Vintage Falcon And Thundershot Rebuild Set-ups

[tonysmini]

Hi, well after joining a few weeks ago and browsing the forum, I've decided to stick my first topic in here.

First one, my old Tamiya Falcon. Now fully ballraced, he's up and running, new CRP dogbones and tamiya drive cups, CRP front lower brace and I am making an upper one, plus a new ESC and motor, love it.

1. Do any more modern metal drives fit the Falcon gearbox and hub ends? I don't fancy stock-piling the plastic drive cups for the future but I am running the car regularly. (Already have hex drives to let me run a different set of wheels when I need to as I can't find tyres anywhere)

2. The rear shocks are way too hard, what rear springs would you recommend to soften the rear end, and would fitting a couple of small washers inside the shock effectively shorten it's travel enough to prevent the dogbones from popping out. (I'm planning on putting 4 hole damper internals to soften the effect slightly).

3. The body is a mess, it's broken in the usual place between the rear towers, so I'm either going to stick a beetle body on it, or can anyone think of something different? I am open to ideas.

Second one, my Thundershot, currently waiting on a new chassis as mine is broken where the gearbox mounts at the front. A5 is fine, but the stainless replacement bit is on order too. This too is fitted with an esc, 20 turn motor and hex drives and new wheels. My ideas all come from Project Terror Scorcher, I love the look of this car, and hope PowerSurge doesn't mind me nicking his ideas.

4. Again the suspension, I think the shocks are all mixed up, the two on the rear are very hard and the damping action very stiff, is this right? The single front one is the complete opposite, very soft with very soft damping action so the front end seems a bit soggy when it drives. Is it worth keeping it, or chucking them all and going for an alloy 4 damper set. What spring sets should I use?

5. Is it worth using the hop-up UJ drive shafts, and how could I firm up the steering action a bit, it just seems a little flimsy to me, or is this right??

Cheers for any advice you can give me,

Tony

[gresh2811]

Hi, well after joining a few weeks ago and browsing the forum, I've decided to stick my first topic in here.

First one, my old Tamiya Falcon. Now fully ballraced, he's up and running, new CRP dogbones and tamiya drive cups, CRP front lower brace and I am making an upper one, plus a new ESC and motor, love it.

1. Do any more modern metal drives fit the Falcon gearbox and hub ends? I don't fancy stock-piling the plastic drive cups for the future but I am running the car regularly. (Already have hex drives to let me run a different set of wheels when I need to as I can't find tyres anywhere)

2. The rear shocks are way too hard, what rear springs would you recommend to soften the rear end, and would fitting a couple of small washers inside the shock effectively shorten it's travel enough to prevent the dogbones from popping out. (I'm planning on putting 4 hole damper internals to soften the effect slightly).

3. The body is a mess, it's broken in the usual place between the rear towers, so I'm either going to stick a beetle body on it, or can anyone think of something different? I am open to ideas.

Second one, my Thundershot, currently waiting on a new chassis as mine is broken where the gearbox mounts at the front. A5 is fine, but the stainless replacement bit is on order too. This too is fitted with an esc, 20 turn motor and hex drives and new wheels. My ideas all come from Project Terror Scorcher, I love the look of this car, and hope PowerSurge doesn't mind me nicking his ideas.

4. Again the suspension, I think the shocks are all mixed up, the two on the rear are very hard and the damping action very stiff, is this right? The single front one is the complete opposite, very soft with very soft damping action so the front end seems a bit soggy when it drives. Is it worth keeping it, or chucking them all and going for an alloy 4 damper set. What spring sets should I use?

5. Is it worth using the hop-up UJ drive shafts, and how could I firm up the steering action a bit, it just seems a little flimsy to me, or is this right??

Cheers for any advice you can give me,

Tony

I was given a falcon by a work mate this week. Upon quick inspection everything seems to be fine apart from the body which is bashed up. i was wanting to put the beetle body on but not sure which one t use, is it the sand scorcher body or another one. also being a newby to all this what else would you recomend doing?

[tonysmini]

The body is notorious for breaking between the rear shock mounts, that's why I'm planning on using something else. I've seen a few scorcher beetle bodied ones now, that's why I may do something different. If only someone did a Riley Elf body, (classic mini with a boot) I'd be laughing.

Tony

[Capt Splatt]

I've been setting up a falcon for vintage racing and the drive cups had to go.

What I wound up with was the drive cups out of a Super Fighter G (HB2010). They're just a bit deeper than the originals but otherwise a perfect fit. I'm using the crp dog bones as well.

 

I wish I could tell you about spring, shock and tyre combos, but I'm still trying to find one I like.

[Capt Splatt]

Oh, another suggestion.

If you dig up a set standard hex adapters, the wheels from a HB2010/Super Fighter G are a pretty good colour match for the original rims that are a straight replacement that take modern 2.2" rubber.

[tonysmini]

Thanks, what I have discovered is a set of Ansmann 85mm shocks restrict the rear end from dropping the last 5mm, plus I've added tiny pieces of plastic to the tub where the rear swing arms butt up.

This works well to stop the dogbones dropping out, it's an old trick apparently.

I'll get a photo up once I've finished rebuilding the car.

[Scorpn]

For the Falcon, these are what I did when I was racing you have pretty much covered them with what you have done but might be interesting if you want to keep it mostly stock looking

For the rear shocks use the 4 hole pistons that are always left over and the springs from a lunchbox, I used that when I raced my falcon a million years ago and the rear end works well, you could also use low weight oil these days, I also put screws under the rear arm pivots where the arms hit the chassis to lower the rear end and stop the drive shafts popping out - also had the advantage of ride height adjustment

Put a long screw right through each side of the front end where it bolts up to the chassis and a nut on top to stop the front end ripping off., I also duct taped under the servo saver to stop the lower front bulkhead breaking.

Thundershot - twin shock front end. Back in the day I never broke mine despite crazy fast 8.4v and technigold motor, just made bald tyres really fast

[tonysmini]

I was thinking about 4 hole pistons, I have 2 spares sitting here that I just found from my old pumpkin from 20 years ago (wish I'd not run that in the road under a bus).

I'll let you know once they are all done.

Tony

[tonysmini]

Wow, nearly a month and I have been busy with both my cars, plus a couple of others I have acquired. (My wife found out, she's not a happy teddy)

After the adive from here, I have sorted both of my cars, well, as much as we do before we decide something else needs changing.

My thundershot is now running well, despite my attempts to demolish it, it just soaks up everything my son and I throw at it. We have a half decent speed bump right outside our house that makes a brilliant ramp, and the shot jumps and lands so gracefully. I have two sets of wheels that I use, one for onroad that are hard enough to let me drift the car really well without the tyres shredding, and some softer small spikes ones for off road.

My Falcon now sports the DF-02 drive cups, the regular Falcon ones shattered the inner drive cups twice, maybe that the old/new ones I got were just too old and brittle for the crp dogbones, but these new ones work a treat. The inner cup shafts aren't quite as long, and they don't have the inner rod to join the two in the centre of the diff, but some careful drilling soon fixed this and the inner rod fits beautifully. I shortened the rear shocks a little more, then added shorter ones to the front to level the car out as I didn't like the 'nose up' attitude it had, I just need to find some wheels and tyres I like, will probably go for a set of off roads and a separate on road set to play with once I've decided on the body. (Seen a Nitro 1/8 Mini shell that may fit, just need to look at it then figure out how to fit it)

I'll have to get my photo's uploaded at some time.

Tony

[HunterZero]

I have the 4-hole pistons in the back of my Falcon and soft oil, but I think it now feels a tad underdamped.

- James

[tonysmini]

Mine seems okay at the minute, at first it seems a little overdamped running 300 weight oil, but after a couple of minutes it seems to soften up nicely. Currently playing with the springs to get it how I feel happy.

I'm busy fiddling with a TB-01 Evo VII and a half built but complete in the box HPI Rally Focus that I picked up too. I love this hobby, lol

[bngiles]

Losi springs work just fine for the older CVA shocks. Gives you more tuning options as they have numerous rates.

[tonysmini]

Cheers for that, looks like another trip to Modelsport is on the cards, like I need an excuse to go there, lol.

[tonysmini]

Cheers for that, looks like another trip to Modelsport is on the cards, like I need an excuse to go there, lol.

[ThunderShotResurrection]

...

Second one, my Thundershot, currently waiting on a new chassis as mine is broken where the gearbox mounts at the front. A5 is fine, but the stainless replacement bit is on order too. This too is fitted with an esc, 20 turn motor and hex drives and new wheels. My ideas all come from Project Terror Scorcher, I love the look of this car, and hope PowerSurge doesn't mind me nicking his ideas.

...

I just finished to restore my old Thundershot and I repaired a broken chassis. It was no problem at all: I used rapid glue and filler to build up a ground stucture and "taped" it with epoxy and glassfibers. After that just used some sandpaper and drilled the holes for the screws. A bit of black paint - ready.

I´m sure its much stronger than before.

Cheers,

Stefan

PS: Also got some nice ideas against broken gearboxes and A5s. Pics are coming soon...