XV01 for carpet racing

[TravisZ28]

Hello! I am going to be building an XV01 to race on carpet. Does anyone have any tips or recommendations for setting the car up to race on a black carpet track with rubber tires? From from I have gathered on all the other posts I have seen on this forum and others I would want to use really stiff springs on the front and really soft on the rear. Probably run a stuff sway bar on the front and nothing on the rear. I would need to get the car low the combat traction roll. How long are the shocks in the standard kit? I would like to run some better shocks but I am not sure what length would be appropriate. I will initially just be running a torque tuned motor but will step up to a 17.5 sensored setup at some point. I would also like to look into the TRF420 suspension upgrade but I am kinda unsure what would be needed to make it happen. Thanks for any and all help you fine folks can give.

[Gratuit]

Hi!

I run mine occasionnally on carpet at our club. No race yet

It works quite nicely, even if I still have to improve the settings (and my driving skills ).

Here is what I have for now:
CVA super minis built with 2 holes TRF pistons, TRF spacers and x-rings.
600 oil front, 400 rear.
Yellow springs front, red rear (from the 53440 On-Road Tuned Hard Spring Set, far harder than the 53163 touring and rally spring set)
I've mesured the dampers, they are 52mm long from eye to eye. Shorter will be too short as I have only around 5mm ground clearance. I had CVA minis installed before, but had almost no stroke, that's why I opted for the super minis.
I don't know what comes in the normal kit as mine was the long damper version. I think they must be the CVA minis.

1° camber front, 2°rear. A little bit of toe out. No sway bars, and almost no grip roll with those settings.
500k oil on the front diff, 7k rear.

Tires are Ride 28 shore.

It's powered by a Hobbywing Justock 13.5t with the highest FDR allowed by the original spur (around 6). That will certainly change in the future.

Here is a (bad) picture of the car 10 days ago (just before I swap the blue springs for the yellow ones)

[TravisZ28]

Gratuit, this is great! I haven't seen any other instances of people running these as a TC on carpet! Thanks so much!

 

[Pylon80]

1 hour ago, Gratuit said:

I think they must be the CVA minis.

The regular kit actually comes with Super Mini's 👍

[Gratuit]

 

11 hours ago, Pylon80 said:

The regular kit actually comes with Super Mini's 👍

Ok, that seems short. I can understand now why people are complaining about the original version's ground clearance for rough rally tracks...

[Pylon80]

@Gratuit the more I look at your car, the more I think it looks cool in "TC" form.

So... Since my XV won't handle the tiniest piece of rock without jamming either the belt or the bell cranks at the front (when the rest of the world has been unanimously successfully at running XV-01's off-road 😡) I think I will be converting mine to on-road!

Fenders off, belt cover off, 6mm ride height and Rush 32 pre-mounts 😎

[TravisZ28]

I cant wait to receive my XV01 and get it built! I have seen this as a reboot of my very first RC the TA03F. I would still love to see a RE-RE of any of those kits.

[magnumcyclonex]

I bought a second XV-01 for almost the same purpose, to run on carpet track. I have yet to build it so I am 1) glad to see someone like you post a thread about it, and 2) will hopefully be able to share my findings whenever I get around to doing so. Since it is basically the successor to the FF03 and FF04, I am most intrigued on its handling characteristics. I will need some time to learn about the chassis before upgrading it to a race class spec (FWD, which means taking out the belt for 2WD). Are you planning to race the XV-01 as a 4WD?

[Pylon80]

4 hours ago, magnumcyclonex said:

it is basically the successor to the FF03 and FF04

The FF04 came out a couple of years after the XV

[magnumcyclonex]

4 hours ago, Pylon80 said:

The FF04 came out a couple of years after the XV

Ah you're right! I was off by a few years. They're all very similar though.

[sosidge]

10 hours ago, magnumcyclonex said:

I bought a second XV-01 for almost the same purpose, to run on carpet track. I have yet to build it so I am 1) glad to see someone like you post a thread about it, and 2) will hopefully be able to share my findings whenever I get around to doing so. Since it is basically the successor to the FF03 and FF04, I am most intrigued on its handling characteristics. I will need some time to learn about the chassis before upgrading it to a race class spec (FWD, which means taking out the belt for 2WD). Are you planning to race the XV-01 as a 4WD?

FF-04 used the front half of an XV-01 transmission and paired it with a carbon chassis and on-road suspension to make an FF racer. I had one. It wasn't competitive, the XV-01 motor position is several mm above the chassis and that has a negative impact on CG and performance. An XV-01 converted to FWD will be even less competitive.

[magnumcyclonex]

I get that the XV-01 isn't going to be a competitive FWD FF chassis because it's designed to be a rally car. It is the experimentation and idea that intrigues me. And even if the proof of concept works, I'm not looking to win any races, but just to have fun with my Tamiya R/Cs in a race format.

Waiting for the day Tamiya makes a dedicated and improved FF chassis once again

[skom25]

On 4/17/2025 at 7:30 PM, Pylon80 said:

So... Since my XV won't handle the tiniest piece of rock without jamming either the belt or the bell cranks at the front (when the rest of the world has been unanimously successfully at running XV-01's off-road 😡) I think I will be converting mine to on-road!

A lot of people converted TT-02 into Rally Car and ran it hard without issues. I damaged around 3 or 4 sets of Pinion/ Spur in short time, because tiny pieces of gravel fell into gearbox compartment. Strange things happen  

7 hours ago, Pylon80 said:

The FF04 came out a couple of years after the XV

So why it is so unpopular? I have not checked this, but I was pretty sure that FFs were released long before XV-01. In my LHS I did not see any kit and spare parts are very limited.

@TravisZ28 probably you need to think about aluminium suspension mounts. I heard that it is the weakest point of XV-01. I did not have any issues with stock parts, but I run car on asphalt and do not hit walls  

[Grumpy pants]

I use Yeah Racing carbon shock mounts, they are cheaper than the Tamiya ones and they do just great.

[TravisZ28]

14 hours ago, magnumcyclonex said:

I bought a second XV-01 for almost the same purpose, to run on carpet track. I have yet to build it so I am 1) glad to see someone like you post a thread about it, and 2) will hopefully be able to share my findings whenever I get around to doing so. Since it is basically the successor to the FF03 and FF04, I am most intrigued on its handling characteristics. I will need some time to learn about the chassis before upgrading it to a race class spec (FWD, which means taking out the belt for 2WD). Are you planning to race the XV-01 as a 4WD?

Yes, planning on running 4WD. Yeah it seemed like the dedicated XV01 thread had gone pretty quiet. That and no one had really mentioned racing on black carpet before. 

2 hours ago, skom25 said:

A lot of people converted TT-02 into Rally Car and ran it hard without issues. I damaged around 3 or 4 sets of Pinion/ Spur in short time, because tiny pieces of gravel fell into gearbox compartment. Strange things happen  

So why it is so unpopular? I have not checked this, but I was pretty sure that FFs were released long before XV-01. In my LHS I did not see any kit and spare parts are very limited.

@TravisZ28 probably you need to think about aluminium suspension mounts. I heard that it is the weakest point of XV-01. I did not have any issues with stock parts, but I run car on asphalt and do not hit walls  

I actually have the Yeah Racing arm mounts in my Amazon shopping cart right now. I am kind of just wanting to wait and see how it goes with the stock parts. 

 

Has anyone used the Tamiya Semi-Slick tires on carpet at all? I am wondering how they do with or without tire compound. Thanks all!

[magnumcyclonex]

5 hours ago, TravisZ28 said:

Yes, planning on running 4WD. Yeah it seemed like the dedicated XV01 thread had gone pretty quiet. That and no one had really mentioned racing on black carpet before.

I would be intrigued at how the XV-01 runs on black carpet. Can you get the ride height lowered to about 5 or 6mm?

5 hours ago, TravisZ28 said:

Has anyone used the Tamiya Semi-Slick tires on carpet at all? I am wondering how they do with or without tire compound. Thanks all!

Regarding tires, for whatever class you are running (I'm assuming 4WD Touring Car?), you'll probably want to use the same tires as everyone else in that class (and not Tamiya tires). When I go carpet racing with a limited modified TT02 (Porsche Cup), every car uses the same one or two allowed tires, so check with your club.

Nothing stopping you from trying out the Tamiya tires on black carpet during practice. But speaking from experience, do know that you'll likely have to apply tire compound on most/all your tires when running on black carpet, otherwise your car will be skating around with little to no grip at all.

[Pylon80]

9 hours ago, skom25 said:

lot of people converted TT-02 into Rally Car and ran it hard without issues. I damaged around 3 or 4 sets of Pinion/ Spur in short time, because tiny pieces of gravel fell into gearbox compartment. Strange things happen  

The remedy is easy: a bead of grease around all the seams of the spur cover and diff covers. And all gears left dry inside.

[Gratuit]

34 minutes ago, magnumcyclonex said:

I would be intrigued at how the XV-01 runs on black carpet. Can you get the ride height lowered to about 5 or 6mm?

No problem for that, mine is around 5mm everywhere. And it runs fine, still have to play a bit with the settings though.
People at my club are always staring at me a but strangely when they see my chassis, as I ride this one or my TL01... While they are all driving xrays or xpress (also some TT02). I like the fact that I can do many different things with the same chassis, and I don't care becoming the next world champion of the area