King Tiger - any way to save the dual clutch's?

[ReaperGN]

A while back I picked up an original King Tiger for a pretty decent price. I bought all new electronics, replaced the road wheels with aluminum ones then hit a snag. The previous owner had lost one track link. I tried working with it but things are just to tight so I ordered up some metal tracks for it. Now I knew they would be heavy and put a strain on the clutches but I figured there has to be a way to make them work. Going forwards or backwards is not a problem but they cant handle turning. 

Is there anything I can do to fix this such as stiffer springs/increasing tension with washers? I removed the cork pads and installed some better ones and that helped a little. I know of a trans I can buy that will convert it over to dual motors but I really rather have the clutch setup. Especially since I dont ever plan on driving it hard and as sad as it is never outside. The body was painted to well and is way to old to be going through bushes or being cleaned often.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Tamiyabigstuff]

Build manual is available on the TamiyaUSA website : http://www.tamiyausa.com/pdf/manuals/56004ml.pdf

There are some tips on how to adjust for poor running at the end.

The gearbox looks to be a factory assembled unit - not sure if it is possible to take it apart & service ?

Try advertising in the parts wanted section for some spare track links.     

[ReaperGN]

At this point I'm committed. There is no going back to plastic tracks. 

As to adjustment the clutch's have rather tight tolerances all things considered. And there is zero adjustment to be had at the actual clutch. I was able to install 4 thin shims under the spring and gain some power out of the clutch but still not enough to drive on anything but smooth tile. Any more than 4 and it locks the clutch tight. 

Unless someone has a suggestion about all I can do is order the trans from eto armor.

[MadInventor]

I went through a similar thing with my vintage KT, as I had also got a metal track kit for it. I ended up converting the gearbox to use twin 540s, and used a v-tail mixer from a model aircraft to drive 2 ESCs. This allowed me to drive it like a clutched tank. If you're driving it indoors on carpet then it will suffer from clutch slippage, as there is too much grip from the heavy tracks. Don't forget when the gearbox was originally designed everything ran on 6V, so even using a 7.2 is overpowering it. I'd recommend bite the bullet and get a gearbox you can run twin 540s in, that way you can use 80 turn crawler motors in it to give even more torque, and I ran mine with a 9.6V battery as well. Makes it a very nice tank to drive.

Link to the gearbox mod I did is here, I went overkill on the heavy duty design on this one, it is possible to modify the existing gearbox housing quite easily quite easily, attaching the tt01 gears to ends of the shafts being the only tricky bit.

 

 

[njmlondon]

I went down the same route and ended up replacing the whole front end with Impact metal gearboxes. I have a feeling you may need to do the same. While you are at it, the KT has awful track tensioners so you may need to sort them as well with metal tracks. 

 

A King tiger is a slippy slope! Far too many things need upgrading and each upgrade causes stress elsewhere.

[MadInventor]

20 hours ago, njmlondon said:

I went down the same route and ended up replacing the whole front end with Impact metal gearboxes. I have a feeling you may need to do the same. While you are at it, the KT has awful track tensioners so you may need to sort them as well with metal tracks. 

 

A King tiger is a slippy slope! Far too many things need upgrading and each upgrade causes stress elsewhere.

What motors are they ? They look too big for a 380, and too small for a 540

[njmlondon]

1 hour ago, MadInventor said:

What motors are they ? They look too big for a 380, and too small for a 540

450's if I remember correctly. Cannot remember where I got them from. Rather a nice compromise though.