactical stockers. This made a big difference in how well it crawled. Not sure what your TRX4 has but might be worth looking into and it’s cheap.