TT02 High Speed Gear Set Worth It?

[EmJayeX]

15 hours ago, OnTheTrail said:

Tower Hobbies has been around for decades.   They were around before the internet and use to mail hobbyists a sales catalog about once a month back in the day (yes, I'm showing my age..... ) plus huge multi-page advertisements in modeling magazines.   Their prices are usually reasonable and competitive.   As for Tamiya hop-ups, from my experience, they're spotty at best.   They have some items but not as many as we'd like.     

That said, Tower was bought out my Horizon Hobby a couple years ago.   Since Horizon is a distributor to most brick and mortar hobby shops in the U.S., that means if Tower or HH shows it on their site, your local hobby shop can get it for you as well.  May take and extra week to bring in your Tamiya special order but at least you'd save the freight.  

As for Amazon, your observations are correct.   I call bull on the "Amazon Prime" where shipping is free on everything.    Somethings yes, most things, no.   If the small Tamiya part is say $7 through your LHS, through Amazon, it's usually $14 with  <ahem> free shipping.    Due to my wife's years of Kindle book downloads, we have two Amazon accounts in our house.  One with prime and one without.  Very rarely do I see a net price that's truly cheaper when I check between the two accounts.   May get it a day or two quicker with Prime but legitimate free shipping...????   Not really in my experience.  

Wow, I must be almost crazy for not knowing Tower Hobbies 😅

I agree on Amazon though...

So I assume that means that Tower Hobbies charges shipping? But overall, would be cheaper than Amazon with "free" shipping? 

Also I ve been running my TT02 and went to check my pinion. It seems to be wearing down a bit already. It looks fine overall to me, but the dust looks to be "mixing" with the grease. Is it something to worry about yet? Or should I wait longer until I see visible extreme wear on the pinion? 

[EmJayeX]

11 hours ago, droidy said:

Like Kowalski86 said, use anything you've got.

But if you're thinking about cones, look for some flat rubber track and field markers instead. Cones are frustrating when you hit them and drag them along or knock them out of position.

Lots of good advice in the Racing by post thread on this forum. Racing by post also happens to be the most fun you can have by yourself with an RC in a carpark!

Hmm, I cant seem to find the Racing by post thread. Not really sure what "racing by post" means. Would you be able to explain a bit more please?

I did get some low profile cones (25 of them) from my local Walmart, for about $12 (US).

[BuggyDad]

1 hour ago, EmJayeX said:

Hmm, I cant seem to find the Racing by post thread. Not really sure what "racing by post" means. Would you be able to explain a bit more please?

I did get some low profile cones (25 of them) from my local Walmart, for about $12 (US).

Here ya go... 

 

Get stuck in. It's loads of fun. All you need is a patch of ground about 8m x 5m, a partner who either already considers you insane or can't see what you're up to, and a means to mark a few points on it. I like chalk for that - it doesn't move when you hit it 😁

Slightly dangerous though - every few months you'll decide you need a new car for it. You don't, obviously. Or maybe you do. 

[TurnipJF]

10 hours ago, EmJayeX said:

Also I ve been running my TT02 and went to check my pinion. It seems to be wearing down a bit already. It looks fine overall to me, but the dust looks to be "mixing" with the grease. Is it something to worry about yet? Or should I wait longer until I see visible extreme wear on the pinion?

The mixture of grease and aluminium particles works quite well as a grinding paste, and is good at accelerating wear to your other gears. In a car with a complex gearbox, this can be quite an issue as eventually you will need to change a whole bunch of potentially expensive gears. However on the TT-02, it is just your pinion and spur gear that are subject to accelerated wear due to grinding paste exposure, so if you don't mind replacing your spur gear at the same time as your pinion, you can run the standard one until it destroys itself, probably taking out the spur gear in the process.

However if you would rather this not happen, the earlier you switch to a steel pinion, the better. These days I build my cars with steel pinions from the outset, as I don't really like the idea of knowingly grinding away at a perfectly good spur gear. 

[Kowalski86]

18 hours ago, EmJayeX said:

Also I ve been running my TT02 and went to check my pinion. It seems to be wearing down a bit already. It looks fine overall to me, but the dust looks to be "mixing" with the grease. Is it something to worry about yet? Or should I wait longer until I see visible extreme wear on the pinion? 

I think you should order a steel pinion, it'll be cheaper to do it now than replace both your pinion and your spur gear.

[Big Jon]

On the original topic, the TT-02RR uses the 64/29 combo with the high-speed gear set and a Torque Tuned silver can, and is much faster than a standard TT-02. The motor gets much hotter, so you’ll probably want to get an aluminum motor mount and a cheap clip-on heat sink.

My TT02 has a Traxxas Titan 12t geared 64/27, and is plenty fast. It’s probably faster than a stock TT chassis with CVA shocks needs to be, which is about right for horseplay. With a decent servo, shocks/bearings/servo saver, and a geared up silver can, the TT-02 is a fun and reliable chassis.

[Kowalski86]

35 minutes ago, Big Jon said:

On the original topic, the TT-02RR uses the 64/29 combo with the high-speed gear set and a Torque Tuned silver can, and is much faster than a standard TT-02. The motor gets much hotter, so you’ll probably want to get an aluminum motor mount and a cheap clip-on heat sink.

My TT02 has a Traxxas Titan 12t geared 64/27, and is plenty fast.

The aluminum motor mount doesn't do much to dissipate heat, but it does help hold the motor better.

How'd you get a 550 to fit? I tried it myself but the motor shaft was too long.

 

[EmJayeX]

1 hour ago, Big Jon said:

On the original topic, the TT-02RR uses the 64/29 combo with the high-speed gear set and a Torque Tuned silver can, and is much faster than a standard TT-02. The motor gets much hotter, so you’ll probably want to get an aluminum motor mount and a cheap clip-on heat sink.

My TT02 has a Traxxas Titan 12t geared 64/27, and is plenty fast. It’s probably faster than a stock TT chassis with CVA shocks needs to be, which is about right for horseplay. With a decent servo, shocks/bearings/servo saver, and a geared up silver can, the TT-02 is a fun and reliable chassis.

Thanks! Great to know! In a separate post, I wrote about how I accidentally bought the wrong pinion set (48p instead of .6 mod) and I somewhat screwed up my spur ON TOP of my already degrading stock pinion. So ill probably be buying a high speed gear spur and new pinion once the old ones completely wear out. The stock TT02 definitely could use some more speed in my opinion, but also could use some steering improvements.

In you guys opinion, better steering? Or more speed? All in the name of fun, so no racing or anything. Though Im interested in getting set up for the Racing by post thing going on 😄

[Kowalski86]

5 minutes ago, EmJayeX said:

In you guys opinion, better steering? Or more speed? All in the name of fun, so no racing or anything. Though Im interested in getting set up for the Racing by post thing going on 😄

I vote for better steering before upping the speed, what servo/servo saver are you using?

[EmJayeX]

1 minute ago, Kowalski86 said:

I vote for better steering before upping the speed, what servo/servo saver are you using?

I have this servo and just the stock servo saver. Though I hear the Kimbrough servo saver is really good.

SunFounder 20KG Servo Motor Waterproof High Torque Servo, SF3218MG Metal Gear Digital Servo, Aluminium Case, Control Angle 270° for RC Robot Cars https://a.co/d/6JI7GU9

And agreed on steering over speed, just wanted to get thoughts anyways 😅

I guess its similar to suspension and handling over raw power on a real 1:1 car

[Kowalski86]

4 minutes ago, EmJayeX said:

I have this servo and just the stock servo saver. Though I hear the Kimbrough servo saver is really good.

SunFounder 20KG Servo Motor Waterproof High Torque Servo, SF3218MG Metal Gear Digital Servo, Aluminium Case, Control Angle 270° for RC Robot Cars https://a.co/d/6JI7GU9

And agreed on steering over speed, just wanted to get thoughts anyways 😅

I guess its similar to suspension and handling over raw power on a real 1:1 car

It's good for its price, I'd play around with your servo saver and servo adjustments before going down the expensive bellcrank hop up route. A good portion of the TT02s slop comes from the stock servo saver.

[EmJayeX]

4 minutes ago, Kowalski86 said:

It's good for its price, I'd play around with your servo saver and servo adjustments before going down the expensive bellcrank hop up route. A good portion of the TT02s slop comes from the stock servo saver.

Ahh I see. I think I remember someone saying that its worth buying just the aluminum steering bridge will help with steering slop too. Is that right?

[Kowalski86]

3 minutes ago, EmJayeX said:

Ahh I see. I think I remember someone saying that its worth buying just the aluminum steering bridge will help with steering slop too. Is that right?

It'll help somewhat, but for the price of Tamiyas bridge you can buy a complete Yea Racing bellcrank set which includes an aluminum bridge.

At the moment I have a TT02D that I plan on slowly upgrading, just to see how "good" I can make a TT02 without much money.

[EmJayeX]

1 minute ago, Kowalski86 said:

It'll help somewhat, but for the price of Tamiyas bridge you can buy a complete Yea Racing bellcrank set which includes an aluminum bridge.

Ok, so servo saver is probably the way to go for now. Thanks so much!

[Kowalski86]

14 minutes ago, EmJayeX said:

Ok, so servo saver is probably the way to go for now. Thanks so much!

The Kimbrough comes in multiple sizes, I think a medium would be best for a TT02? Can someone else chime in?

[Big Jon]

1 hour ago, Kowalski86 said:

The aluminum motor mount doesn't do much to dissipate heat, but it does help hold the motor better.

How'd you get a 550 to fit? I tried it myself but the motor shaft was too long.

 

I just cut the shaft to the correct length with a cutoff wheel. And you nailed it with the motor mount. The stock plastic one gets soft when it gets hot, and a good hard crash will take out a spur.

1 hour ago, Kowalski86 said:

I vote for better steering before upping the speed, what servo/servo saver are you using?

”Slow” great handling cars are more fun than fast poor handling ones, I think. I mean, of course it’s got to travel at a reasonable speed, but the ability to drive it really precisely is a blast. There are a million ways to improve the steering on the TT-02, from pretty cheap to surprisingly expensive, and they’re all worth it. The lash up I’m using now is a bunch of spares and bits of a Yeah bellcrank with adjustable Ackerman; there’s some other stuff I’d like to try like the long tie rod kit. There’s so much slop and friction in the steering and suspension that anything you do to improve either makes the car more fun to drive. The Tamiya bellcrank sleeves, low-friction suspension balls, adjustable turnbuckles, high-torque servo saver make a big difference.

It’s important to keep them moderately powered. It’s very easy to overpower a TT-02 and really ruin the handling.