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hedge

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Everything posted by hedge

  1. The Gearbox. Earlier on I had said that I had broken a servo saver because I over drove it due to (my ineptitude to start see earlier) the servo rod being positioned to far out on the servo arm, also the top of the radio box lid was off as I tested and the top lid has supports that secure the movement of the servo savers. However on top of all this as I started working the gearbox it became clear that the high speed 2wd gear was a bit sticky. Back a couple of steps... first the silicone on the gearbox was pretty well covering the whole thing as opposed to the instructions which suggest to put it just where the gearbox parts mate. However it was a relatively easy job to remove it all taking a little more than a couple of hours! The general look of the thing was OK, the screws where in good condition and where the right screws for the job - again indicating (not stating) that this is a light use truck built from new, check out the output shaft set screw mark in picture 3, looks like its been done up once and once only. The rubber boot on the motor is in great condition, these are almost always badly split at the wires. Also the rubber grommets that connect the gearbox to the gearbox mounting plate are also very good and rubbery still although they could be re-re Rough Rider/Sand Scorcher shock mounting grommets. The transmission plugs however are in a poor condition. I am not sure why, so will surmise that knowing the truck has definitely been run at least once - mud on tyres and on bottom of radio box and axles - that the oil used in the gearbox has accelerated the perishing of this rubber. Unfortunately I cannot use the plugs as intended as the bottom section has broken off. So I am fashioning and preserving the tops so that they can be used when on display (99% of the time). I don't think you can still get these, I did source some for my Blazer about 10 years ago and when googling last week I found a set in the "US of A" but I got an email at the weekend saying they were mistaken and not in stock. However optional replacements or working replacements are easy enough to get using either blanked grommets of the correct size or open grommets plugged in the middle with screws. Back to the sticky gear. I wanted to strip the gear box anyway but this was the excuse I needed. On opening up the unit all I can say is wow, It was like new. I cannot see wear on the plastic spur or any of the metal gears plus check out the bushes I removed, in the last picture, hardly any wear at all. Right so, following the instructions I got from Kope it all came apart very easy and with no surprises - no springs shooting off, or parts getting lost. On inspection I found one of the bottom sections of a rubber grommet stuck to a gear shift and suspect that this fell off a while ago and was the culprit that was making 2wd high sticky. I also removed a fair amount of the silicon rubber that I had been scraping off the outer case as this had found its way in through the open transmission holes. Rightly or wrongly I've also replaced some bushes with bearings but will keep the bushes for authenticity or for when/if I sell it on in the future. Anyway as I rebuilt the gearbox I oiled all the gears and sliders. Then I polished the metal up, both the outer gearbox case and also the gear changing mechanism which has a nice amount of brass and finally used some food safe silicon spray to clean the rubber motor boot. I think it looks lovely and I will look forward to reassembling this all in the near future. Following the manual in reverse order its the front bumper next Some pictures to follow...
  2. I will post progress on the gearbox this weekend, I need a clear 2-3 hours to strip it, dont want to rush it and lose something irreplaceable. In the interim Ive been cycling an old 7.2v hump pack. Its been lying around in my spares box for years. While I used to race cars with Nicads and NiMh I've sadly forgotten more than I ever used to know about them. This is an old shot of my race discharge rig, its was a complex bit of kit that allowed you to micro manage each cell yadayada etc etc... I am sure I would have had an equally complex peak charger but I've no recollection. Of course everything is now LiPo and all the chargers manage cells individually.... Sooooo whats my point... I am using this stuff now Talk about old school! The theory that I read recently was along the lines of the trickle charger is so low in charge rate that while you may have a duff cell or 5, the charger will simply warm them rather than explode them. While reading I had recollections of exploding cells at the various races I use to attend, not me I might add, but it was almost every race someone would "pop" cells. Now I have a pretty safe charge area all concrete floor and away from anything flammable where I charge my big LiPos so I thought whats the worse that can happen and hence I've started to charge and discharge (cycle) this old NiCad. Also its a shame you cant see the cells and guess their condition, but I dont want to open the pack as I like the battery and know from past experience that these things dont open easily - who knows it may just be a pool of molten green acidy mess inside? Its obviously all just a bit of a fun, as who cares what battery you use, its all just electricity, not as if the old 7.2v hump pack emits vintage electricity, but its in my mind to run this using the old Hump pack so that's my aim - BTW I would have used the old 6v 4000mah if I had one. I do plan on rigging up a 12v supply for the Quick Charger so I can reduce the time between cycles - currently running at 12 hours a pop! I would like to know what the max input voltage is for this charger I know obviously that it was designed around a car lighter socket which is 12v DC but I am sure it will have a wider operating window than that. My bench PSU is 15v so I might just try that and see how it goes, again whats the worse that can happen Lastly I did a bit of googling and hope I have found the right Molex connectors and pins for the original 6v 4000mah battery connectors Male and Female I'll let you know when they arrive as they are readily available and not that expensive. I already have the original ESC side female connector but need to build up a couple of rigs so I can use this Original 7.2v battery and connector and also an EC5 connector as I have LiPos and LiFe batteries with those on but I want to keep the original 6v connector o the ESC. Anyway back to the day job for now and looking forward to pulling the gearbox apart. My now not so complex discharge rig
  3. Glad to hear all is well and look forward to your updates in the future.
  4. Interested in getting one of these big bricks pm me if your interested. Thanks.
  5. Finished the tyres and wheels tonight. When I first looked at the tyres they had some mud and stuff on but I thought a quick soak and rub down with a brush should do it but no, some 2 days later and each tread block has been carefully cleaned using many many cocktail sticks. Anyhow all done. I’ve not lettered tyres for about 10 odd years, took a while to get my eye in and the paint consistency right but I feel quite pleased with the result, probably get a touch up or two over the coming weeks but so far so good. I think they will really lift the final model. All in all the tyres are in great condition, I can’t believe they have been exposed to sun, rain and mud for 40years! Plenty of tread left and still soft and rubbery. It’s the gearbox next :-)
  6. Yeah that’s the one I used to have in my Blazer. But the adverts are selling a 7.2v version of that big battery. I am assuming it’s custom made by the shop as I can’t see any other references to it being Tamiya.
  7. I've been doing a bit of background digging as I tend to do on a refurb. I've got a handful of old Model Cars and Radio Race Car magazines so was scooting through looking for reviews. Unfortunately there where none, however I did find a full page rear advert and various pricing options. What caught my eye was a 7.2v 4000mah batter for Blazer/Toyota. I had not seen this before and (following a bit of googling) cannot find anything to say that Tamiya produced one. I assume that the model shops themselves just built them up for you? Indeed there is no mention of said battery in the Hilux Manual either The full page advert is interesting to me because if you look at the chassis in the lower left corner you should just be able to make out how shiny the gearbox is. It's often commented on refurbs that people polish stuff too much, and that the kits never shipped like that BITD. Well I am almost certain that the brass (UJs etc) from new kits was always shiny, however I am not so knowledgeable about the POT metal castings. Anyway I dont plan on over polishing anything but I am certainly removing oxidisation and now seeing this will give a little extra effort to the Gearbox. On the pricing front it seems that the model typically sold for around the £115 mark although I saw one advert as low as £98. But when bundled together with transmitter, battery and charger it was more like the £199 shown below. Interesting for me is all my favourite cars are listed in this advert. But the only one I owned BITD was the Sand Rover which was approx £39.99. LandJump (I've got the Integra) Mardave Marauder (This is a runner) Sand Scorcher (Will be joined on the shelf by this) Anyway back to the resto, we are currently cleaning the tyres, harder than I thought it would be!!
  8. Your right!!! ****, thanks for pointing that out. I have to be quite careful assembling and disassembling this box so as not to scratch it. All done now thanks again!
  9. I do like a good restoration project, I find the model speaks to you, as you peel away each layer you learn more and more about the cars history. Having sorted the electronics its time to start on the truck. I decide to just do it in reverse order, although technically the body is the last thing to be built I have put that to one side and will focus on the chassis. The radio box is the first item to clean up. Now it look like someone left the car out when they where painting the ceiling as there are small spots of paint covering both the body, the windshield and also the radio box lid. SO I tried some Tamiya Laquer Thinner on both the paint work and also on a small spot on the radio box lid. I wetted a tissue with Laquer, wiped the paint off, then promptly wiped the Laquer off with water and another paper towel. Neither plastic seemed effected so it was this method I used on the radio box lid. It worked, but at one point I could have sworn it was about to turn cloudy, I washed, rinsed and polished all in very short order and from what I can tell all is good, but I will be very careful with the windshield when I get to to it. Following the manual I could see there where 4 washers missing form the servo mounting rail, easy to fix. The radio latches are missing 2 of the 4 mm self tapping screws, I believe I should get them in the post this week from a very friendly ebay breaker (thank you if your reading this!). The Servo rods where all mounted in the wrong holes on the servo arms they should be approx 14-15mm out on the arm and finally the gear shift servo rod was not bent, so I've bent that to be approx correct.... Now when I first tested the electrics, I said to myself that I should detach all the servo arms before powering on, this was in-case the servos and transmitter had never been set up and on powering up they could move 90 degress in any direction and damage something, did I listen to myself - no. But it all seemed roughly right, so then I moved the gear shift and promptly snapped the servo saver! Bit annoyed especially as I had made a point of thinking not to do this while quickly testing. Anyway easy to get another set but an unnecessary expense. I was glad that there was some work to do though as it makes me feel I am adding more than just a clean up to this car. All in all the radio box is in great shape and looking like new. I am a bit OCD, not much but a bit, when I saw that I had two types of servo AS-2 and AS-3 I thought no problem, I think I might have an AS-2 in the garage... no. Ok ebay, nada. Hmmmnn ok so I googled the AS-3. ( I was a bit sad as well, as it had shattered my illusions that this was all original radio gear). I had to come to terms with the fact that actually, somewhere along its 40 year history someone had replaced one of the AS-2s with a newer AS-3 - Oh how wrong was I The AS-3 is a Counter Clockwise servo and Acoms (actually it was Riko the uk importer) created a dedicated package that included 2 x AS-2 and one AS-3 for the Tamiya Hilux. The AS-3 operates the Transistorized speed controller! So now I know Anyway a few pictures and a very short video.
  10. I had a half day off work today but the thing I had planned got cancelled, so I put a couple more hours into the transmitter. I should say at this point this car is a shelf queen to me. If it can run, it will run but only a few times, the rest of the time it will sit on the shelf. I say this because it was sold as untested and when I bought it I had no expectation of it working, it did not need to as it was going on the shelf. I was excited to see that the truck came with an Acoms AP-427 handset, I think it will look great sitting next to the truck on the shelf and any who ask (shows any interest - even glances at it!!) will be treated to how the left stick is a gear lever allowing control of the trucks full potential. As a kid I never even wasted the ink on my letters to Santa for one of these, but I was lucky enough to be a member of an RC car club where the chairman had one and personally I found the TX almost as magical as the truck itself - that gear lever mmmmnnnnn. Therefore when I got this in the post and saw how good the condition of the handset was I eagerly opened the battery door to see if it would/could work and was greeted by the dreaded green fungus of aged leaked batteries. Resigned to failure - but still optimistic - I cracked on, I've seen this green stuff spread like mould to the circuit boards and that just kills everything, so was pleased to see it had not gone that far. Straight away I did a quick clean up job with dremel and various other small scrappy tools to see if it would work... and it did! Additionally it also powered all three servos (more on that later on). Anyway that night I only did a quick fix so today I took the opportunity to finish it off. Now I dont know the chemical names or the reactions that get produced I just know its bad from experience. The acid that leaks out reacts with battery connection terminals and erodes the plating back to what looks like copper although it seems too springy for copper. Most of the terminals where damaged but complete and most of the damage was on the bottom terminals, I expect the handset was left upright for some time and all the acid leaked down. Unfortunately the largest of the terminals which spans the two battery compartments was so badly corroded that when I removed it, it broke in two. Luckily I was able to solder the two halves back together. Just to give an idea how bad it is the two pictures below show the "Green" from the back of just one (previously cleaned from a couple of nights ago) terminal, you can just glance it in the first picture behind the spring. This is how much was behind the spring! Before the initial clean It was all as bad as that, indeed my workbench (and me) was covered in green dust that night. Anyway after cleaning the backs of all the terminals I then applied some Corrosion X, its a wonderful liquid/spray that clears rust and protects metal and is completely safe for electronics. I've used it for years in RC and its never let me down. Fingers crossed this can now last another 40 years. The other thing I find exciting about this TX (other than the gear stick) is that all the decals are looking OK (Fantastic for 40yrs) and are all readable even the one on the back by the charge plug! So all Ive done is spruce it up a little, I've simply cleaned out some old gunky dust from its crevices, added some silicon spray to make the battery door open and shut smoothly and then touched up some of the black and silver markings. Glad to say the Antenna is all complete and unbent (miracle!). Now I am just waiting on the Red Frequency Flag to arrive . Last point for those that follow these things it is Serial Number 0014874.
  11. Its a great car mate, I needed a couple of drinks to buy it, but very glad I did, I think collectors only ever look after things for the next person to enjoy
  12. I had no idea about either. Do you know what the differences are between the two gear boxes? It will be my next task and I am bound to open it. From back when I ballraced my old Blazer gear box I still have a detailed strip down instruction set. I dont remember having any issues following it so can only assume that the version of gearbox I ahd was the same as the version the chap who created the instructions (I think @bruiserbuilder) was stripping and re-building. Just to be clear no plans to ball race this truck, just building/rebuilding it stock, but still interested none the less.
  13. Yeah thanks Kev, I remember having a lot of fun and ultimately satisfaction doing the Blazer in my showroom. I sold that and then soon regetted it, but the itch has been getting worse and worse this year hence the new purchase So I started stripping the car and what can I say this is on another level compared to the Blazer. This is a clean up job more than a resto, the car is in superb condition. I've spent most of my free time today cleaning up the speed controller. I remember wondered and hence searching for what was inside the ESC box and the one I found was, I am guessing, the one below from @gordb new build as in my memory it was micro switches. I took the screen shot you can see below, the full build thread is here -> 58028 Hilux Build - Vintage Tamiya Discussion - Tamiyaclub.com Screenshot - This is not my ESC!!! So imagine my surprise when I saw this. I would not have thought that there would have been a big enough run of these to merit upgrading the speed controller but I am pretty sure that's what I have. Mine has what look like FETs and a rheostat, whereas the one above seems to have micro switches. At first when I opened mine, I did think perhaps some clever modeller had built their own speed controller in the original box, but on closer inspection you can clearly see the Tamiya name and two stars on the circuit board. Anyway I've removed all the silicon and cleaned up the heatsink a bit. I have not tested it, but looking at it I am pretty confident it will work. Just look how clean the informational decals are, this really reflects the entire state of the truck, very low mileage. Not looking forward to the gearbox as that too is covered in silicon!!!
  14. Thank you for that, Ive seen those, was hoping to colour match the ones I have as the Tamiya ones are headed towards a bronze colour vs the hard bright steel of the ones on ebay. I will keep my eyes open and see what pops up.
  15. Does anyone know of any kits available today that have these screws?
  16. Very excited to have a new 3sp back in the stable. Bought off here from @53HRA (Thanks again for the excellent service). I like restorations, its good to see something get cleaned up and back to running order. This one is a great base for resto so I am looking forward to getting stuck in. Downloaded the manual and started thinking about the start point. First order of work was to check the radio gear out. To me the Acoms AP 427 set with gear gate is almost as special as the Hilux itself. Outside it looked fine, inside the battery compartment it was clear that someone had left the batteries in and they had burst so there was that green stuff all over the contacts, I quickly checked the actual transmitter board and thankfully the green had not spread that far! After a couple of hours of work with the Dremel and careful dismantling we had all contacts cleaned and ready to go. Last job was to replace the RX battery pack as the one supplied was broke, no problem I had a spare one from an Acoms AP227 Mk1 set, but!! the RX plug size was different size, same shape but different thickness. Rather than cut wires, I managed to swap plugs and test the gear. It all worked Step one good start. Not any photos at this point, but will be sure to document the cleanup.
  17. What ever happened to @gordb ? Such excellent well documented work, just left half finished? I hope he/she is OK. I Would not normally quote myself but found it funny, I just bought a Hilux from @53HRA was searching the web for stuff, found this thread and read from article to article, only to find my approx 3 years younger self already trying to scratch that 3spd itch. Anyway will start a new thread soon. gordb I hope your well.
  18. Ooops I should say playing devils advocate!!! I am not sure you can get a 27mhz transmitter any more from a retail shop? Therefore the only option would seem a 2.4g set up. As a responsible seller looking to form an on going relationship beyond this sales, it seems the right thing to do. Anyone asking me what to buy for RC car fun, I would not suggest 27mhz and crystals. Anyone in the know would just search ebay and pick up an handset second hand. So i think the suggesting is a good one.
  19. Most kit is 2.4ghz, there are a few ways it works depending on what you've got. Simple ones scan the 2.4ghz range when the Transmitter is switched on, when they find 2 clear channels they save them, then when you turn on the Receiver it locks onto those two channels. More advanced systems constantly switch from channel to channel only ever selecting it if its clear and available. All this happens in the blink of an eye. This negates the need to hard wire the channel - aka putting crystals in.
  20. The ESC is an Electronic Speed Controller, this does away with the old Mechanical speed controller and servo. You should only have 1) Receiver 2) Front steering servo 3) ESC 4) Battery
  21. I would look at rcracing.tv any of the finals in the 1/10 scale (or whatever scale your planning on using) onroad, these shells offer the best handling. I am not sure what the difference is between shell choice and scale, but 1/8th road and 1/12 carpet look very similar in shape and both are insanely fast requiring as much downforce as they can get. All the above assumes your into racing, if flat out top speed is your thing then I would expect the shape will change again.
  22. I think the Grasshopper was my second Tamiya after my Sandrover... This was a long time ago and I could be wrong. What I do remember though is that I got it at Christmas and my mate - let’s call him Dave - Dave and me went to a place local to him and ragged our Christmas presents ragged. “Ready for poor description :-)” There was this bank which was about 3ft/1m high and you could jump up it or down it. Up landed on mud, roughly at the same height as the bank, down on to tarmac 1m down. whenever I think if the Grasshopper, it’s that day and only that day that comes to mind. I don’t remember running it at any other time - which is weird as I def would have kept it for at least a year. Anyhow I keep looking at them on eBay and what gets me is that second hand built ones with various broken bits seem to go for more than the new inbox ones? I don’t get it, in my mind £50 should be the level they are at yet more often I see them at £100+ ? I don’t get it. Anyway maybe I’ll crumble and get one again but for now at least just getting this off my chest is keepin the “buy it now” at bay. Love the look, love the memories of me and “Dave” but feel the reality will be a little less exciting.
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