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ThunderDragonCy

TB-03 - Project Can I Get a 4WD Touring Car Working For Me?

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11 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

@ruebiracer You are a bad man. There are now a heat sink motor mount, aluminium prop shaft drives, aluminium IFS rockets and aluminium rear shock towrr mount on their way from Eagle 😂

I knew you couldn´t resist! Welcome in the mouse trap! But you will not regret it. Eagle Racing is a quite old Japanese company, their stuff is great.

And you do not Need the TB05. Too much gears!:lol:

Just add in the end the TB04 Carbon damper stay in the rear for the SSBB Shocks, 419 or 420 wishbones, the Carbon reinforced tub chassis...

This beast can Keep it´s potential over the years, especially in some stock racing. :wub:

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To the track! Over two hours of running and tweaking the setup. I was so excited to get the TB03 on track after how much fun I've been having driving in the street. 

20200716_200346

It actually took a lot of changes to the setup to get it somewhere near what I wanted. Despite switching to the 6 deg caster c hubs which should calm down turn in, it was turning in super sharp, but then developing a lot of understeer, especially on power. The back end was just locked in, although for the hairpins the key seemed to be turning in just as you bang the brakes so that the weight transfer worked. If you braked earlier, or just came off the throttle and rolled into the corner, lots of understeer. Also, worth noting that despite being asphalt and in a public park, this track has considerably more grip that the streets outside my house! So I started working through options.

Firstly I tried changing the front toe as I have struggled to get enough adjustment with it as the turnbuckles are basically bottomed out, so that wasn't much of an option. I pulled them apart this morning and they are 32mm long. I've ordered some 28mm versions which should give me more options.

Next this was the car just seemed very lively over the bumps, and I had fitted my Yeah Racing dampers off the TA06 with 500cst oil in, but with the tapered hole pistons which alter the rebound apparently. I don't know what oil is in the silver TRF Flourine dampers that came on the car, but I switched them in and it seems a little more settled. 

Then I noticed that the rear of the body shell was quite low. I lifted it up a single notch on the rear body mounts to even it out and it genuinely made a bit of a positive difference to the understeer! These cars are so sensitive! And the whole time I'm fiddling with the dual rate and expo on the steering because it's savagely responsive around the straight ahead, then really understeery. I also checked my trusty Hudy setup guide, which along with a bunch of other suggestions mentioned opening out the front diff. Remember I'm still running the ball diffs, and I had tightened up the front as much as I could which is fairly standard touring car practice, but it does also induce understeer. I loosened it of a half turn and that definitely helped. I guess I like more open diffs? 

Asisde from raising the rear ride height a bit (which did also help), I tried adding negative camber to the fronts and removing it from the rear, so it probably endup up around -2 front, -1 rear. That just made the turn in behaviour even more inconsistant, so I wound the front back out the same number of 1/4 turns back to what I hoped was -1. 

Then the big guns came out. Anti-roll bars and roll centres. I had my TA06 stabiliser bar set with me, which is the same shape as the TB03 parts. Stiffest gold bar on the rear helped again, then I took the 2mm spacers out from under the inner ball studs on the rear to raise the roll centre, and another improvement. Finally I fitted the softest pink TA06 front bar, which is way thinner than the medium yellow TB03 bar that was on the car, and we were definitely getting somewhere. 

In between times I had been running my FF03 on the new Sweep BRCA Frontie 34 treaded tyres and apart from adding the rear sway bar, just ran and ran and was really fun. The TB03 was running the Sorex32s I had tried on the FF03 a few weeks ago, but right at the end of the night after another good run with the FF03, I decided to double check on the tyres so I switched in the Sweeps and low and behold, MASSIVE improvement in the TB03. Suddenly the front was locked in but consistent, and the rear was even a little loose in places, but in a nice helpful rotation kind of way. I ran solidly for 5 minutes at the end of the night without any crashes. It also looks ace on the spoked wheels ;-)

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And this is how it finished the night

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Oh, and if you didn't see my Postman Brought Me post, that's a carbon battery strap I drew up and got from Fibre Lyte. I couldn't find the Tamiya straps, and the Yeah Racing aluminium one it came with is a bit thick and heavy and doesn't fit the end recesses very well. 

So, the plan is to get some Sweep 34 BRCA slicks when they're back in stock in a week or so, and ditch Sorex. I just don't seem to get on with them. In fact it's really got me thinking about the TA06. It's in bits donating it's nice parts to the TB03 at the moment, but once it's back together I think I will strap some Sweeps on it and bring it to the track one last time. It would be nice to send it off on a positive note. 

I've also ordered the new 54871 shock plastics for the silver shocks, as they bottom eyelets on a couple of the shocks are a bit sticky, and I think I'm going to stick with these and sell the Yeah Racings on the TA06. 

The other thing I'm going to do is adjust the rear toe in. I've realised when I added the adjustable mount the other week that I went for 3 deg toe, when the original setting was 2.5. I nearly pulled it apart to change it at the track, but sense prevailed and I'll switch out the inserts this weekend to hopefully make the rear end a little more mobile. 

Despite all of this though, I loved running it and it did seem more fun to drive all the way through this, whilst the TA06 always seemed like a fight. Can't wait to get back with a few more adjustments.

 

 

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Yeah sounds like your having great success. 
unfortunately  I can’t remember what blocks I had on it now. As put it back to standard when for sale. 
The silver dampers have tamiya standard yellow Oil in 400cst. 
like the dremeling of the battery slot, i used a piece of non slip mat and raised the locating pins with spacers, mainly cos I didn’t have a dremel! 😂 your way for better as keeping c of g low down.  
Carbon batt holder nice too! 👍👍

did you manage to get the cases for the diffs then? Where did you get them from? 

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1 hour ago, Mark3gti said:

Yeah sounds like your having great success. 
unfortunately  I can’t remember what blocks I had on it now. As put it back to standard when for sale. 
The silver dampers have tamiya standard yellow Oil in 400cst. 
like the dremeling of the battery slot, i used a piece of non slip mat and raised the locating pins with spacers, mainly cos I didn’t have a dremel! 😂 your way for better as keeping c of g low down.  
Carbon batt holder nice too! 👍👍

did you manage to get the cases for the diffs then? Where did you get them from? 

Good to know which oil was in the dampers Mark. Thanks. I drove with the stock plastic blocks a bit, so i know what they were - 1D rear rear, 1XA rear front for 2.5 deg toe in. I got the 1XB adjustable block for the rear front position thinking i would replicate the kit setting, but i got so tied up with getting the pivot heights right when installing upside down that i just put the middle setting insert in for 1XB which is 3 deg.

I have a super low cg race battety that actually sat ok on the ribs, but my other square packs and shorties really stood out of the tub. Just need to sort some spacers for the carbon strap to keep it solid because even on the lowest setting the clip holes in the post are too high now. 

I didn't get the spec r spares. Couldn't find them anywhere short of buying a whole diff on uncertain lead time from far east vendor. I managed to pick up the various parts required for the TB04 diffs from uk and europe quickly and reasonably priced. Only issue with these is that it's both or notjing because of the larger crown gear. They were bought in haste due to my expecting the ball diffs to be awful (after melty buggy experiences) but they have been great so the gear diffs remain unassembled, and the prop ends unmodified. I may change that today. Once i can fit them and they are built its only a 5 min job to drop them in at the track to test them if they have shims and bearings ready fitted. 

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Hey Cy,

 

found em here as well 

http://www.hksrc.com/store/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=8853

 

they are around but post will be slow.

 

but if your going tb04 that’s cool!  Will you have to mod the gearbox covers? 
wonder if their is a ring gear for a tb03 front spool? It may fit the tb04 diff then you don’t need to alter internal ratio or bevel gears.


Once you build them you can tell me how you stopped them leaking! 😭 I’ve built mine twice and it still leaks. It’s got 3k oil in, may have to go thicker. 
if you watched the videos on the tc-01 did you notice their tb04 diffs? Leaking all over the place! 😱😂


I put the tb04 diff In my Tb evo 4, stock ring gears fit, I wonder if it’s ring gears are the same size as tb03? 🤔

final trial fit thou I didn’t use the Ali ring gears in the end as slightly thicker and felt a bit tight, used kit rings and silky smooth.

Tb evo 4

 

Tb evo 4

 

Looking forward to seeing the next upgrade! 👍

cdrbon fear shock tower on the list? 😁

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@Mark3gti Thanks for the links and the really interesting advice, especially on the ring gears. Just been through the evo 4 manual and counted teeth and that does use 39t crown gear just like the TB03, and the 51109 plastic evo 4 one way gearset is still available. Brilliant! Thanks! That said, if i have to buy more crown gears i might get the spec r ones. 

As for stopping the diffs leaking, are you still using the black o rings? Just like with tamiya shocks, you need to get the hop up red ones. They sorted the various TA06 diffs i have. 42259.

Cheers! 

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For the weights thread, but thought it would be interesting on here too. 

20200718_175340

Not bad for a plastic car! 

Also nicked the slotted collars of the yeah racing shocks so i can tell how much preload i am changing visually. 

@Mark3gti Those TRF 42259 o rings are really hard to get in the uk. Apparently the Xray 972050 o rings work. I have ordered some. Will let you know. 

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Great work so far, and thanks for the detailed driving feedbacks. Always interesting. Also the tire experiences. It´s still a so important factor, which can ruin a whole setup or heal it.:)

weight is really good. Imagine a Ti/Alu screw set could bring some further grams... But still the ball diffs are the lightest option on this car.

If you get the Spec R replacement housings, you can keep the smaller crown gears from TB03. I still think the Spec R diff is the lightest gear diff for the Tamiya shaft cars. If you could get hold on the optional Aluminum outdrives, they would outperform the Tamiya gear diff on the scales.

At least I would give my heart for them. Rotational mass is quite a factor on stock racing...

But for sure the TB04 diffs with the red orings work fine and are bombproof in my eyes. they also fit in the housings without problems.

 

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Thanks for the heads up on red o rings.

im 99% sure I used red o rings in it, it leaks from the main seal, when I stripped and rebuilt I noticed the seal is shiny one side, so I swapped it round when rebuilding (new seal) and is a lot better but I’m sure it still weeping a bit as appears stained. My only fear is running it and running out of oil and melting it. 
 

 

not a bad weight that at all! 👍👍 looks well tidy especially with the silver dampers :) 

 

good news the tb04 diff fits with out modding. 👍👍

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Sunday morning hand-waving / pontificating. 

I got the car on my desk yesterday to check the setup. Having swapped to the silver dampers at the track i had to make do with ride height estimates using my gauge on the tarmac. I also was winding preload to change ride height to try and improve the balance. As it turns out i ended pretty low at the front (a little under 5mm) and very high at the rear (more than 7mm). With the sweep tyres on the handling was good but a tiny bit loose at the rear on occasion. The front of the shell was also scraping the ground a little - not unsurprisingly given the rake and height. 

Yesterday i reset everything and evened it out side to side. Went for 5.5 front, 6.5 rear. Our track has a couple of big bumps on high speed corners and if you run the rear too low it bottoms out and spits you off! I also had the inner rear suspension block off and put the no4 insert in to give me a 1XA setting for 2.5 toe in. This should make the rear a little more mobile, despite the lower rear end. And now i have run the car with such a large difference in ride height front to rear and still ended up running fine, i think that gives me an easy and quick option to change the handling balance on a race meet without getting too hung up on what the ride height ought to be because everyone else says so. 

Aiming to get to the track again next week to check all this out, after the 28mm turnbuckles arrive and i can adjust the front toe properly. 

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28mm turnbuckles arrived yesterday so i gave the car a quick blast earlier. All seemed good, but it's still very responsive around the straight ahead. Also the front end was a bit low, scrapping the shell. The air dam at the front was quite badly split in several places and a piece came off, despite raising the front end a bit. I stuck some shoegoo on but i am not sure it will hold. 

Anyhow, to try and calm the steering down i moved the ball stud on the servo saver to a shorter position, which helped a bit. Dug out my old zoo racing hellcat shell, which was just too much steering on the TA06, but seemed ok on the TB03. After that quick proving run i put heavier 500 oil in the front shocks as this should slow down turn in a bit as well. Definitely seemed a bit more calm, so i will leave it like this and see how it is at the track. I think i will see how the zoo racing shell runs as well. I hope my 39t crown gears arrive tomorrow because then i can build gear diffs to try at the track too. Here's the old shell. Actually in better nick that the Protoform. Certainly feels more robust. 

20200721_212331

 

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On 7/18/2020 at 3:14 PM, ThunderDragonCy said:

39t crown gear just like the TB03, and the 51109 plastic evo 4 one way gearset is still available

Evo 4 crown gear is 39T, but input gear is one tooth larger - now I can't remember exact number - so it won't work with TB03 diff on other end. You'll need TB03 spool/one way gearset. Also from what I've read, end of input shaft have to be grinded a bit, otherwise it rubs against diff case.

You could also build ball diff with TB04 gears, it has 12 balls, so it'll be slightly smoother.

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@Honza I've just received the EVO4 39t crown gear and fitted it to the gear diff, filed down the end of the front prop shaft and fitted it. All goes together fine. I just used the kit prop shaft bevel gear. I've run it up on the bench and there doesn't seem to be anything untoward going on. I'm going to give it a run in the street later to make sure it works OK.

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3 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

@Honza I've just received the EVO4 39t crown gear and fitted it to the gear diff, filed down the end of the front prop shaft and fitted it. All goes together fine. I just used the kit prop shaft bevel gear. I've run it up on the bench and there doesn't seem to be anything untoward going on. I'm going to give it a run in the street later to make sure it works OK.

O.k., already fitted. But make sure you have the new crown gear on both axles with the new bevel gear. Otherwise you have different ratios f/r and will end up in some Rally/drift setup!:lol:

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@ThunderDragonCy Mesh might be little off, because bevel gear angle changes with gear ratio. But it's just 1 tooth, so difference will be very small, about 1 degree, which might have no effect at all.

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Could you not just run the evo 4 bevel gears as well? Then you know for sure the mesh is correct.

or shim the tb03 bevel from behind to push it forward into the ring gears a bit more. I think it will be ok. But you’ll know if there is a lot of movement when wiggling the diff and holding the centre shaft.  

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@Honza @Mark3gti I shimmed the diff and mesh seemed good. I wanted the 39t bevels so I could avoid having to switch out both ends, for mix and match with the ball diffs to find the setup I like. I gave it a quick run this morning and it all seems fine. It pulls to the left a little under hard acceleration, but it improved with a bit of use so it's probably just the seals bedding in. 

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@ThunderDragonCy sounds good! 
 

how did you find the tb04 diff in the end? I never reported back,  but I have the red o rings in it, it leaks from the main seal! 😱 tried twice and still residue on the body. I wonder if 3k oil is perhaps a little thin for them? Or I just can’t build gear diffs! 😂 someone mentioned ‘green slime‘ sealant, maybe the next option when I rebuild. It makes me not want to run it in case it leaks out and cooks the internals.. 

 

if you’ve got a snazzy tx you could mix in a bit of right with throttle may stop the torque steer? Or just see if it beds in ok.. 👍

 

 

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20 minutes ago, Mark3gti said:

@ThunderDragonCy sounds good! 
 

how did you find the tb04 diff in the end? I never reported back,  but I have the red o rings in it, it leaks from the main seal! 😱 tried twice and still residue on the body. I wonder if 3k oil is perhaps a little thin for them? Or I just can’t build gear diffs! 😂 someone mentioned ‘green slime‘ sealant, maybe the next option when I rebuild. It makes me not want to run it in case it leaks out and cooks the internals.. 

 

if you’ve got a snazzy tx you could mix in a bit of right with throttle may stop the torque steer? Or just see if it beds in ok.. 👍

 

 

I've only built the front one with 300k oil so far, and run it for 3 mins, so I don't know! 

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40 minutes ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

I wanted the 39t bevels so I could avoid having to switch out both ends

I know, that you have no issues, but alternative with 39T crown and 16T input bevel is 51255 from TB-evo 5, which was used in TB03 one-way set.

Also, I'm not sure if it was mentioned before, but 51438 is compatible with TB03, from my experience, 12-ball diff can be built looser and smoother than 8-ball.

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55 minutes ago, Honza said:

I know, that you have no issues, but alternative with 39T crown and 16T input bevel is 51255 from TB-evo 5, which was used in TB03 one-way set.

Also, I'm not sure if it was mentioned before, but 51438 is compatible with TB03, from my experience, 12-ball diff can be built looser and smoother than 8-ball.

Yes, I have since found out about the 51255 parts, but I have the Evo 4 parts and they seem to work OK. We'll see after some extended running. I can always swap in the 17t input bevels if I end up gear diff front and rear.

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Track time! Couple of hours in perfect conditions this afternoon. Started out with the gear diff with 300k oil in. Was working well, but after a few laps there were some nasty noises coming from the car under power. Hat tip to @Honzaand @ruebiracer, the evo IV 39t crown wasn't meshing well enough with the 16t prop bevel, like they said. However, the balance was really nice. Easy to drive, but predictable. So, track side diff change. The 300k oil gives a relatively free but stiff diff action. 

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I had brought all the other diff options, and first try was the ball diff with the 3mm urethane blocks in to give a spoolish type effect. On power this seemed to be good, but i kept spinning on the brakes. I managed to begin to drive around it by not nailing the brakes super hard, but the new layout has three pretty big stops in it. I managed to begin to use it to rotate the car on the brakes, but it was tricky, and i wonder if there was something about the rear ball diff that was not helping? It was always spinning right. So, next option, balls back in. I lucked in that my diff grease was in my box. Casual track side ball diff rebuild! 

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With the ball diff back in the car was much more predictable and i could run five minute "heats" with very little off track moments, but the car was still a little edgy on brakes. I do wonder about the rear ball diff. However, i was so happy to run long and enjoyably. 

The M2x8 screws i needed to complete the second gear diff didn't arrive yet so i couldn't try one in the rear, but when they do i will swap in the matching 17t bevels and run gear diffs front and rear. I hope 300k front, 3k rear is the ticket. 

Going to get some slicks soon, but it was running lovely on the treaded sweep 34 brca frontie tyres. And the zooracing shell worked great too. 

20200724_165026

 

20200724_165033

I really wish race slicks were available on spoke wheels! 

 

 

 

 

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