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BuggyDad

My DT-03 for fun driving and tinkering

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I saw a YouTube video where a chap glued some thin foam into a tube, around a loo roll. It appealed to the Blue Peter fan in me, plus I reckon it wants to be as thin and porous as possible, only enough really to keep solids from flying in. So if I can find a suitable material I'll have a go at that. 

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Wire wing mount mk1 is on the high side!

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"Too high" is kind of fun though, and half the point of it. I might keep it and make a second shorter version.

It's neat and tidy, but it takes away my usual switch mounting position. Bought some 1.5mm stainless rod and bent it by hand. Fixed to wing with Schumacher Cat XLS wing mount clamp and to shock tower with the old wing bracket. 

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Wire wing mount mk2, down and in about 10mm.

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Also fitted front turnbuckles and rear steel dogbones and cups, so I've moved the shocks to the inside lower mounts. Gets me a bit more ground clearance at the back now the big plastic cups don't foul the wishbone at full extension. Also reinforced the shell and wing with the old plasterboard tape. 

Next on the to do list is a few invisible hop-ups, rear turnbuckles, hex conversion and a set of black wheels I think will really set it off. Maybe a little exercise in weatherproofing too, and then a long and drawn out learning experience about suspension and geometry...

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Looking good mate! How do you think the wing will fair?

Which model of front tyre have you fitted there, Schumacher mini spikes? Can you post the model number? Cheers

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Those are Ballistic Buggy 4wd fronts, green compound. Cheap Fastrax mounted ones on the back, for now. The wheel mismatch looks rubbish I know, but all being well I've got a good improvement coming on that front.

The wing and mount are 90% aesthetics but I hope I've also introduced something that might flex in a crash to save a wing crack. 

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And indeed it does. Not necessarily a good sign to bend it like that on its first run but not a bad one either. No damage, quick bend back by hand. 

20211208_014056.jpg

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15 hours ago, BuggyDad said:

Those are Ballistic Buggy 4wd fronts, green compound.

Do you find that with the wider 4WD fronts, the steering becomes quite sluggish?

I was so impressed by how stable my DT-02 handles on road tyres that before the price went up for the Neo, I was quite interested to get one for a cheap trasher after my next 2 builds. I even went as far as listing out the costs of hop ups I can get.

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12 minutes ago, alvinlwh said:

Do you find that with the wider 4WD fronts, the steering becomes quite sluggish?

I was so impressed by how stable my DT-02 handles on road tyres that before the price went up for the Neo, I was quite interested to get one for a cheap trasher after my next 2 builds. I even went as far as listing out the costs of hop ups I can get.

By sluggish steering do you mean they slow down the servo turning the wheels to initiate the corner, rather that anything about whether they grip to the line they're on? If so I haven't experienced that but I guess it would depend on the servo as well. Mine is a Savox SC-0254. And to be honest would probably need a more experienced driver to know what's going on. 

Re grip, so far these have been a big improvement vs the stock tyres for me on my limited range of surfaces (grass, sand, rough gravel). So long as they're actually on the ground I've more oversteer than under, to the point I think they need matching with similar rears rather than what I have. But other than these I've only tried stock ribbed ones (no grip pretty much anywhere) and truck ones (not really comparable). So I may not be a good person to answer your question! NB these are about the same width as the kit ribbed ones, mounted on the kit wheels. I'm not sure they'd fit on much wider wheels. 

Once I've sorted my hex conversion I'm going to try some wheel and tyre sets that are for 4wd and all look wider at the front, so I might know a bit more in a week or so. Soon enough I should be able to compare complete sets of:

Schumacher yellow mini spike 4wd. 

Fastrax stub as I currently have on the rear. 

Fastrax cuboid - cheap "all terrain" sort of thing. 

These are I think all wider than the Ballistic Buggy fronts I have now.

Probably another go with truck wheels/tyres too, in time, because they were much better on some surfaces probably just for size reasons. 

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6 minutes ago, BuggyDad said:

By sluggish steering do you mean they slow down the servo turning the wheels to initiate the corner, rather that anything about whether they grip to the line they're on?

What I mean was they went from oversteer (donut madness) to understeer. Think the switch from pins to road tyres also makes a difference.

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2 minutes ago, alvinlwh said:

What I mean was they went from oversteer (donut madness) to understeer. Think the switch from pins to road tyres also makes a difference.

These ones are quite oversteery I'd say. But I wonder what they'll be like matched up to something more similar on the back. I'm not sure. There's a risk with my car that it'll pull a lot of wheelies with good rear grip too. 

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6 hours ago, alvinlwh said:

What I mean was they went from oversteer (donut madness) to understeer. Think the switch from pins to road tyres also makes a difference.

Interested to know what road tyres you've got on front and back and how you get on. I think it'd be fun to see what it can do on tarmac with good grip, and maybe a bigger pinion, which I have incoming anyway. 

I think you've posted elsewhere on this, so sorry, but I can't find it! 

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2 hours ago, BuggyDad said:

Interested to know what road tyres you've got on front and back and how you get on. I think it'd be fun to see what it can do on tarmac with good grip, and maybe a bigger pinion, which I have incoming anyway. 

I think you've posted elsewhere on this, so sorry, but I can't find it! 

Just cheap Fastrax Arrows. They are the only buggy sized road tyres I managed to find. Searching on Modelsport, my usual wheels and tyre supplier, filtering buggy>2.2 shows up only pins and blocks. 

I will need a more powerful motor with the roadies, they have so much grip that it became drag.  

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I think I have to accept the wing wire is a bit of a failed experiment. It just bends too easily. Although I might try a heavier gauge wire if I can reduce it down for the brackets at the wing. And/or shortening it further. I like it aesthetically. 

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And so begins a motor waterproofing experiment

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Spraying conformal coating on the sensor board. It's not intended to make the motor properly waterproof, just better able to withstand wet getting in there than it is now. I don't intend to do esc, just the motor because its in such an exposed position. However, in the video I've seen he does do the ESC and run the whole lot submerged. But then he also applies silicone to the casing, sensor lead connectors etc etc., none of which do I intend to do.

Aerosol air duster also seems like a good purchase. My Aldi compressor lacks the oomph to be an effective cleaning device and is too noisy and a faff to use.

I'd be doing my hex conversion if FedEx hadn't tried to deliver my parcel to the wrong house... 

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Rear cv joints (thanks @Nobbi1977!), stainless suspension pivots and last turnbuckles all fitted, alongside replacement damper oil (600 rear, 400 front, surprisingly to me the old stuff was already filthy, perhaps largely from wearing the damper shaft coating).

20211209_175601.jpg

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1 hour ago, BuggyDad said:

Aerosol air duster also seems like a good purchase. My Aldi compressor lacks the oomph to be an effective cleaning device and is too noisy and a faff to use

Is the Aldi one the hand held active energy battery one? I use that one and find that if I put the football pump needle on it really focuses the flow of air and makes it very effective at cleaning RC cars and all other objects at a close range:) It did fly off during use the other day after over a month of using it like that, so could be worth checking it for a secure fitting every once in a while to avoid impaling something or someone in a dart type fashion!:lol:

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33 minutes ago, Kol__ said:

Is the Aldi one the hand held active energy battery one? I use that one and find that if I put the football pump needle on it really focuses the flow of air and makes it very effective at cleaning RC cars and all other objects at a close range:) It did fly off during use the other day after over a month of using it like that, so could be worth checking it for a secure fitting every once in a while to avoid impaling something or someone in a dart type fashion!:lol:

No mine's an old mains one that sounds like a tractor and produces a little whispy puff of air, and for which someone long ago lost half the attachments 😒

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By the way, on stainless suspension shafts, I thought it would be worth pulling together the relevant parts info. Or at least where I've got to so far. 

53301 is 4 x 48.5mm shafts and 4 x 37mm. 

The 48.5mm are a perfect fit for lower rear arm inboard pivots and would I think be perfect for same on the front, but I've kept the U shaped kit one. 

37mm do the outboard rear lowers with 3.5mm of spacers added (from 53539).

So that does the rear lower arms twice over.

Front outboard lowers need 25mm shafts, which I've so far only seen in 53479 and haven't ordered. 

I also bought 54613 but it looks like this pack is surplus to requirements. And I ordered 54395 22mm ones which I hope to use as kingpins for the TRF201 C hubs I've got coming, drilled out to 3mm.

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Tough weekend for the little car. 

20211212_075948.jpg

Curous to snap the tower where I did, leaving the shock mounting points still functionally attached to the chassis. Glued up OK and then my octogenarian father in law drove the car into the water at the beach. I had to chuckle. ESC wasn't quite so amused. Both cars need another strip down and clean up. It's a full time job, this! 

Motor was firing well after its sensor board waterproofing effort. Turns out I should have done the ESC as well! I'm hoping it'll be revived with an extended drying session. 

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On 12/9/2021 at 8:31 PM, BuggyDad said:

By the way, on stainless suspension shafts, I thought it would be worth pulling together the relevant parts info. Or at least where I've got to so far. 

53301 is 4 x 48.5mm shafts and 4 x 37mm. 

The 48.5mm are a perfect fit for lower rear arm inboard pivots and would I think be perfect for same on the front, but I've kept the U shaped kit one. 

37mm do the outboard rear lowers with 3.5mm of spacers added (from 53539).

So that does the rear lower arms twice over.

Front outboard lowers need 25mm shafts, which I've so far only seen in 53479 and haven't ordered. 

I also bought 54613 but it looks like this pack is surplus to requirements. And I ordered 54395 22mm ones which I hope to use as kingpins for the TRF201 C hubs I've got coming, drilled out to 3mm.

The way I roll these days is to grab a pack of 53301, 54395 and 54613 each time I buy something from PJ. They cost next to nothing and will not add to the shipping cost. This way, I can gradually change all my pin screws on all my cars over to stainless shafts. The pin screws, once rusted, will be a pain to remove (ask me how I know!). 

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58 minutes ago, alvinlwh said:

The way I roll these days is to grab a pack of 53301, 54395 and 54613 each time I buy something from PJ. They cost next to nothing and will not add to the shipping cost. This way, I can gradually change all my pin screws on all my cars over to stainless shafts. The pin screws, once rusted, will be a pain to remove (ask me how I know!). 

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Am I right that with these sets you're still missing the ones for the outer lower front pivots (3x25mm for 22mm clip to clip)? I found some GPM ones in the USA but obviously shipping doesn't make sense for them. Then I found titanium Schumacher ones in the UK for £5ish, which I've ordered. Hopefully they'll do the job but I can't be sure how well they'll fit til I get them.

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22 minutes ago, BuggyDad said:

Am I right that with these sets you're still missing the ones for the outer lower front pivots (3x25mm for 22mm clip to clip)? I found some GPM ones in the USA but obviously shipping doesn't make sense for them. Then I found titanium Schumacher ones in the UK for £5ish, which I've ordered. Hopefully they'll do the job but I can't be sure how well they'll fit til I get them.

If it is just 3mm difference, 53539 will have the right spacers to take care of things. See my front hex for DT-02 thread to see how they are used. But for the front lower, I believe I used 54395.

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4 hours ago, BuggyDad said:

Tough weekend for the little car. 

20211212_075948.jpg

Curous to snap the tower where I did, leaving the shock mounting points still functionally attached to the chassis. Glued up OK and then my octogenarian father in law drove the car into the water at the beach. I had to chuckle. ESC wasn't quite so amused. Both cars need another strip down and clean up. It's a full time job, this! 

Motor was firing well after its sensor board waterproofing effort. Turns out I should have done the ESC as well! I'm hoping it'll be revived with an extended drying session. 

I never thought to throw in a rear shock tower. I have a spare if you get stuck.

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31 minutes ago, Nobbi1977 said:

I never thought to throw in a rear shock tower. I have a spare if you get stuck.

You are an absolute diamond, my friend, but no worries - I went nuts on amazon last month so I've got two of these spare! 😂

And it really is odd where it broke, such that I wouldn't be entirely surprised if the glue job holds for a bit. 

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