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ThunderDragonCy

ThunderDragonCy builds a, er, Thunder Dragon

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I want to get one set of tyres for the nice wheels i have bought for this, so i set off to the park this morning with a bag full of wheels and tyres. Initially run on mini spike front and full spike rear, this is fun, but it does grip roll, and the full spikes will be rubbish on the astro at Robin Hood Raceway. 

Popped some mini spikes on the back with used cut stagger on the front. Handling was benign enough, but quite understeery. Maybe a new set would help. I have a random used set of mini dart fronts i bought off ebay and threw them on and it worked pretty well. Here it is in that setup with the Saint Dragon shell

20200531_111932

So, i think mini spike rears for sure, but for the front i am still not sure. Darts are pretty aggressive on astro, and i really like the look of spikes. Might try getting mini spike front in hard blue compound and go for yellow rear to keep the balance. 

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Tyres finally arrived so could fit the planned wheels for this build, but i was also up early so i decided to crack on with gearbox plastics replacement and shock tweaks too. Although brilliantly priced and full bearing internals, the gearbox plastics were in a pretty sorry state where they attach to the tub. Luckily because of my Super A5 part i don't need that sought after bit, and someone popped a brand new A parts sprue sans A5 on ebay for half the price of a complete set. Seemed rude not to! So, full gearbox teardown, internals are all super good. Tapped M3 threads in the new plastics as i have loads of machine screws from replacing kit screws with stainless in other cars. Pivked up the D screw bag for brand new 2.6 self tappers for the bevel gear covers. 

Whilst the shocks were off i made a coyple of tweaks. At the rear i added 3mm shaft spacers internally. The nature of the laid over shocks on the Thunder Dragon chassis means you need stiff springs which still resulta in soft suspension (laid down shocks have more mechanical advantage than upright) and you get a lot of droop to ride height. I was getting nearly half the travel as droop! This does give the cars their distinctive, quite oversteer balance on turn, because with this much rear droop, which you get off throttle or brake, you get loads of weight transfer forwards. I thought reducing this a little would be good and would hardly make a difference to the overall usable travel. 

At the front, i replaced the kit two hole piston with the two hole piston with very small holes off the yellow cva sprue. I went bqck down to 400cst (from 700 fitted last run) to compensate. Seemed super slow, so i may go lighter on the oil (i have 300cst as an option), but it's got a lot on controlling both wheels. 

I also reamed the reinforcement / repairs i made to the shell so i could fit that, and here it is... 

Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073 Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073

They are JC Racing Products 2.2" Optima style wheels. They just look fantastic and are qvailable for a great price in loads of colours. I think they are a nice hat tip to the old school Tamiya wheels, in a way that dull disc wheels wouldn't be. 

I think it's somewhat inevitable it willget new arms at some point. They are plentiful and expensive right now so it was just be nice. Still stand me well under a hundred quid even with arms, and my spares box is now pretty much empty too which is great. 

Can't wait for some better weather to run it. 

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10 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

Tyres finally arrived so could fit the planned wheels for this build, but i was also up early so i decided to crack on with gearbox plastics replacement and shock tweaks too. Although brilliantly priced and full bearing internals, the gearbox plastics were in a pretty sorry state where they attach to the tub. Luckily because of my Super A5 part i don't need that sought after bit, and someone popped a brand new A parts sprue sans A5 on ebay for half the price of a complete set. Seemed rude not to! So, full gearbox teardown, internals are all super good. Tapped M3 threads in the new plastics as i have loads of machine screws from replacing kit screws with stainless in other cars. Pivked up the D screw bag for brand new 2.6 self tappers for the bevel gear covers. 

Whilst the shocks were off i made a coyple of tweaks. At the rear i added 3mm shaft spacers internally. The nature of the laid over shocks on the Thunder Dragon chassis means you need stiff springs which still resulta in soft suspension (laid down shocks have more mechanical advantage than upright) and you get a lot of droop to ride height. I was getting nearly half the travel as droop! This does give the cars their distinctive, quite oversteer balance on turn, because with this much rear droop, which you get off throttle or brake, you get loads of weight transfer forwards. I thought reducing this a little would be good and would hardly make a difference to the overall usable travel. 

At the front, i replaced the kit two hole piston with the two hole piston with very small holes off the yellow cva sprue. I went bqck down to 400cst (from 700 fitted last run) to compensate. Seemed super slow, so i may go lighter on the oil (i have 300cst as an option), but it's got a lot on controlling both wheels. 

I also reamed the reinforcement / repairs i made to the shell so i could fit that, and here it is... 

Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073 Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073

They are JC Racing Products 2.2" Optima style wheels. They just look fantastic and are qvailable for a great price in loads of colours. I think they are a nice hat tip to the old school Tamiya wheels, in a way that dull disc wheels wouldn't be. 

I think it's somewhat inevitable it willget new arms at some point. They are plentiful and expensive right now so it was just be nice. Still stand me well under a hundred quid even with arms, and my spares box is now pretty much empty too which is great. 

Can't wait for some better weather to run it. 

This looks ace! (Wasn’t too keen on the other body tbh)

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11 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

Tyres finally arrived so could fit the planned wheels for this build, but i was also up early so i decided to crack on with gearbox plastics replacement and shock tweaks too. Although brilliantly priced and full bearing internals, the gearbox plastics were in a pretty sorry state where they attach to the tub. Luckily because of my Super A5 part i don't need that sought after bit, and someone popped a brand new A parts sprue sans A5 on ebay for half the price of a complete set. Seemed rude not to! So, full gearbox teardown, internals are all super good. Tapped M3 threads in the new plastics as i have loads of machine screws from replacing kit screws with stainless in other cars. Pivked up the D screw bag for brand new 2.6 self tappers for the bevel gear covers. 

Whilst the shocks were off i made a coyple of tweaks. At the rear i added 3mm shaft spacers internally. The nature of the laid over shocks on the Thunder Dragon chassis means you need stiff springs which still resulta in soft suspension (laid down shocks have more mechanical advantage than upright) and you get a lot of droop to ride height. I was getting nearly half the travel as droop! This does give the cars their distinctive, quite oversteer balance on turn, because with this much rear droop, which you get off throttle or brake, you get loads of weight transfer forwards. I thought reducing this a little would be good and would hardly make a difference to the overall usable travel. 

At the front, i replaced the kit two hole piston with the two hole piston with very small holes off the yellow cva sprue. I went bqck down to 400cst (from 700 fitted last run) to compensate. Seemed super slow, so i may go lighter on the oil (i have 300cst as an option), but it's got a lot on controlling both wheels. 

I also reamed the reinforcement / repairs i made to the shell so i could fit that, and here it is... 

Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073 Tamiya Thunder Dragon by CTE 58073

They are JC Racing Products 2.2" Optima style wheels. They just look fantastic and are qvailable for a great price in loads of colours. I think they are a nice hat tip to the old school Tamiya wheels, in a way that dull disc wheels wouldn't be. 

I think it's somewhat inevitable it willget new arms at some point. They are plentiful and expensive right now so it was just be nice. Still stand me well under a hundred quid even with arms, and my spares box is now pretty much empty too which is great. 

Can't wait for some better weather to run it. 

Wheels/tyres look great. What tyres did you go for on the rear? I had a play with my DF03 wheels on my TD but wasn't feeling them. Tried rears on front and back and they looked a bit too big. I think the spiky tyres on the slimmer fronts certainly help. I was looking for an excuse to buy a set of these wheels, thanks for making it easier! :D

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13 minutes ago, mman2005 said:

Wheels/tyres look great. What tyres did you go for on the rear? I had a play with my DF03 wheels on my TD but wasn't feeling them. Tried rears on front and back and they looked a bit too big. I think the spiky tyres on the slimmer fronts certainly help. I was looking for an excuse to buy a set of these wheels, thanks for making it easier! :D

Thanks. Schumacher mini spike2 in yellow compound. It's great on grass and astro and i don't run on any hard surfaces. The fronts are schumacher wide cut stagger yellow compound. Dry grass and astro they are great and don't have the harsh turn in of spikes so they make the car easy to handle. I have some mini spikes for the front i can swap on for more grip or damp grass. 

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10 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

Thanks. Schumacher mini spike2 in yellow compound. It's great on grass and astro and i don't run on any hard surfaces. The fronts are schumacher wide cut stagger yellow compound. Dry grass and astro they are great and don't have the harsh turn in of spikes so they make the car easy to handle. I have some mini spikes for the front i can swap on for more grip or damp grass. 

👍I'm probably going to get blue for outdoor bashing. Do you happen to know the difference between mini spike and mini spike 2?

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8 minutes ago, mman2005 said:

👍I'm probably going to get blue for outdoor bashing. Do you happen to know the difference between mini spike and mini spike 2?

The 2 is meant to be a slightly improved version but i can't tell. They're both spiky! Just happened that 2s were the ones i could find for best price. 

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Seems that the extended first run of the OG Thunder Dragon the other day, and the associated massive overheating of the 17t brushed motor was enough to kill it. I have run it twice now and despite checking everything it's slow and can barely get out of its own way. Chatting to @graemevw he has had similar heating problems with his Terra Scorcher. As a result of our chat i have designed a new motor plate which i have a plastic prototype coming which will hopefully (if i got my measuring and sums right) allow the fitment of 12t and 11t pinions to the Thundershot gearbox in order to drop the FDR for hot brushed motors. That will give 9.6 and 10.5 FDR options. Given its age it really is geared for brushless! 

Found that Team Powers (the official uk Iconic supplier) are selling off the V2 motors. They are around 17t brushed, and £9 posted in the uk. Given scarcity and expense of all rc electrics at the moment and the gamble on posting from the Far East, these look like a great option for a fairly fast brushed motor, in stock in the uk. 

That said, I am still nervous of brushed in the TD given i mostly run on grass which is hard on motors too. I'll get the new motor plate right, and see how 11t runs, but i have a TBLE02S with a Speed Passion 13.5 brushless in my RR-03Ra and i am tempted to swap that in. Tye RR-03Ra is 2wd rally car. It's light and runs on hard surfaces so it's not in need of the brushless really, and it will sing with a fast brushed, so i think that's the overall plan. 

Oh, and i found the super small hole piston damping much too slow. I only had 300 oil to step down to so i didn't bother and tried the one hole piston from the low friction sprues you get with the DF03 alloy set. I put 500cst oil in and its too fast again now. This is proving tricky! I am going to put the original 2 hole piston back in with 800 oil and see how that goes, and if it's still too slow, maybe drill the small hole piston if i can fit a drill small enough. 

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1 hour ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

maybe drill the small hole piston if i can fit a drill small enough. 

How about notching the side like schumacher pistons?

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Like all my car, this has sat dormant for a few months, not least because the weather is awful at the moment. Anyway, all the buzz about reres got me motivated to tidy up and finish a few things, plus mention some bits that did not get recorded on this thread last year. 

Firstly, with the easy availability of spares i bought some new arms and a chassis cover. 

20210130_110649

I cut it a little deeper than the cut marks, and slowly removed material until it was pretty well "sealed" 

20210130_112837

I removed the MSC tray and everything sits underneath nicely. It's still a little baggy on the right, so might get some sticky velcro for the side. 

One thing i did which i would highly recommend anyone buying a rere Thunder or Fire Dragon is flip the B8 part at the rear. Gives you some toe in. Much better traction

20210130_115537

Fitted the new rear arms. Still needed a 0.3mm shim

20210130_115550

This is the front pulled apart showing my Super A5 and the stiff silver DF03 front spring i am using. Be interested to know how the springs on the rere are. 

20210130_115932

Even with brand new arms there is a lot of slack in the pins

Rc

Fixed with 1mm spacer each side

Rc

The other thing i actually did a few months back was get that revised motor mount design finished. I had it 3D printed in the steel material at Shapeways and it works for 12t and 11t (shown) pinions. It broke two of my M3 taps and @graemevw eventually helped me out and got it done for me when he did his. It all meshes nicely, but i haven't run it yet so i don't know if it solved the overheating. 

Rc

Due to the difficulties we had i didn't feel comfortable putting on my Shapeways store, but if you want one message me and i'll get you a price. 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Long Shock Conversion

Way way back in the mists of time, the Thunder Dragon promo video shows the rear long shock upgrade option for the Thunder Dragon. This mounts the 105mm long Boomerang/Bigwig/Supershot rear shocks to the top mount on the original narrow shock tower. It looks awesome, but these shocks are actually way too long for even the top shock mounting hole. 

2021-03-04 (2)

Now, as you all know, I've tried a *few* different configurations of this suspension on my various Thundershot chassis transmission buggies. Last week I came to the conclusion that the best I have ever used is my black CVA 2 shocks in longest 94mm length, running on the top Long Shock position on the narrow tower. At full extension this shock length gives full droop (the droop stops on the arms are just about touching the stops on the gearcase), lots of droop, lots of grip, lots of fun. It was the best option on my other Thunder Dragon, and I've reverted Ultra G to it too, because it's the best there. I've tried the wider Terra Scorcher tower, the original configuration here, with a bunch of different shock lengths, and none are as good as the Long Shock in my opinion. 

So, with this in mind, I wanted to see how I could keep the OG yellow CVA shock look and get a good Long Shock conversion for this fairly stock Thunder Dragon. Here's the original configuration with short shocks, which are 80mm eye to eye.

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

To give you an idea of what I'm blathering on about, here's my other Thunder Dragon a couple of years back with it's Long Shock CVA2 configuration:

20180819_164550

First things first, the big different between original CVA Short and Long shocks is the body itself. These are usually readily available as the Boomerang/Bigwig U Parts tree, but there's nothing out there new right now. I lucked in with a member who I bought some used Long shocks off complete. These bodies are 10mm longer than the short shock bodies on their own. Here's the original short shocks sitting next to the long shocks:

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

Then comes the piston rods. Here, I relied upon the brilliant Buggy Damper Thread where all the various CVA piston rod lengths are listed. I went for the current CVA short shock rod 9805917, which at 47mm long is a little longer than the original short shock rods, but 11mm that the rods in the Long shocks. However I've since found out that the Fire Dragon ReRe uses these 9805917 rods in it's original style CVA short shocks, so it's possible the difference isn't that great, so if you have a ReRe Thunder Dragon or Fire Dragon you probably don't need new piston rods, just the Bigwig U parts for the body.

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

First build up and I put them together and the total length came out at 93mm, and I wasn't getting full extension of the suspension to the droop stops. I popped the ends off and fitted a 3mm CVA spacer between the nut and the shock end to extend to 96mm

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

Perfect!

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

These springs are from the DF03 setting spring set and needed another thick preload spacer on top of those pictured to take up the slack. I don't know how long the stock CVA springs are, but probably shorter so you'll need a few preload spacers handy. The Long shock springs are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too long. Would have had ridiculous preload built in, which is not good. 

Got travel?

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

Haven't run it yet, but if it's anything like as good as Ultra G, it will be great. And now it's all done a final thought occurs: In the buggy damper thread you'll find that the next size up piston rod is the 49.5mm long 54043 TRF501 gold coated rods from the Aeration dampers. So, you could go well s*******y and get those for the perfect length without any spacers. Hmmmmmmm......gold bits......

Oh, and here's the awesome original Thunder Dragon promo video

Cheers!

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Gave it a run this lunch time

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

Needed an exrtra medium spacer (black) to take up the slack in the spring, but this almost no preload. It does sit quite low, but with lots of droop there was plenty of rear grip. I ran mini spike front and rear, and although there was the odd grip roll, it was actually pretty well balanced. Certainly more so than when I first built it a few months ago. As the ride heights seems a little uneven front to rear and tried a little more preload at the rear, but that immediately resulted in more grip rolls, so back down it went. I took 5mm preload spacer out of the front monoshock and that was really nice. I did notice the rear has huge camber gain through it's travel though. I'm running the original 1987 uprights which have a much taller pin location than the ReRe versions. This gives a low roll centre to resist roll, but clearly has downside with the camber gain. It probably has more than 10 deg negative camber towards full travel at the rear! I have some of the ReRe uprights, which raise the roll centre (for more grip and less grip roll too hopefully), and maybe they will have less camber gain too. I'm going to give them a try next. Whilst I'm enjoying tweaking the setup on this, I specifically don't want to go mad down the hop ups route as I've already done that with my other Thunder Dragon, so it will be limited to trying out kit parts. I have an original rear anti roll bar too so if the grip roll does keep on I might try it, but it didn't work too well last time I used it. We'll see.

Just because of what was fitted to what it has the JC 2.2" Egress rear wheels and the JC optima 2.2" fronts. I thought I was going to switch onto the Egress wheels on this because the offset is more in keeping with the buggy, but I think the Optima wheels just look better, so I think this will keep the Optima wheels, and I'll have the Egress wheels for my other Thunder Dragon. 

Tamiya Thunder Dragon Long Shock Conversion

 

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I don't like it, if they change parts for the ReRes...

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1 hour ago, wtcc5 said:

I don't like it, if they change parts for the ReRes...

To be fair, it was actually a running change in period. The Thundershot and Thunder Dragon came out with the tall pivot uprights and C Hubs, and they changed them to the lower ones on the Terra Scorcher and Fire Dragon in 1989. The very first ReRe Thundershot had the revised uprights and everything ever since has. You'll probably see why in a minute.....

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Back from work, and had the buggy out anyway I thought I'd dig out the other uprights and fit them. Quite a difference! Original tall on the right, revised 1989 upright on the left.

Tamiya Thunder Dragon

Much less static camber:

Tamiya Thunder Dragon

A LOAD less camber gain at full compression:

Tamiya Thunder Dragon

Should be really interesting to see if such a drastic change in upper pin height will markedly change the handling. The rear now has a much, much higher roll centre, which should in theory give it more grip, up to a point. I haven't changed the front.  Will have to give another run tomorrow to see how it goes.

Also forgot to mention earlier, after trying an 11t pinion with my revised motor mount to lower the gearing for hot brushed motors, I felt the car was a little too slow. Today I was running a 12t for the first time for 9.6 FDR. The 11t give 10.46, and the 13t on the stock motor mount (which cooked a 17t brushed motor last summer) is 8.86. So only one tooth difference doesn't seem much, but if you look at the numbers my 12t setup today is nearly 10% lower geared than the smallest 13t stock option. And it made all the difference. The 12t is a good speed, nice and lively. It was a fairly cold day, but the grass was fairly long. The motor was fairly hot, but I could still easily hold my fingers on it for 10 seconds or more, and the ESC wasn't warm at all. So, I think for motors around 17t, the 12t seems good. The 11t would probably be good for something really high revving like a 13t maybe?

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Hey Thunder, if I ever own a Thunder dragon, it will have all your cool mods!:rolleyes:

You really teach us all the tricks from the old days and the new ones. The 3d printed steel motor mount is ace, just thinking about the shapeways price makes me a bit nervous!:lol:

But cool info about the changed upright geometry, didn´t know that!

Have fun on the next ride, 

Matthias

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@ruebiracer Thanks man. That means a lot. Actually the motor mount would be about $28 plus shipping in steel, so not crazy money. Still concerned about how tough it is to cut threads in. 

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Tried out the new setup on a temporary cone marked track at the park

20210306_153857

I think its better. Rear is nice and stable and i could run it acouple of mm lower. On pretty much dry grass (but cold) the front mini spikes became a bit much, but i bought the trimmed Darts and thry were spot on, so i think i will get a set of these for my nice wheels. 

Tried a new front damper setup too and i think this is a keeper as well. Still with the stiff DF03 front spring, but running the kit 2 hole piston with 800cst oil - double the weight of the oil in the rears. Seems good. Pretty much there with this i think. 

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17 minutes ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

Tried out the new setup on a temporary cone marked track at the park

20210306_153857

I think its better. Rear is nice and stable and i could run it acouple of mm lower. On pretty much dry grass (but cold) the front mini spikes became a bit much, but i bought the trimmed Darts and thry were spot on, so i think i will get a set of these for my nice wheels. 

Tried a new front damper setup too and i think this is a keeper as well. Still with the stiff DF03 front spring, but running the kit 2 hole piston with 800cst oil - double the weight of the oil in the rears. Seems good. Pretty much there with this i think. 

Sounds very good! Don´t forget: TRF teflon pistons are a good fit for the CVA 1, and you v´can get them also without holes, only markings to drill your own holes! Some of the old pistons have very big holes, hard to get any damping by them. And the the teflon piston is reducing the friction of this old shocks quite drastically, especially under sideloads. So would be y try especially for a front monoshock...;)

But I fully understand your theme on this one, to only do lightly tuning compared to your other dragon...:)

Have fun,

Matthias

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