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markbt73

Lockdown fun: Apollo 13- inspired build challenge

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My wife and I watched Apollo 13 the other night. One of my favorite parts of that whole story is when they need to build an adapter for the CO2 filters, using only what they have on board.

Fast forward to today: I was looking around my workshop, taking stock of what projects i have to work on, and I noticed that I have a lot of bits and pieces that aren't associated with any particular project.

And I thought: what if, before I dig into the other projects, I see what I can build out of just that stuff? So I'm going to do just that. No ordering parts, no stealing bits from other projects, just leftovers. I'll let the parts tell me what they want to be, and attempt to build a functional, fun, interestig vehicle out of them.

I also have quite a bit of scrap plastic and aluminum from work (I work for a sign company) so making a body and/or chassis is a distinct possibility.

Watch this space, and if anyone else wants to join in, by all means, post your own creations.

And remember: Failure is not an option.

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a very cool idea. Looking forward to seeing what you and maybe others come up with.

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I just got 3 weeks off work and have quite a few planned projects.

Tomy Trackmaster Percy power upgrade. - almost complete.

Matchstick VW camper with ftx mini crawler Running gear- underway. 

Lunchbox junior RC conversion chassis kit. - not started.

See you in 3 weeks. Lol

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Neat idea.  I think there was a thread maybe a decade ago about scrap yard creations, building something from stuff you had lying around.  I always intended to get involved but never got around to it.  At the time I had most of a Monster Beetle chassis, a WT01 rear gearbox and some front arms from something else.  Sure I could have turned those into some crazy contraption if I'd ever got off my lazy behind and done it.

I spent an hour in the workshop last night fitting the shocks onto my TXT rebuild but it was way too cold to stay out any later, otherwise I'd have more lockdown stuff done by now.  Still, no rush, we don't know for sure how long until the lockdown is lifted.

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First step: tidying up the workbench. (Edsel model I was working on is put away for now; I need a couple of paint colors that I don't have anyway.)

2020-03-24_09-36-24

 

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OK, so here's what I've dug up so far:

Lunchbox rear axle, with 18 tooth pinion on the motor

Associated Dynamic Strut front suspension, complete (came from an RC12L, if I recall)

Direct steering linkage/servo saver from a Traxxas something-or-other

One (and only one) Associated shock absorber

Wheels and tires from a re-re Sand Rover

Futaba S148 servo and Novak Rooster ESC

And of course, my box of random hardware.

2020-03-24_03-26-25

i do have a pair of friction shocks (somewhere) from a TL01 or something that I can use, in case I can't find the mate to the Associated shock. And lots of other miscellaneous junk that might find its way in here. But this is the stuff that looked like the beginnings of a car when I laid it all out.

I'm thinking rally car, but then I'm always thinking rally car....

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Great question @markbt73

The best part of Apollo 13 is Jim Lovell’s / Tom Hanks pithy summary about  ‘bouncing around for 30 mins‘ but ending up back where they started with the same problems 

A lot of politicians (and people) might reflect on that right now ...

You’ve also inspired me to see if I can build a vintage SRB from bits - so here we go ! 😬

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1 hour ago, yogi-bear said:

do you have a body for this?

Nope. And that's what is making me reconsider it. I have so many other things I want to do, I'm not sure I want to spend so much time scratch-building a body.

I'm going to go through my stash of body shells and see if anything jumps out at me. Otherwise, I might go ahead and do a quick n' dirty Fiat 126...

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13 hours ago, markbt73 said:

I may have found it... :)

fiat_126p_rally_2.jpg

I have an 1:1 body in my garage. My sister bought it as a replacement for her Fiat 126. Unfortunately nothing happend to it for the last two years. Sometimes I think I will rebuild it but I have a lot of other things to do. If you need some measurements from the original car let me know.

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Thanks! I really do want to do a 126, but I don't think it's going to be for this project. If we're still cooped up in a month, I'll probably be bugging you for measurements and photos, but for this "junkyard" build, I've gone in a different direction:

2020-03-25_08-06-29

 

Carisma scaler truck body, just sitting on the wheels for now. It will still use the Hornet/Lunchbox rear end and RC12L front end. I'm going to start designing a chassis for it today. Will probably end up being very Hornet-like...

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Well, yesterday I discovered a box of Bolink parts I had almost completely forgotten about. Turns out I had enough parts to build both a Digger and a Legend:

2020-03-26_08-01-03

 

The Digger's wheelbase is 8 inches, 203mm, same as 1/12 scale pan cars, and near enough to 205mm M-chassis as to make no difference. Looking through my stash of body shells, there was only one choice:

20200326_075441

Too bad I don't have some yellow pan-car wheels somewhere.

The Legend's wheelbase is about 9.5 inches. Too short for a touring car, but just right for this:

20200326_075511

That's a re-re Sand Rover body with a badly botched paint job. (Note to self: don't mix brands of paint, even if they say they're the same type.)

Anyway, it's not fastened on; just sitting there. I'm not sold on it yet, but it's an interesting notion.

Still working out a chassis for the green truck too, so I might end up with three builds out of this. I didn't realize I had this much stuff sitting around, to be honest.

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4 hours ago, markbt73 said:

Well, yesterday I discovered a box of Bolink parts I had almost completely forgotten about. Turns out I had enough parts to build both a Digger and a Legend:

2020-03-26_08-01-03

 

The Digger's wheelbase is 8 inches, 203mm, same as 1/12 scale pan cars, and near enough to 205mm M-chassis as to make no difference. Looking through my stash of body shells, there was only one choice:

20200326_075441

Too bad I don't have some yellow pan-car wheels somewhere.

The Legend's wheelbase is about 9.5 inches. Too short for a touring car, but just right for this:

20200326_075511

That's a re-re Sand Rover body with a badly botched paint job. (Note to self: don't mix brands of paint, even if they say they're the same type.)

Anyway, it's not fastened on; just sitting there. I'm not sold on it yet, but it's an interesting notion.

Still working out a chassis for the green truck too, so I might end up with three builds out of this. I didn't realize I had this much stuff sitting around, to be honest.

Those rear wheels on the buggy look so right!!!! Find some more matching front wheels and a little work on the paintwork and you have a simple good looking buggy

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I wish I could find the matching fronts. I know I had a full set of these at one time, but the fronts are nowhere to be found. I have a feeling they got installed on some project or other that was later sold... probably one of the dozen or so RC10s that I fixed up and sold on a few years ago.

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Another possibility for the Legend: chopped-up Pajero body, and Custom Works sprint car front wheels/tires. Might look especially cool if I built out some fender flares and trned it into a Pikes Peak-style racer...

20200326_143745

 

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OK, so owing to the fact that I have a lot of other projects waiting, I'm not going to dig into the whole Pikes Peak Pajero thing right now. It's an interesting idea, and I may very well return to it later, but for now, I'm going to focus on the Digger Stratos.

20200328_180643

 

20200328_180702

 

And here's a body-off shot for those who aren't familiar with the DIgger chassis. It's as simple as you can possibly get: basically just a way to hold up four wheels and a motor. No suspension, no diff, no adjustments to be made except gear ratio and toe-in. Running gear, for the curious, is an old Reedy "DS Spec" 23-turn motor, a Tamiya TBLE-02S ESC, an Airtronics 94102 servo, and my trusty Tactic radio.

20200328_180530

I'll take it for its maiden voyage tomorrow, if the rain lets up, and get some running shots. These things are incredibly fun to drive, far more stable than you'd guess, and love doing wheelies...

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