5th Element ST-110 Urban Inline Skates

The last pair of blades I owned was when I was maybe early teens? Never great but loved to float around. The three wheel caught my eye after seeing some on bike trails and finally breaking down and buying a pair and these for the bill. Defiantly got me hooked on skating and not mad about the price of entry. That said, I modded them out with some extra foam and a new foot bed for some extra comfort. I have years fitting ski boots and it was easy to handle so not a big deal in my world. The wheels are fast and smooth and still looking good after five times out so far. Plastic holds up well on falls and the straps seem replaceable. Give em a go and have some fun!Hide

I've had these skates for a year now and purchased them after having inline skated only a handful of times before. So I've more or less learned how to skate on these almost from scratch. These skates are VERY good, VERY fun, and, while not easy to learn on, (the skates are really tall) it's definitely still doable and extremely rewarding if you were to apply yourself. I don't have a lot of experience with other skates, but here are my detailed pros and cons for these.

Pros:
-Excellent skates and, as far as I can tell, great for the price. I'm getting a lot of mileage out of them. I keep the outsides of my abec-7 bearings clean and haven't had any issues with them. They have a rubber jacket so I will eventually be able to clean them when needed.
-Super fast, smooth and veeery fun. With these big wheels you can ride rough roads like brick paths (it kinda sucks but is still totally doable)
-A tall ankle boot with a built-in joint keeps your legs stable and safe but allows for a little bend.
-Ratchet is super easy to use and gets them on tight. I also like the redundancy of the two latches+laces. It makes your foot feel really secure.
-The plastic shell of the boot is very thick and sturdy. My friend's skate lace recently cut through one of the top loopholes of his skate's plastic shell. I can't see something like that happening with these.
-One-pin axle system makes wheel maintenance really fast and simple compared with some other skates that can have two pins and even a finicky middle piece (I don't know the name of it)
-BIG pro: These skates are REALLY COMFORTABLE once broken in. I can go for hours in these without thought and I'm not even forming callouses from them. However, you have to put them on exactly right which I'll cover in the cons.

Cons:
-Material quality of the lower ratchet strap- some of the ridges of my lower ratchet strap stripped very early into my use of these skates. I was overtightening them a little as I was trying to figure out the correct tightness while breaking them in, but the plastic strap material is quite soft and now when I ratchet to the correct tightness for my foot, the strap sometimes skips back a setting.
I should mention that it appears the ratchet strap unscrews and can be individually replaced.

-Tongue of the boot keeps folding. Because of the sewing pattern and width of the boot, the outside edge of the tongue folds in on itself almost every time I put my skates on. If you tighten skate like that it can get very uncomfortable very fast, as it creates a vertical line of pressure along the top outside of your foot. It can be very finicky to keep the tongue of the boot unfolded and, between the strap skipping, and the folding tongue, the process of putting the skates on snugly and comfortably can take up to seven or eight minutes.

Neither pro not con but still want to mention: The stock wheels are meh. I've skated aggressively on them about three hours a week for four months, rotated them diligently and I've now killed them dead. From my understanding that's a bit short of a lifespan, but probably not a dealbreaker.

All in all, I still would highly recommend these skates and hope this review is found useful in someone's final decision.Hide