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Bearings can be replaced at a later date, right?

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Gonna start building some cars soon and they have the plastic bearings.  For now, I wanted to just use the bearings that come with the kit.  I am assuming (since they are a hop up) that at a later date I can remove those bearings and put in metal ones???

Thanks!

 

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Ideally it would be best to replace the straight away, as and dirt/dust attracted to the grease gets ground into the shaft that the bearing runs on making for more friction and also scoring the shaft which makes for a loose fit once you get around to fitting the ball bearings.

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43 minutes ago, berman said:

Ideally it would be best to replace the straight away, as and dirt/dust attracted to the grease gets ground into the shaft that the bearing runs on making for more friction and also scoring the shaft which makes for a loose fit once you get around to fitting the ball bearings.

+1 this

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52 minutes ago, berman said:

Ideally it would be best to replace the straight away, as and dirt/dust attracted to the grease gets ground into the shaft that the bearing runs on making for more friction and also scoring the shaft which makes for a loose fit once you get around to fitting the ball bearings.

+2 this

 

Plus, most Tamiya plastics don't appreciate repeated disassembly and reassembly as it wears the screw holes, so the fewer times you need to take it apart, the better.

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Yep. Plus, many times the kit bearings require you to grease the shaft that the bearing supports. Once you install ball bearings you don't have to anymore, but you're still left with a sticky greasy mess with which you now have to install ball bearings into.

23 minutes ago, XV Pilot said:

+2 this

 

Plus, most Tamiya plastics don't appreciate repeated disassembly and reassembly as it wears the screw holes, so the fewer times you need to take it apart, the better.

If you're using self-tapping screws (the standard Tamiya screws) you can, if you're careful. Don't overtighten them to begin with to prevent the threads from being overstreched, but the main thing that saves the threads upon reasembly is to do this:

- Put the screw in the hole
- Carefully reverse the screw (as if you're undoing it)
- Once you see the screw fall a bit into the hole, do it up

What this does is allow the screw to catch its own old thread. When you turn it counter-clockwise slightly you're feeling for the tip of the screw to sink back a bit into the old thread, preventing it from cutting new thread and eventually wearing out the hole. If you do this, and you're a bit careful about it, you can re-use the same hole (and threads) many times.
 

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Hmmmm,,,, Interesting!  Ok... so I will make sure the gear boxes have metal bearings... Is it less of a problem to change the wheel bearings later?  I heard that plastic ones are better for younger drivers to get used to the speed... or is there a negligible difference?

 

 

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Bearings (as opposed to plastic bushes) will give you quicker acceleration, higher speed, longer runtimes and will last longer. It's a no brainer really. If you want to slow it down for younger drivers, you're probably better off using a different motor, or adjusting the ESC...

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But in answer to your question, yes it is easier to change out the wheel bearings compared to the gearbox bearings, as depending on the car in question you ought to only need to undo one screw per hub, possibly none, as opposed to however many hold the gearbox together.

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13 minutes ago, XV Pilot said:

But in answer to your question, yes it is easier to change out the wheel bearings compared to the gearbox bearings, as depending on the car in question you ought to only need to undo one screw per hub, possibly none, as opposed to however many hold the gearbox together.

The cars in question are a DT-03 and TT-02b (thanks for the recommendation on the TT-02b XV!)  Will it make much of a difference if I keep the plastic one on the wheels?  I remember my Hornet going pretty quick with the plastic ones!

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I use plastic bushings on the front wheels of my DT03 because it gets run on the beach quite a lot. I found very little difference. However, I run them dry. (I have bags of these little white bushings) because of all the sand.

On the TT02B, yes, it will make quite a difference. More bearings and the drag of the wheels directly influence the rolling resistance of the drivetrain. On the DT03 the front wheels are free to roll seperate from the drivetrain.

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The issue of wear to the metal parts will likely be lessened by running the bushings dry, as there will be no grease or oil to attract dirt and be turned into grinding paste.

 

The effect of the bushings' extra friction on performance will be more noticeable with higher-revving motors, as a lower-revving, torquier motor will overcome the extra friction more easily, and will be slower overall anyway.

 

Plastic bushings certainly do have a maintenance advantage over metal shielded bearings, but to me the best solution is to get a good set of rubber-sealed bearings and fit those to the wheels, diffs, outer propshaft drive cup locations - basically anywhere that is exposed on one or both sides. The rubber seals do a good job of keeping muck at bay and the bearings thus require minimal maintenance.

 

I wouldn't really consider bushings as a means of purposefully limiting the car's performance. It might slow it a little with the stock motor, but at the price of increased wear to the shafts and stress on the motor. As already mentioned, there are better ways, such as fitting a slower motor or adjusting your throttle endpoints.

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Rcbearings.co.uk is worth a look. Quite affordable, and decent quality, sold as sets or individually. I dont buy bearings anywhere else these days.

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With the price of bearings so low these days , if you're changing any, I'd change the lot.

I doubt you would notice any difference in car performance, battery life you would notice better run times.

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Yep you can replace them later just leave it on the shelf till you do so.

For all the reasons stated above!

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Almost all of my shelters have bearings in them. Compared to back in the day of $80 bearing kits, they are dirt cheap.  I've bought them as low as $.30 a bearing. 

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All of my shelfers have bearings too. But since I refuse to acknowledge that I have too many cars to run them all regularly, none of them are shelfers in my head - all are runners. :)

 

 

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