Stress has been proposed to condition tone sandhi patterns across Chinese dialects (e.g., Duanmu, 2005). However, empirical experimental data are still needed to attest to this proposal further. Shaoxing Wu Chinese, a Northern Wu dialect with complex tone sandhi patterns, seems to challenge the stress-based account. Previous studies suggest that in disyllabic words of Shaoxing Wu, both the initial and non-initial tonal contours can be preserved depending on the tonal context. The current study took an experimental approach and examined the tonal realizations in trisyllabic compounds with 1+2 (e.g., [new [fly machine]], ‘new plane’) and 2+1 (e.g., [[fire car] station], ‘train station’) structures. Our results show that generally speaking, the initial tones determine the trisyllabic sandhi patterns, with non-initial contours completely neutralized regardless of tonal contexts, which differs from the disyllabic pattern. In some cases, however, we found that 2+1 compounds consistently form one sandhi domain, while 1+2 compounds show variations in tokens with specific underlying tonal combinations. Such results are not predicted straightforwardly by a stress-based account of the tonal realizations or sandhi domain formation. Our findings call for a re-examination of the stress-based account for tone sandhi patterns in Chinese dialects.