davidwj95

I agree, modern truck/ truggies are getting more extreme and becoming a parody of themselves. The wheel track is too wide, body too low and horrible wheels with low profile tyres. I've no doubt they are faster and stronger than a tamiya but the appearance puts right off. Also, I've no interest in repeatedly jumping one 20' in the air off a skateboard ramp.

Started to reassemble, I should have back end complete and electronics in by tomorrow but then I can't do anything until the non gearbox front end and TL01b steering knuckles arrive at the end of the month. I dont like using self tappers where I can get away without them. I drilled out the gearbox mounting holes to 3mm and put threaded rod all the way through secured with nyloc nuts.

I agree, there aren't many new trucks or buggies that appeal to me. I wish someone would make something with blackfoot/monster beetle proportions and scale appearance but with a strong chassis and gearbox and decent suspension. Oh and it would have to be a kit, not RTR.

The chassis side plates I made years ago when I had access to CAD at work. I plotted the hole centres then printed them out at 1:1 scale. I double sided taped two pieces of 3mm aluminium together then stuck the hole plan on top. This meant that when I drilled the holes I went through both pieces of aluminium to get them exactly the same. The out line and battery cut out were based on the original plastic chassis. All cutting was done with the chassis halves stuck together to keep them identical. Only tools used were hacksaw, files, piller drill and wer and dry sand paper. I made the shock towers last week using the same methods but had to draw out the holes by hand using scriber, square and vernier caliper. I found a drawing online with the hole positions. These new ones are slightly different to the original set I made.

Chassis parts painted, gearbox stripped cleaned and reasssembled and battery retainer spacers made. Tomorrow's job is to make radio/esc mount.

I rebuilt the gearbox tonight and was wondering what to do about the diff. I packed it with anti wear grease which I'm hoping will make it tighter. It certainly feels so when turned by hand. If not I'll look into using the diff putty.

I was going to order a lunchbox brace and hornet brace a few weeks ago but overall cost with postage to uk put me off. Let us know if it cures the bouncing issue.

I bought these HPI rims a few weeks ago, they have a lot less offset than the originals so will make the car a bit narrower. I made the mistake of assuming they'd fit straight onto the Tamiya hubs. They don't. I spent some time looking into it and found that I'd need some long axles and HPI drive hexes. So much for keeping this a cheap build. Don't want to bodge it though as the aim is to have a tough reliable runner. Tonight's job is to clean the chassis ready for paint.

I bought some hubs for my terra scorcher from miniature manufacturing off ebay, the quality is excellent. I noticed they did quite a few bits for the lunchbox.

Shock towers cutout and painted.

I have an Ansmann W5 transmitter that I use with about 8 cars. Ive just bought a flysky transmitter as it's compatible with my receivers but has a 10 model memory. The receivers are only about £6 each.

New shock towers marked out

I'm keeping the arms standard but I have some HPI rims with less offset that I'm hoping will reduce track width by about 20mm. I'll get some photos up soon.

Good point about the Amarok body, I hadn't thought of that. I wish Tamiya had made more bodies with the correct wheelbase.