JConcepts 2.9" Tusk Crawler Tire
SCX-6 Honcho outfitted with the JConcepts Tusk tires and Treal Hobby aluminum wheels.
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Back in 2022, we reviewed a set of the JConcepts Tusk tires in the 1.9” size and came away quite impressed with their performance.
Since then, the Tusks have become one of our favorite tires in both the 1.9” and 2.2” sizes, with it being the tire of choice when exploring new areas in our arid terrain. Early in 2024, JConcepts released the 2.9” version, and we couldn’t wait to get a set for testing. Rather than rewriting a general overview of the Tusk tire, check out the 1.9” review of the Tusks here: Link. Much of the information is the same, with the only major change being the larger size of the tire. |
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Tire Details
The Tusk tires carry on JConcepts fantastic attention to detail with precision molding, excellent rubber compound, and nearly perfect ratio of carcass thickness to lug height. Usually, we hold back from speculating about performance before we hit the trail, but there was little doubt as to if these tires were going to be excellent. Heck, we were still running the 1.9" Tusks on our new titanium moon buggy. Unlike the heavy, chunky pattern of the Swamper tires, the Tusks have a tighter, directional lug pattern with smaller sidewall lugs and a direction block / chevron styling. This setup has proven to work quite well on aggressive, technical rock. |
A fantastic level of detail on the Tusk tires.
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Tire Setup
We had been seeing excellent results from the Injora two-stage foams, so a new set was used for this tire review. Before we installed the foams, we punched three 3mm holes in the tires for venting.
After venting, we installed the Injora foams with only one tuning disc on the inside of the tire. These tires run a bit narrower than the Pro-Line Racing Super Swampers, so only one disc was needed. Here is a link to our article on making tuning discs: LINK
Once the foams were installed, we pulled a new set of Treal RC aluminum wheels from our rack. These are a traditional mag pattern, anodized in a deep bronze color. Unlike most aluminum crawler wheels, these do not have a decorative beadlock ring on the outside of the wheel face. Rather, they have a machined lip running around the edge of the wheel which functions somewhat like Method’s bead-grip wheel lip. When you tighten the inner bolts of the wheel half, this machined lip secures the edge of the tire’s bead against an inner locking ring. The system works very well and omitting the beadlock ring gives this wheel a distinct look.
With the wheels and tires ready, it was time to hit the trail and see what they could do.
We had been seeing excellent results from the Injora two-stage foams, so a new set was used for this tire review. Before we installed the foams, we punched three 3mm holes in the tires for venting.
After venting, we installed the Injora foams with only one tuning disc on the inside of the tire. These tires run a bit narrower than the Pro-Line Racing Super Swampers, so only one disc was needed. Here is a link to our article on making tuning discs: LINK
Once the foams were installed, we pulled a new set of Treal RC aluminum wheels from our rack. These are a traditional mag pattern, anodized in a deep bronze color. Unlike most aluminum crawler wheels, these do not have a decorative beadlock ring on the outside of the wheel face. Rather, they have a machined lip running around the edge of the wheel which functions somewhat like Method’s bead-grip wheel lip. When you tighten the inner bolts of the wheel half, this machined lip secures the edge of the tire’s bead against an inner locking ring. The system works very well and omitting the beadlock ring gives this wheel a distinct look.
With the wheels and tires ready, it was time to hit the trail and see what they could do.
Tusk tires making short work of this incline.
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Badrock Ridge and Technical Rock
Heading out to Badrock Ridge, we wanted to attack the technical rock right away to get things started. There was no need to crunch along the lower trails to see if these tires could handle the basic trails. Starting at the base of a large formation, the Tusks had little trouble finding traction and hauling the SCX-6 to the top. The wedge-shaped tire lugs easily hooked into the rock’s imperfection, with the soft carcass wrapping around the rock and providing solid traction. Watching the truck closely, it was interesting to see the weight shift around on the steeper ascents, unweighting one tire while jamming another into the rock. On most steep technical climbs, at best you have three tires working together on the rock’s surface. The uneven face will cause one tire to float or just lightly contact the rock with minimal pressure, and usually it is one of the front tires. |
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We moved over to one of the free-standing rocks which features a bit of a mix between slick and technical rock, where the truck has to navigate up and over to the other side.
It’s a relatively simple climb, but with poorly designed tires it can cause some problems. Starting from the bottom, the SCX-6 walked up this with little effort. As you can see, the Tusk tires had no problem finding traction, and the truck remains stable for the entire climb. |
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After that climb was knocked out with relative ease, we headed over to another steeper and much longer technical climb.
The east side of Badrock has a nasty drop off the right side, so a bit of care is needed on the initial part of the ascent. Hitting this climb with some gusto, you can see the Honcho settle down into steady progress, working its way up this massive block of sandstone. |
It didn't take very long to make it to the top of this chunky climb, and we were pleased to see the Honcho maintain a good level of composure on the difficult terrain. The shock setup and weight distribution makes a big difference on these steep ascents.
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After a number of steep climbs that day, it was obvious the new Tusk tires were up to any challenge the Honcho encountered, often times providing more traction than the truck could make use of.
We continued on that afternoon exploring the trails and watching to see if there were any new paths to be discovered. Badrock is such a large crawling area that we are still finding unexplored trails. This keeps things interesting on these longer testing sessions. Another item to note is that our Honcho was running our new front servo mount, and so far, everything was looking good with both the amount of steering travel we had as well as the robustness of the mount itself. We continued exploring for the remainder of the day, picking out a few places to check out the following day. On our radar were a series of technical trails recently discovered which wrap their way around the south side of Badrock Ridge. |
Gaining elevation as we work our way along the trail.
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The drag brake on this 3BRC outrunner motor is impressive.
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From start to finish, this interconnected series of trails, known as Newton’s Disco, takes about two hours to complete.
The trail's primary composition is technical rock, but there are a few challenging spots of slick rock, accompanied by sheer drop-offs close to the edge of the trail. At times the truck is inches away from a 20’ drop, making crawling, filming, and walking quite the challenging trio of simultaneous activities to undertake. Kicking off the start of Newton’s Disco is a steep climb up a fractured joint in the sandstone. The rock is heavily eroded in this section, resulting in deep undercuts and oddly spaced steps. |
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Initially, the Honcho made smooth progress, but the steep angle of the trail paired with deep undercuts had us fishing around a bit for traction to keep things moving.
At times the links would bind up on the rock, or the diff would high center on a ridge, but with some wiggling around we were able to break free. Lucky for us the Tusk's sidewall lugs were able to bite into the rock and get us back on track and to the top. |
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Once at the top, we headed over the summit of the rock to the next challenging part of the trail and the start of a sketchy descent. As we often comment, crawlers need to be able to handle steep inclines as well as steep declines.
Tackling this section, we needed to carefully drop down a series of rock steps and carefully sweep out on a rock ledge in order to get the right angle for an up-and-over rock obstacle. Even with the tall Tusk tires, we would still catch the skid plate at times on sharp transitions of the trail. |
The accompanying video documents the progress along the trail, showing just how technical of a Newton's Disco represents. After reaching the end of Newton’s Disco, we pretty much knew by that point that the Tusk was the best 2.9” crawler tire tested to date. We could put the pen down now, but without a trip to Leclerc Rock as well as some dedicated slick sandstone testing, the review wouldn’t be complete.
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By this time, it was mid-November and the upcoming weather was looking pretty grim. It gets cold in the desert, and Kyle and I needed to get out to Leclerc before the first dusting of snow hit the area.
Starting out on a cold and windy early afternoon crawl with the Honcho and Kyle’s SCX-6 Moon Buggy loaded up in the truck, we headed out to Leclerc Rock to see how the Tusk tires would perform on the abrasive limestone. Starting at the base of the rock, we plugged in our batteries and headed up the trail with the Honcho in the lead. The cold wind whipped around us, but these heavy crawlers didn’t seem to mind. |
Kyle close behind with his RC Speedy XXL SCX-6 Moon Buggy.
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Kicking off the start of Hangman's Keep.
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With the usual ripping and tearing sounds from the tires on this limestone surface, we made short work of the lower sections trail until we hit the trail head for Hangman’s Keep.
Driving along the trail, you quickly gain elevation, and before you know it you're 60' some feet off the wash's floor. Tumbles from this height are tough on both the crawler and the driver. It’s at this point where things become challenging, and there was one difficult rock section which had been eluding the Honcho for quite some time. Crawling our way along Hangman’s Keep, the trail forks between a very steep “A” line and then a lower chunky “B” line before joining together again some ten yards away. I’ve tried the A line multiple times with the Honcho, but the tires just couldn't seem to grip the rock surface. Either the Honcho would slide back or tilt to the side and tumble over. |
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Kyle nosed into the A line with his moon buggy, working his way up the rock and to the top.
Interestingly, he was able to lean a bit to the left and keep some traction with his driver’s side tires by hooking them over the edge. It seemed like a good idea to try in that it keeps the truck’s front end down just a bit, and it might be just what I need to knock off this A line. Following his lead, the Honcho carefully worked it’s way up the rock with the Tusk tires groaning under the truck’s load, but sure enough this beast of a crawler didn’t lose its footing and summited right behind the moon buggy. Knocking this line off was well worth being windblown and cold, but after a bit more crawling we were ready to be done with the day. It was readily apparent that the Tusks were a solid performer on this rock, and some point in the future we planned on coming back out for a bit more crawling with the Tusks. |
Taking the A-Line to the top.
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Time to summit!
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Change of Scenery - Sand Hollow State Park
During the testing, Kyle and I decided to take off for a weekend to check out some 1:1 crawling over at the Trail Hero event at Sand Hollow State Part in Hurricane, Utah. The event is a popular off-road rock crawling competition, showcasing a wide range of rock crawling buggies and highly modified off-road trucks. Many of the crawlers in our fleet are a scale version of these 1:1 machines, so it’s quite a bit of fun to see the real deal in action. During our time there, we were able to hit many of the same trails with our SCX-6, and the new scenery was much appreciated. |
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What surprised me about the trails at Sand Hollow was the amount of fine dust and silt covering the rocks.
This abundance of silt and dust was from the repeated passes of full-size crawlers clawing their way up the rock, pulverizing the sandstone during the process. With Badrock Ridge being such a pristine area, the fine silt brought a new and highly challenging surface. Hitting the first few lines, the Tusk tires were immediately coated with the fine silt and struggled to grip the slippery rock. At times it felt like we were crawling on ice with the Honcho sliding sideways off the rock. We worked our way through some of the heavily traveled trail sections, looking for challenging lines to test the “dusted” Tusks on. |
Black rub marks along the rock is from multiple passes of the 1:1 crawlers. Chipped rock and fine silt cover the trail.
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A surprisingly difficult line due to the fine silt covering the rock.
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Crunching along the rocky debris, we spotted what appeared to be a simple trail running along a rock wall, but once we started to climb up the first step, the tires would spin and allow the truck to slide off to the right and tumble down the side.
Initially thought it was a bad line choice, so I repeated the trail again and again, each time failing to maintain traction. Somewhat frustrating, the fine silt stuck to the tire like a film, preventing any stickiness of the green rubber compound from making contact with the rock’s surface. Finally, I opted to run high up on the wall, driving the tires hard into the driver’s side. It was at that point that the tire flexed enough around the rock for the lugs to mechanically lock onto the rock and keep the Honcho from sliding off. Carefully I eased up the rock and wrapped the trail around to the right, continuing on to the next section. |
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The further we got away from the main crawling line, the more the amount of fine silt subsided, and before long we were back to crawling on relatively fresh sandstone and rocky trails.
This terrain felt more like Badrock Ridge, and the Tusk tires were able to shed some of the fine silt and start sticking to the rock again. Steep descents intermixed with pockets of open sandy desert kept things interesting, and we spent the remaining weekend exploring the area while enjoying some time away. We tried to take some film footage, but none of the angles looked very good during setup, so we chose to stick with a few photos and focus more on enjoying the time out on the trail. It was good to get away and crawl a new area, but we wanted to get back to Badrock Ridge for a few more filming sessions before we completed the review. |
Carefully working our way down a dusty block of sandstone.
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Ready for some slick rock testing.
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Slick Rock
Back from Sand Hollow, we hit the trail again for a day of dedicated slick rock testing. This was a day where we jumped from one obstacle to the next one, solely focusing on how the Tusks would handle the steepest, slickest rock at Badrock Ridge. Now, it’s important to note that at the end of our trip to Sand Hollow, we pulled the wheels and tires for a full cleaning and inspection. The tires had taken on a significant amount of the fine silt through the venting holes, and the outside of the tires were still covered in the fine dust. Pulling the tires from the wheels, we washed the tires, foams, and wheels, then rebuilt them for the next testing session. |
Kicking things off, we set up to film a steep and tricky descent on slick sandstone, which was complicated further by an off-camber hump on the rock. Starting out from the trail above, the optimal line is down and to the right, running high enough up on the passenger side to keep the driver’s tires from sliding off into oblivion, yet not so steep that you roll over. It's a tricky line for a 1/10 machine, let alone this massive 1/6 crawler.
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With the camera set up, we carefully eased the Honcho down the trail, hoping the Tusk tires would somehow hook in and keep the Honcho from launching off the side of the trail.
As you can see in the video, the passenger rear tire floats in the air as the Tusks slide along the grainy rock surface. This surface is challenging to grip, yet the Honcho moves smoothly in a controlled slide until the front passenger tire hooks a corner in the rock and stops the descent. From there it's in the bag and off to the next section of trail. |
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To close out the slick rock resting, we set up on two more challenging ascents on a nearby block of sandstone.
The are two lines side by side on the same rock, and Honcho works up both lines with relative ease. After knocking these last two slick rock ascents off the challenge list, it’s no question that the rubber compound and tread pattern of the Tusk tires excel on this slick sandstone unlike any other 2.9" tire we've tested. |
Bringing the filming at Badrock to a close, we wanted to share with you two more videos demonstrating the technical rock performance of the Tusk tires. Both of these sections of trail are challenging, but the Honcho with the Tusk tires does not disappoint.
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This first video shows a fun section of trail on the north side of the ridge, running between two large formations.
The seam between rocks is so tight of an angle that there's no way to clear the front bumper and make the transition. Thus, we had to stuff some rocks in there until the front bumper doesn’t hang up. Not ideal, but unfortunately necessary. That high-clearance bumper has its limitations. |
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Once past the transition, the trail became very steep, challenging the Honcho's traction and suspension to hold onto the rock and deal with the deeply eroded undercuts. It’s a tough line, but the Honcho made it to the top.
We finished up the day with another few hours on the trail, and it was mostly to enjoy the sunny weather and fresh air more so than to further evaluate these tires. They are so well suited to this desert terrain that the idea of pulling them from the Treal RC wheels after the test was highly unappealing. Most likely they will remain mounted up and used until they finally give up the ghost on tread life.
We finished up the day with another few hours on the trail, and it was mostly to enjoy the sunny weather and fresh air more so than to further evaluate these tires. They are so well suited to this desert terrain that the idea of pulling them from the Treal RC wheels after the test was highly unappealing. Most likely they will remain mounted up and used until they finally give up the ghost on tread life.
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Speaking of tread life, high-performance traction from a crawler tire comes at a price, and these tires started to show signs of wear by the end of this test.
In our opinion, the soft green rubber compound used on these tires is the right choice for this design, event at the cost of some tire life. Anything harder in compound, and the steep, slick rock performance would suffer. If crawling is your main interest, this shouldn’t deter you from testing a set out, but they won’t last like the OEM tires. Even though the Tusk are directional tires, we might end up reversing them to get a bit more life before replacement. |
Peeling rubber and rounded-off edges; just the typical wear and tear from some good times out on the trail.
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Ready for the next adventure.
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Final Thoughts
As of December 2024, this is easily the best 2.9” crawler tire we’ve tested to date. Even though the assessment numbers place it close to the second and third place tires, the JConcepts Tusks are truly superior to everything else in the 2.9” class. Could a better tire come along and bump this from the top spot? Sure, it’s possible, but not likely. Their absolute versatility on the trail was stunning, with their slick rock performance truly something else. It’s hard to find a detail of performance aspect we don’t like about the Tusk tires. Unfortunately, they don’t last forever. |
JConcepts 2.9” Tusk Specs
JConcepts Tire Link: Treal Hobby Wheel Link: Injora Foam Link:
- Part Number: 4045-02
- MSRP: $65.00
- 181mm | 7.13” overall size without inserts
- Super Soft, Green compound
- Includes medium, open cell insert
JConcepts Tire Link: Treal Hobby Wheel Link: Injora Foam Link:
JConcepts 2.9” Tusk Evaluation Results
Technical Rock: 30/30
Large Slab ( Slick Rock ): 19/20
Tire Construction Quality and Appearance: 20/20
Rubber Compound: 20/20
Tread Life: 3/5
Versatility: 5/5
Total Score: 97/100
Technical Rock: 30/30
- The JConcepts Tusk tires feel as if they were designed from the ground up for optimal performance on technical rock. The chevron / block tread pattern with side bars and low-profile side lug steps form a tread pattern which grips just about any kind of imperfection on the rock's surface for traction. Intended to manage the weight of the SCX-6, the Tusk carcass flexes an ideal amount, allowing for conformity to the rock without giving up control. It's a carefully achieved balance of flexibility and control.
Large Slab ( Slick Rock ): 19/20
- It's stunning as to how well these tires handle large, slick blocks of sandstone. The videos clearly show a tremendous level of traction on this difficult surface.
Tire Construction Quality and Appearance: 20/20
- Tusk tires exhibit the usual high-quality from JConcepts, with perfect molding lines, crisp details, and an overall excellent curb appeal. This is easily one of their best tires in their entire lineup.
Rubber Compound: 20/20
- The green soft rubber compound has set the bar for 1/6th scale crawlers; there is no better compound on the market in the 1/6th scale class.
Tread Life: 3/5
- The Tusk's detailed tread pattern wears out quicker than other tires, and we couldn’t care less. Yes, it’s not a perfect score, but everything comes at a price. Tire life is one of them, and personally I'll take performance over longevity when it comes to crawler tires.
Versatility: 5/5
- There was no terrain, trail, or obstacle we encountered where these tires didn’t perform. If you’re serious about rock crawling and trailing, these should be on your short list.
Total Score: 97/100