wtcc5's TB-03 addiction

[wtcc5 4889]

@Pylon80: Thanks! This one will be the first with a brushless setup for many years. I had a lot of issues recently with the electronics, especially Offroad. Even with a dustcover, the motors won’t last a day. I then went on to use Torque Tuned motors (very cheap, 3€/piece), but these killed two esc…

My friends and I will try brushless now.

You can see Tamiyas TBLM 17.5T motor in the upper right corner of the picture.

[Pylon80 2628]

Oh right I see it now. Interestingly I have started having fun off-road with rally cars myself and was having exactly the same thoughts in terms of dust and sand damaging the motor. I run a Torque Tuned motor with a 1080 ESC. Geared very conservatively. It's been fine but my chassis has holes to let the dirt out and a heatsink it's placed on the motor to block the holes in front of the brushes. I wipe and oil the rear motor bushing after every run.

In any case I'm looking forward to see how the TBLM goes! Being a 17.5t it will be interesting to see if you can gear it long enough with 06 module gears.

Marc

[wtcc5 4889]

I am so gonna enjoy this build   Manual lead the way!

 

Differentials first. I use the steel outdrives and made one balldiff and one with bushings to make it a slipper spool:

 

Then the spur gear was next. In a swiss shop with awful search engine, I found some hard to get Hop Ups, like the spur gear mount:

You can see here, that I replaced the A5 part with an o-ring and an 8mm long steel pin. The A5 part is kind of low quality and I don't trust it.

 

The rear gear box was next. I put on the Hop Up damper stay. For a runner I prefer using Titan screws. The anodized aluminium screws will look ugly too fast:

 

To save time and reduce the labor, I bought a forming tap... in hindsight, I should have done this years ago...

 

Next was the front gearbox, which got the Hop Up aluminium shaft. I had these as spare parts from the TBevo5MS-build and just needed the cross joints to complete it:

 

Both gearboxes:

[wtcc5 4889]

44 minutes ago, Pylon80 said:

In any case I'm looking forward to see how the TBLM goes! Being a 17.5t it will be interesting to see if you can gear it long enough with 06 module gears.

Should be no problem. I plan to use a 80 teeth 64dp spur and a 39 teeth pinion for a 5.00 gearing. Pretty much the same I use on the TT-02KR-conversion. It should fit the TB-03 also and position the motor very close to the center drive shaft without touching (but good for weight distribution --> weight on the inside).

This should also give a wide range of gearing towards lower numbers.

[Pylon80 2628]

1 hour ago, wtcc5 said:

I plan to use a 80 teeth 64dp spur and a 39 teeth pinion for a 5.00 gearing.

Ok, yes in 64p it'll be no problem.

1 hour ago, wtcc5 said:

It should fit the TB-03 also and position the motor very close to the center drive shaft without touching (but good for weight distribution --> weight on the inside).

I hear you. I have used very small spur and pinions once on a TT-02 to be able to balance it with a shorty pack. 👌

[wtcc5 4889]

The next build stage is very tasteful. The blue motor mount (should have been standard) and the TBLM motor:

 

Both come into tub together with the rf arm mount...

 

... before the rear gearbox is added. The 80 teeth spur fits perfectly to the 39 teeth pinion for a 5.00 gearing 

 

Lets hide all the beautiful blue:

 

The build continues at the front with the steering assembly and fr arm mount:

 

And again the gearbox follows:

[svenb 3774]

The TB03 is a lovely looking chassis especially with all the blue hop ups, just a pity a lot gets covered in 🙄

[wtcc5 4889]

The suspension is next according to the manual.

Rear arms:

 

Rear hubs and shafts:

 

Everything preassembled and ready for installation:

 

Done:

 

Now, the front suspension:

 

 

 

[wtcc5 4889]

And now to the USP of this chassis: The lay-down-shock assembly. I really like the blue rocker arms. Unfortunately these "IFS"  layouts never gained acceptance in this category. But I am glad Tamiya still put it in several kits (TB-03, FF-03, FF-03evo, TA-05v2, TA-06, TA-06MS, F201, TC-01,...). With some appropriate shimming it works very good:

 

I used Revolution Design white o-rings for the damper build:

 

The installation of the steering servo comes next. Again, I am "all in" with servo mounts, blue servo screws and the aluminium direct servo horn:

 

Then came the installation of the esc... and boy, was this a torture. I chose the Xerun XR10pro. It is a very good esc with flawless functions, good feeling, good brake, no known weaknesses. It fits good into the chassis if you use a low profile servo and a small rx. All the pain is caused by the motor. The ABC-sockets are separated by 120 degrees. So one is always next to the chassis bottom, which makes it very hard to reach for soldering. I somehow managed to do it, while using a lot of curse words:

 

 

 

 

[Honza 936]

Simply beautiful. Tamiya should do newer versions of TB03 and TA05, they were just no-nosemse budget variants of their racing kits.

Btw, have you considered to put in some parts from the newer kits? For example, the TB04 front gearbox cover would hide unused holes for the front damper stay, making IFS more part of the design

[wtcc5 4889]

Sorry for that break. I was traveling and all R/C activities were resting.

@Honza: Do you have a part number for me? I just found a gearbox cover with holes. Regarding parts from the TB-04, I was thinking of the spool, but in the end, this chassis is not going to races, only some parking lot fun "racing".

 

The car nears its completion. Next on are tires. As I mentioned, this will be a runner, so the tire choice is Ride. Of course I need to add the blue hexes:

 

Bumper, body posts, battery brace:

 

...and the nearly finished chassis:

 

One more thing to add: The anti-roll-bars:

 

Now it is complete:

 

 

 

[wtcc5 4889]

 

Somehow, with white wheels, it looked wrong, so for these shots, I changed to the box black ones:

 

 

Wide and low 

[Honza 936]

@wtcc5 It's part of K-parts tree (51550), it's just a little part that covers the holes - it still looks better than unused holes

 

It'd be just little detail, like cherry on the top of your beautiful build

[ThunderDragonCy 7876]

@wtcc5 Absolutely wonderful Kevin. I am so glad you built a runner. I was given a pass to race mine in the Iconic class last summer (being post 2005 it shouldn't be eligible really) and it was a joy to run. I love the IFS cars!

I agree with @Honza: tamiya really ought to run TA05 V2/TB03 again. As with a lot of older cars, just another run of some of the unique plastics and drivetrain bits and they would be super easy to keep going and are such lovely cars to drive. 

[wtcc5 4889]

Let's go racing, boys!

@Quincy and I were on our schoolyard track again. I drew a challenging track layout:

 

Then it was time to present the cars:

 

My TB-03 with white wheels:

 

We had a lot of fun and needed only minor setup tweaks to make the cars fast. The car is so quiet compared to the TT-02. I really like it.

The standard suspension plastic seems to be a bit too soft. Even in this medium-low grip conditions, it feels overwhelmed by the forces and tweaks quite a bit. Quincys TB-03 with TRF420 arms has a bit more reserve. Overall we were really close. The look of the cars is fantastic, close to the real thing  

[ThunderDragonCy 7876]

TRF419 or TA07 medium stiffness arms work great. You flip the front ones to work with the IFS.