What is the shock shaft of a Losi 8ight RTR made out of?

I have a question about the RTR shock shafts fro the losi 8ight Buggy/truggy.
The shafts I have are silver/grey, what are they made out of? Al? Steel?
Also, the TiNi upgrade shafts (come in the kit as well I think?) I assume they are just TiNi coated, what are they made out of?
I noticed that I bent one of my rear shock shafts this weekend (among other broken parts) and I am hoping that the upgrade/kit shafts are made of a more durable material then the RTR shafts, so that if I do upgrade I will not run into this issue again.
Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

[glassdoctor]

Steel. I don't know if the kit shafts are a harder steel than the rtr ones. The TiNi shafts are coated, not solid Ti

[jayjay283]

I have the TiNi shafts aswell on my 8T, I was hoping they are titanium with a TiNi coating link because you could buy 1 Ti hingepin for about $5, but they could be steel for all I know. I havent bent one yet and ive had some pretty bad crashes. Im sure ill get around to it.

[glassdoctor]

Originally Posted by jayjay283

I have the TiNi shafts aswell on my 8T, I was hoping they are titanium with a TiNi coating link because you could buy 1 Ti hingepin for about $5, but they could be steel for all I know. I havent bent one yet and ive had some pretty bad crashes. Im sure ill get around to it.

I could be wrong... but I have never seen them advertised as titanium shafts, only "ti coated" shafts.

A quick comparison on a scale would give a definitive answer

[Sammus]

titanium wouldn't necessarily be harder to bend anyway, the idea is that its lighter than steel but stronger than aluminium. The only real advatage it has as a metal is that its extremely corrosion resistant.

The TiNi coatings are awesome though - although they cant polish them quite as well as steel (you'll notice polished steel shafts are like mirror finish, tini always looks slightly blurry) theyre much much harder. I've successfully sanded little nicks and stuff out of steel shafts before, but before I realised that all tini shafts have that slightly blurry look to them, I tried to sand it to a mirror finish. I put the shaft in a drill and gripped it hard with sandpaper (I tried a lot of different types). Every time just wore away the sandpaper without a mark on the shaft. Top stuff :P

Ok,
I have a new newb question:
Would using to heavy weight of diff fluid increase the likelyness (is that a word?) or bending the shaft?

[Arct1k]

I assume you meant : Would using to heavy weight of shock fluid increase the likeliness of bending the shaft?

Yes IMO - Heavy shock fluid will cause slower transfer of energy to the shock fluid and hence more force will be held by the shock shaft as it is trasferred to the chassis.

wow, i guess I should have proofread.... ehh well, you got the idea, maybe I will tone down the weight of oil in the shocks (I was afraid I might have went overboard....)