Hotshot HP front suspension. Has anyone tried the modern CVA short as a substitute?

[nowinaminute 2815]

I hear that while this upgrade improves handling, there isn't enough shock travel for the chassis to bottom out which will cause strain on the suspension components.  Has anyone tried the new style CVA short shocks? I've got a feeling they have slightly shorter bodies and longer stroke. Anyone tried it?

 

[Juls1 1661]

I don’t have a hotshot so I can’t trial this, 

but there isn’t a shorter body that has “more” travel however CVA super mini can be fitted with a longer coated shaft that brings there travel up closer to that of the CVA mini damper.

i believe it’s 53575.

http://www.rcmart.com/tamiya-damper-piston-4pcs-53575-p-14556.html?cPath=389_690

this shaft also lengthens the m chassis dampers. I think these shafts come standard in xv01 and TT02S with the super mini bodys. May be the case with other kits. 

[nowinaminute 2815]

You're right, smaller body wouldn't give more travel overall but the standard HP shock I think either has spacers inside or undersized shafts to limit downward travel. The newer short shock can be built to have the same overall length but can compress more because of the slightly smaller body. I dont know if the difference is enough to allow full articulation though (I can't even remember if the new version can fully compress before the piston disc hits the top inside)

[ThunderDragonCy 7878]

I got into this a little bit when i built my Boomerwig as the big wig uses the same 80mm 'short' short shock on the front. You can build a modern black cva2 to 80mm by putting both small and large shaft spacers inside with the short eyelet to make an 80mm long, 18mm stroke shock. I don't know if 18mm is more stroke than the yellow shock in the kit. If you put a long piston rod in a mini shock to make an 80mm long shock you get less stroke as the mini shocks only have 15mm stroke. It might be worth looking at this another way though: although i have never seen one in the plastic, it always struck me that the issue with the super shot front suspension wasn't the lack of stroke, its that it looks like it jacks the front end up too high initially, like the top shock mount is too low so the suspension sits too extended? If the front ride height is much mire than the rear maybe the thing to do is to build a mini shock with a longer piston so the shock is shorter than 80mm to start with to even out the ride height? If you built a mini shock with a rear piston road 9805917 it would build up 77mm with the long eyelet, and if you put shaft spacers on the shaft under the spring as a travel limiter it won't damage the inside of the shock by having too much piston compared to sbock body length. 

[Saito2 6686]

I wouldn't say the Super Shot front end is particularly lacking in travel, but as you noted, the front shocks will bottom out before the chassis. This isn't completely uncommon for buggies of those times. Some magazines actually promoted the idea of limited travel with fuel tubing to prevent the chassis from bottoming out, like a bump-stop. Of course, now we know that that could wind up stressing the suspension and its better to let the chassis bottom out and take the hit. The Big Wig front end (different front arms and shocks mounted ahead of the arms) does allow the front end to bottom out. That said, I've never broken anything of mine with a Super Shot front end.

[dannymulder 766]

I have bought gmade 75mm shocks for the front of my hotshot with the supershot parts, they have 17mm of stroke, I don't know of the chassis bottom out with these shocks, because the car is NIB so I have to build it. 

I bought the gmade shocks because I don,t like the yellow cva and the gmade shocks are nice I have them on my wt-01 and on my gf-01.

for the rear I have 93mm gmade shocks, I am going to use the long tamiya eyelet on them to make them longer, the tamiya eyelet fits like a glove on the gmade shocks.

[nowinaminute 2815]

1 hour ago, Saito2 said:

That said, I've never broken anything of mine with a Super Shot front end.

That's good to know.

I really wanted to keep it stock because it looks so awesome but the tendency for the front end to dive and not rebound is driving me crazy. 3rd time I took it out the front bumper caught in a rut whilst braking and the car did a forward flip and landed on the roof. 3rd run in and a dented roof and scraped rear spoiler 😖

Trying to decide how to move forward now. I have the HP front end parts and I have an old Parma dual rear shock conversion and a couple of long yellow CVAs so I could go to 4 shocks but I also have the three red shocks hotshot ii/sabre style and boomer front arms and I can't decide which route to go!

[nowinaminute 2815]

I got around to trial fitting the HP kit tonight. I can confirm the buggy will bottom out with the newer shocks fitted. There's only a small difference in shock travel but it's enough to make a considerable difference to the articulation because they are mounted so far inboard.

I dare say if you took the nut off the bottom of the stock shock and just put the plastic eyelet on, you might just about manage it with the standard shocks too. The shafts are shorter than the bodies so there would be no risk of the pistons hitting the diaphragms. Haven't tried that yet though.

I put a shock of each type on each side to give you a comparison:

Standard unit:

Modern CVA Short:

That's as far as I got today.

[ruebiracer 1046]

I´ve tried out quite the same last week on my Avante 2001 build, to get also the possibility to bottom out in front, without changing shock mount positions. The newer CVA´s have a more compact style. So compressed length is Shorter. With a different Piston rod with Shorter length of the lower thread, you can build the without flange nut. So more down travel. (did that already on my Monster beetle runner to increase front axle stroke). On my Avante 2001 runner I´m testing also the possibility to leave out the diaphragm completely, to be able to use longer rods for more droop at the same time. Want to come to High cap-mounted complete axle stroke of my Vanquish, without using high caps. So in fact these are then built as aeration dampers like on the Dyna Storm or on more modern buggies using the Buggy aeration dampers. You just have to cut the inner part of the diaphragms out, and just use the outer O-ring shape as a sealing. To get a super smooth friction behaviour, I also want to use TRF Teflon Pistons and higher quality O-rings from Revolution racing. Shall be a nice "sleeper" Avante, which is more than it seems...

 

[Grotty Otty 868]

Fitted the hard titanium piston rods (54042) as recommended by @ThunderDragonCy to my DT-03 front shocks I'd put on my Super Hotshot. Length now perfect for full travel and bottom out beyond the chassis tapping the ground first. Used the longer eyelets and longer spacer above the lower spring retainer to get the correct travel. Only thing to be aware of is the shims required a couple of washers to keep it snug between the e clips on the piston rod. I went with the three holed ones as the washer partially covered the holes.

 

[ThunderDragonCy 7878]

@Grotty Otty Great news that it worked. Looks spot on there. 

[nowinaminute 2815]

That's awesome. At least 2 easy ways to achieve this then!

Want to take mine out to try but it's peeing down with rain as usual.

Trying to decide what to do at the front of the Hotshot now the red mono shock has gone, it's a bit bare looking now. Super Hotshot shell maybe because it's designed to smarten up that area.

Or maybe a mock radiator or intercooler......hmmm

[ruebiracer 1046]

6 hours ago, Grotty Otty said:

Fitted the hard titanium piston rods (54042) as recommended by @ThunderDragonCy to my DT-03 front shocks I'd put on my Super Hotshot. Length now perfect for full travel and bottom out beyond the chassis tapping the ground first. Used the longer eyelets and longer spacer above the lower spring retainer to get the correct travel. Only thing to be aware of is the shims required a couple of washers to keep it snug between the e clips on the piston rod. I went with the three holed ones as the washer partially covered the holes.

 

The shims between the e-Clips is a nice trick. Many Tamiya dampers can profit from it. You really can feel the "Play" when pulling and pudshing the shock by Hand when changing the direction. Cool Looking Super Hotshot, by the way!

[GTodd 1349]

On 11/20/2019 at 3:25 PM, nowinaminute said:

I got around to trial fitting the HP kit tonight. I can confirm the buggy will bottom out with the newer shocks fitted. There's only a small difference in shock travel but it's enough to make a considerable difference to the articulation because they are mounted so far inboard.

I dare say if you took the nut off the bottom of the stock shock and just put the plastic eyelet on, you might just about manage it with the standard shocks too. The shafts are shorter than the bodies so there would be no risk of the pistons hitting the diaphragms. Haven't tried that yet though.

I put a shock of each type on each side to give you a comparison:

Standard unit:

Modern CVA Short:

That's as far as I got today.

Wait, hold the phone! How'd you mount the suspension with the sway bar intact, I thought you couldn't do that! 

One of the reasons, although ilogical that I'm leaning toward a HS over the Super Hot shot is the swaybars and how they look. 

[nowinaminute 2815]

6 hours ago, GTodd said:

Wait, hold the phone! How'd you mount the suspension with the sway bar intact, I thought you couldn't do that! 

It's not mounted, just dangling off lol.

I've seen it done though, by spacing the top of the shocks outward a bit more.

Only problem is that it creates a dodgy shock angle.

That might be less of an issue with the CVA shorts though as they have softer springs. I might have to try it.

[nowinaminute 2815]

Just a little update guys.

I can confirm that as well as using modern CVA shorts, you can also get the car to bottom out with the HP dampers by simply removing the nut from the shaft. Even at full compression the thread doesn't reach the o rings so no worries of damage there and the shaft isn't long enough to hit the diaphragm either. 

The modern CVAs work great too but the springs are too soft really so you'd have to fit the HP springs or a ton of preload to get the ride height above scraping level. There doesn't seem to be much point when you can just whip off those 2 nuts and stick to the original HP dampers.

Now I need to have a think about this front end because it looks a little naked to me without the stock damper. I could add the Boomerang extensions and fit another yellow CVA but with no spring or oil inside, just for looks? Or maybe another pair of spotlights?

[dannymulder 766]

7 hours ago, nowinaminute said:

Just a little update guys.

I can confirm that as well as using modern CVA shorts, you can also get the car to bottom out with the HP dampers by simply removing the nut from the shaft. Even at full compression the thread doesn't reach the o rings so no worries of damage there and the shaft isn't long enough to hit the diaphragm either. 

The modern CVAs work great too but the springs are too soft really so you'd have to fit the HP springs or a ton of preload to get the ride height above scraping level. There doesn't seem to be much point when you can just whip off those 2 nuts and stick to the original HP dampers.

Now I need to have a think about this front end because it looks a little naked to me without the stock damper. I could add the Boomerang extensions and fit another yellow CVA but with no spring or oil inside, just for looks? Or maybe another pair of spotlights?

when I started to build my hotshot I knew that I going to build it with the hp kit so I cut the body to fill up the cap on the front, maybe an option when you need another body, and I am using gmade shocks  I like them a lot, and I do not like those yellow CVA, I do not like the yellow color and the shocks self.

[Saito2 6686]

10 hours ago, nowinaminute said:

Now I need to have a think about this front end because it looks a little naked to me without the stock damper. I could add the Boomerang extensions and fit another yellow CVA but with no spring or oil inside, just for looks? Or maybe another pair of spotlights?

 

The was a red Boomerang (I think) around back in the day that ran 3 shocks up front. Actually it had 4 in the back too for a total of 7 shocks. The Super Shot body also provides more coverage up front. Personally, I like the uncovered look up front. It looks like the mechanicals are bursting forth from the bodywork.

[nowinaminute 2815]

16 minutes ago, Saito2 said:

The was a red Boomerang (I think) around back in the day that ran 3 shocks up front. Actually it had 4 in the back too for a total of 7 shocks. The Super Shot body also provides more coverage up front. Personally, I like the uncovered look up front. It looks like the mechanicals are bursting forth from the bodywork.

You're right, I cant make my mind up to be honest lol. It does look kind of brutal with the chassis sticking out. I dont really want to go with a super shot body because I want it to still look like a mk1.

I did consider the possibility of adding something mechanical looking like a dummy radiator or intercooler perhaps?

[Saito2 6686]

As much as I love the Super Shot, I wanted to go with the Hot Shot body (in metallic blue) on my Super Boomerhotshoterang, so I know where you're coming from. A dummy oil cooler or extra pair of spot lights might look pretty cool.

[ThunderDragonCy 7878]

Ooo, extra front spots. Now you're talking!