We have talked to a lot of skaters in the past few years, we get constant feedback on products - since we actually have a land shop where skaters visit regularly. From everyone we talk to Rictas appear to be the best wheel out there. Bottom line: they didn't flat spot. If you are looking for a good wheel we highly suggest rictas. Wheels are their business.

Ricta has had a pretty amazing team over the past few years: Eric Koston, Kareem Campbell, Rodrigo TX, Geoff Rowley, Bob Burnquist, Arto Saari, Paul Rodriguez and Ed Templeton. I think even Mark Appleyard is on the team. Rictas has a series called "Supernaturals". Ricta Supernaturals are skateboard wheels with no cores or dual durometer composition. That means they are made of 100% pure urethane. The one noticable thing we saw from Ricta Supernaturals is that they didn't yellow over time. A lot of wheels will begin to yellow as they oxidize with the air. That signifies that the skateboard wheel urethane has an unstable chemistry. Why does this matter? Skateboard wheels that are made with urethanes that are unstable mean that the wheels is suseptible to corrosion and may easily flatspot because the chemical bonds are not "locked in".

Ricta also makes two types of cored wheels. One is a normal core and the other is an air-core. Normal core skateboard wheels have a plastic insert in the center of the wheels. This has two effects on the skateboard wheel. One is that it can make the wheel lighter. The pastic cores are usually less dense than the wheels outer urethane. The next value of the core is that the bearing can not eat away at the softer urethane when it is encapsulated in a harder plastic core. This feature may increase the longevitity of your skateboard wheel. There is also one more feature that cored skateboard wheels provide - that is they have a greater rotational inertia than a 100% solid urethane wheel. Since most of the wheel density is on the outer circumfrences of the wheel, the wheels rotational inertia will increase, which means the wheel will spin faster and accelerate quicker down hill.

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