Another Monster Beetle gearbox stiffener

[SBlackfoot 5]

Hi guys,

I'm new here but not new to Tamiya. With a long hiatus I've been a Tamiya fan since goofing around with my brother's first-gen Hornet in the late 80's then on to my Madcap a few years later. Do you guys have an introductions forum?

Long story short, I've had the remains of a Monster Beetle sitting in my basement for a good twenty years now and I feel bad for it, I might try to piece something run-able together now that 3D printers are common (I have three small ones beside me right now!). The first thing that I wanted to play with was a transmission brace to save the fragile diff.

So, I sketched and cut two plates out of 316 stainless steel on one of my lasers at work to sandwich the transmission side plates. So far so good! I plan on 3D printing some spacers to move the plates out to account for the Monster Beetle bumper. The problem is that I don't actually have a bumper yet. Could anyone tell me the thickness of the mounting ears by any chance? I'd like to make the spacers in advance.  :)

I added a sway bar mount because why not? I'm also debating perhaps extending the steel plates out into a wheelie bar or some other sort of bumper. I'm also thinking about tapping one of the side plates so that I don't need to use a separate nut at each of the three screws. Any suggestions or comments?

Please forgive the dirt on the ol' girl, she hasn't seen daylight in quite some time. And please forgive the old Lunchbox wheels, that's all I had at the time. And the plastic half shafts that I turned into a dogbone on one end. I used what I had back then...

[KEV THE REV 2310]

These plates look great - and sway bars - well why not ! . I love the 'rat' look - mix and match