wtcc5

Thank you @BloodClod I hope the gearboxes accept their fate to get a new chassis type. To be honest with you all, as strong as I wished to make this kind of plate chassis, I could hardly enjoy the designing process in the first days of this project. The last days were different. With the chassis being radical narrow and all connectors finding their place and more obstacles overcome without running into dead-ends, it becomes more and more fun. It slowly feels like a unique design with good solutions. Today more puzzle pieces found its place: Take a look at the outer suspension mounts: These will be made of 2.5D milled carbon material and key into the gearbox like the original plastic pieces. To have some arm-geometry options, I integrated the bushings of Tamiyas Aluminum Adjustable Suspension Mount set (54885). Especially in the rear this will make life easier on track. I liked this design so much, that I used it for the front, too. There the carbon part can be a lot simpler: It will then be connected with the small bumper, that also uses another hole in the front gearbox: Now, I am thinking about integrating these suspension bushings on the inner side, too. This would result in a very wide setup window for the arms, front and rear. Space is very limited, but I will try to find a solution in the coming days

Oof… what a build masterclass

I continued with detail work, that costs a lot of time and is maybe a bit boring for the reader: The rear gearbox mounts were precisely drawn and beefed up. The gearbox mounts were shortened and the chassis got some milled down areas to prevent collisions with these mounts. This work continued in front with the servo position and mount optimized... ... as well as the top deck design: I also drew the arms as base for the outer suspension mount design:

I plan to use the original arms. Other Tamiya arms should fit as well as far as I know from customer conversions. The lower position came with the idea to increase traction with the lower and lighter chassis and gain design freedom.

Wasted another evening worth of binge watching Netflix for CAD-designing my chassis. And it is going surprisingly well! Even though, I would've liked a standard top deck, the gearbox design nearly forces a vertical position as it allows a simple and effective implementation: This picture shows how the top deck also acts as LiPo battery mount and support for the servo. Between both a connection to the lower plate can be fixed to have a flex option. Comparatively simple plastic mounts secure the battery in the other directions. The outer two mounts have additional pins to key into the chassis plate. By loosen the screws, these pins come free and allow to rotate the angled mounts and free the battery: And a picture of the unfinished chassis design from below, showing the short plate concept and its asymmetry due to the strange gearbox design:

It is slowly taking shape: The project took an important step tonight. I could realize a functional chassis-to-gearbox-mount concept. Also a bit surprising everything develops very good so far, with most mounts fulfilling double functions like mounting the servo, chassis and gearbox or functioning as lower arm mount, too. The package has a small footprint and simplicity. The next step is to design a (maybe vertical) top deck.

@ThunderDragonCy: Always you You can pick them up at the Laupheim Tamico Offroad Cup then I worked some more on the concept today. At first I aligned the gearboxes and then drew the main shaft with outdrives. One big part of my concept is to remove the lower arms from the gearboxes and put them on the chassis plate. On the rear this allows for improved angles. Most of the time went into finding solutions on how to connect chassis and boxes. Days before I already tinkered around with the electronics layout. Especially the awkward steering layout of the original is a thorn in my eye. If possible I want to use a simple direct steering and tiny electronic components. Regarding the electronics layout I can be more aggressive. At the moment I think I want to be radical with the aim to have a super narrow double deck chassis. This totally breaks the "neo vintage" character of my previous chassis generation and maybe chase away some of you here. My apologies...

No scan only pain

@Kol__ Yeah, this host going broke hurt a lot of my threads... The gearboxes are the opposite of simple My sarcasm was meant on the "fun" I had drawing these for this project. Today I invested another 6 hours in drawing the rear gearbox. Not sure what the Tamiya engineer was taking when he designed those, but it must've gave him appetite on asymmetry. Well, here it is: Edit: Just saw, that I forgot one bore hole... Can you spot it? I need a drink

Well... that was limited fun

I am reviving this thread! It died with all the pictures gone. What happened so far: 1. I build a Terra Scorcher and added Hop-Ups galore. 2. The ThunderShot was rereleased and I bought one for my father as it was his first R/C car. 3. I designed a carbon chassis for this Buggy family and sold it in three variations to enthusiasts around the world. Now to my motivation to revive this thread: When I visited Japan two years ago, I brought one chassis set with me. On my bucket list was to visit the (now old) Blockhead shop and gift one set to Jun Watanabe. In the end, I found the time to short and precious to use one whole day of the short two weeks I had, for the Blockhead shop visit. Meeting and racing Jun at the Tamico Days at Kinzigtal reminded me of the old plan. When we did small talk in between the races, I promised to send him a set. Since then I had only limited time, but have the urge to do a total new design. The new design will be much more complex to realize. In the first step I need to draw the ultra complex gear boxes (really can’t think of anything more funny… that was sarcasm). Today I took apart my father’s ThunderShot chassis in preparation:

@ruebiracer: The rear stabi mount is a 1:1 copy 3D printed. The rear track width will be adjusted with shims for the moment. Maybe I make a design with longer arms later... I really like the 90s period of Tamiya. They made a lot of special parts for their chassis. I love all the wheel designs, but also details like the different bumper designs of this line of stadium trucks. The Chevy S10 and the Toyota Prerunner came with the Escort Rallye car bumper: The Ford F-150 and the Desert Fielder came with a narrow TC-style bumper: I chose the former: The front gear box housing was also prepared for the aluminum support (three holes). Now to a very nice Hop-Up I had these planned for another project, that then didn't need them and now can be used here.

Now to a very important upgrade - Adjustable camber links. It should be an easy thing, but for TA-02/FF-01 cars it is always a stretch. Problem is the kit use of fitting bolts. So if you do a carbon shock tower conversion and a camber link conversion, you need shims and shorter fitting bolts. You also need super short turnbuckles (18mm): The rear was no problem: The shocks will need a bit of spacing... Back to the front, I added the front one-way: The camber links then made more problems. First, I didn't have another pair of short step screws and then the camber link length is much too short to use turnbuckles... I decided to use the longer touring car front arms: Which then also required to change the cardans back to 44mm: After adding both adjustable camber links and steering links:

@Tbird232ci: Happy to hear that The look of these Stadium Trucks is already very nice, but after I took it for an easy track stroll, it gained a spot in my heart for being so much fun. I continued with hexes and tyres: With body: The car is not completed, yet, but I had to wait for the rest of the tuning parts and/or parts for these Hop-Ups. These then arrived so I could continue. Black aluminum motor mount by Xtra Speed: Looks 1:1 like the Tamiya original: This is a good time to add the tougher drive shaft outdrive to the rear gear box:

Thanks guys Very appreciated! For the servo installation short aluminum mounts and a black high-torque-saver was used: Then the top deck completes the chassis conversion: I used period correct spacers in front. You may have also seen, that I didn't install the middle plastic parts and the mounts for the battery. Here I want to design and print some custom bits (Astute-style) later. Maybe a bit early, but I couldn't wait ... tyres, wheels and Tamiya 53056 Pin Type Wheel Adapter: I lightly sanded the scratches of the wheels and painted them silver for refreshment: All to not install them, because they would've been in the way for the anti-roll-bar installation. I bend a 1mm piano wire as I want the Hop-Up on the car, but without making it too tail-happy: