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Juhunio

Juhunio's TRF415MSX Restoration Project

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7 hours ago, Tizer said:

I forgot about the white belts for the TRF415! It makes it look so much better :)

Yeah they're nice aren't they? A nice contrast with the blue and carbon 😎

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I worked out that I can still do a lot on this build without the suspension shafts, most of the bulkheads etc can be attached and still allow easy access to add the lower arms at a later date

So, with that in mind, on with the Spur Gear...this meant making use of the new centre pulleys, spacers and front belt along with the bespoke front centre post that came with the stick-deck set

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These TRF spur / pulley structures can be quite beautiful 😎

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It needed a little bit of fiddling about with the grub screws to get the pulleys lined up so the belts would run straight and the spur mount would run clear of the bulkhead...

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Blimey, it's been a while...I had to head down to Page 4 in this section to find the thread!

So a little update on this resto-build...

I was about to work on the front one way and steering when I took a good look at the parts. They were probably in the worst condition of all, the steering arms were faded and scratched and the core of the one-way looked a little rusty.

So I decided to replace them...along with the spur gear, centre shaft, front and rear pulleys and the hex hubs, all of which just looked a little bit scruffy. Essentially fine, just not perfect

I had already sold the original chassis plates, so in the end decided to bundle up the front one way, spur gear assembly, rear ball diff, rear uprights and a few other bits and bobs. And I sold them too.

Then I cleaned up and refurbished the frankendampers that came with it. And sold them too!

The original car cost me £80. And I've now managed to sell lots of the old parts for £250 😳

I had already shelled out for the new chassis plates, but still had a healthy budget for new parts to replace the old ones and get this fully up to MSX spec, most of which have arrived. Thankfully lots of these were in stock at Plaza Japan so nice and cheap

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Unfortunately the remainder all need to come from one of my favourite model shops, based in Poland, who have recently stopped shipping to the UK 😟. They have kindly put the parts to one side for me, but this project won't be finished until whatever restrictions are in place have been removed and I can finally get these parts from Poland:

  • steering arms
  • steering posts
  • spur gear
  • spur holder
  • centre shaft stopper
  • rear swing shafts 
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21 minutes ago, Addicted said:

This certainly is a thing of beauty 😁

Cheers!

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Great job selling the parts and get a healthy cushion to buy new stuff :) Thumbs up!

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A little bit of progress, a few baby steps until Poland will ship to the UK again..

First, now that I have the titanium coated suspension shafts, the rear arms can go back on

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Sadly I can't complete the rear suspension without the new swing shafts so it's on to the ball diff next, rebuilt with the new pulley and plates and a set of tungsten carbide diff balls (53124)

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The belt looks a bit sad without the spur and pulleys to hold it in place 😟

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Putting the front suspension back together to MSX spec means using these mad little 10mm turnbuckles in place of the 10mm grub screws in the stabiliser anchors

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The front one way is all new parts 😃

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It kind of blows my mind a bit that in such an expensive, precise kit you have to glue your own diff and one way pulleys together 🤷🏻‍♂️ Why were they not just one piece jobbies??

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With the front universals rebuilt with new swing shafts, assembling the hubs means a new MSX addition, these little 5x1.9mm bearing spacers that aren't used in the MS even though both variants use the same uprights, hubs, axles and bearings

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And...that's it, for now. I used the last of my 32mm blue turnbuckles on my Evo III so I've had to order a couple more from PJ for the upper arms. So this one goes back on hold, for a bit...

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On 3/16/2023 at 4:11 PM, Juhunio said:

 

 

Unfortunately the remainder all need to come from one of my favourite model shops, based in Poland, who have recently stopped shipping to the UK 😟. They have kindly put the parts to one side for me, but this project won't be finished until whatever restrictions are in place have been removed and I can finally get these parts from Poland:

O dear is that ATA? great shop

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7 hours ago, svenb said:

O dear is that ATA? great shop

Yup, Zabawki Brothers stopped shipping to the UK just after the new year. No idea why, they have no idea why either, something to do with the courier companies :(. They seem to ship to pretty much every other country in the world, just not the UK 🤷🏻‍♂️

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Some new turnbuckles arrived from PJ, along with the correct short suspension shafts, so I could do a little more on this one

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Bit weird that it uses the titanium coated longer shafts but just the stainless steel shorter ones 🤷🏻‍♂️

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Despite the ongoing lack of rear swing shafts, I decided to stick the rear uprights and upper arms on anyway 😂

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With the front and rear suspension (nearly) complete, I could attach the stabiliser rods

These are different to the MS parts, and despite the specific part numbers being pretty hard to find, turns out they are the same as TA05 stabiliser bars and I had some of those lying around to go with the nice new blue bits

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Next up, time for a shiny new set of TRF dampers 😎

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To be completed with a nice new set of springs. I ended up with two of the 53163 spring sets coming bundled in with some other parts I bought from Japanese auctions, so these are essentially zero cost 👍

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With dampers ready I could attach the damper mounts, the original rear and a new front to replace the original which was chipped, which just won't do!

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With the fronts on I was also able to build the steering tie rods and attach the correct servo stays to replace the weird Square RC parts that came attached to the chassis

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And, just because, I went ahead and attached the bumper and body posts. The plastic bumper, body posts and bumper brace are the ones that came with the chassis as they are still immaculate, but I did treat the restoration to a new urethane bumper

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Then on with the battery strap that came with the stick-pack chassis conversion kit, and that REALLY is it for now

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The last few parts remain hostage to ATA Zabawki's shipping policy to the UK, which will hopefully untwist itself soon 🙏

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