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Toolmaker72

Tamiya Frog body finish ideas?

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My re-re Frog.

ALL horrid puke colored chassis plastic was painted with Tamiya TS-40 Metallic Black before assembly - should have clear coated it, as the under-carriage is starting to wear away from runs, but sides are still OK.

Body (detailed in another thread) PS-42 Translucent Yellow, PS- 36 Translucent Silver, PS- 28 Fluorescent Green and finally PS-41 Bright Silver backing. Gives a nice yellow/green change in light depending on light and angles.

Skirt/trim is PS-48 Semi-gloss Silver Anodized Aluminum with a very fine coat of PS-55 Clear Matte - probably should've gone more coats for a more matte finish.

Wheels are the old RC4WD aluminum bead-locks for the Sand Scorcher - no longer available.

On/Off switch positioned in the rear window for easier access.

rere-frog.jpg

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Since this is vintage forum, here its is next to my OG Frog and TamTech GB-01 ... only thing missing from the party is the Neo Fighter, but will hopefully get that in the new year.

Note on the OG.

ALL original except for steering rods which were taken from re-re kit after i upgraded the re-re to heavy duty threaded rods - as the plastic ball ends/cups had split. I also has new tyres - after 30+ years the old spikes were completely bald, and extremely thin.

The OG was bought new when i was 4/5 years old (30+ years ago), and have strong memories of both the purchase and build by my dad all those years ago, so this individual car - and the Frog in general - hold pretty strong places in my heart.

The car is 100% operational, all mechanics function, and she runs fine - which is saying something after the abuse it copped at my young childhood hands - but nothing, and i mean nothing, ever broke or got replaced (cant say that for the re-re). However, due to sentimental reasons (dad passing) and the purchasing of re-re soon after his passing (which got me back into the hobby several years ago); i will no longer run the OG anymore.

As the photo shows, it does need some TLC to give it a bit of a clean up, but i don't envisage a full tear/down resto - at least not at this stage.

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Thank you for those pictures.  I must admit I haven’t had a chance to purchase a body and paint to turn my chassis into the frog yet.   Also I don’t have a problem with the cross over between original and re-release. In my eyes they are all vintage just with a gap in production.   😊

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Over Christmas I finally got round to ordering a frog body.  It’s the Kamtec version and seems to be made from a slightly thicker gauge polycarbonate from what I remember from way back but still horrible to work with.  
whilst unpainted it shows what clearance I have underneath to perhaps lower the body.  Not much tbh.  So it sits in the stock position.    
Currently a little 2845 5000kv motor is in the post, the new brushless hobbywing esc just fits where the old msc would fit.  I’ve fitted that aluminium part upside down to create a slightly lower tray.  The esc is a 30amp continuous draw and can cope with a 180 amp burst.  The motor max power is quoted at 240 watts, so I’m borderline on the speed control handling the continuous amp draw.  My battery will be a nimh type of 3300mah so not as punchy as a lipo version. Fingers crossed it should all work lovely especially as the motor pinion will be only 10 tooth.  My maths makes it equivalent to a 20k rpm 540 motor fitted with a 18 tooth pinion. 🙂

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Brushless motor finally arrived today.  I mentioned above it was a 5000kv version but it’s not.  It’s a 4370kv version.  My mistake.  Now the small esc I have has 3.5mm bullet connections and the motor came with 4mm versions.  No big deal as it’s easy enough to solder new ones.  Fitted it to the gearbox and found the wiring too short to keep the esc in its current position.  Once the body is fitted there isn’t anywhere else suitable.  I have another brushless motor the same size fitted to another chassis with longer wiring so I’ve swapped them over.  That motor is 3930kv so not quiet as pokey but still much better than a standard 540 brushed.   Realistically it will use less amps which helps the small esc. The esc also has a setting to reduce start punch which again reduces intial current.   So had a test wiz around the kitchen, trying to load the motor and esc to see how hot things get and it’s all really good.  Using a nimh 7.2v battery the performance is rather impressive for such a small motor.  Noticeable better than a standard 540 brushed motor.  I need to do a straight line test to see if the motor cuts it there as it’s using a small 10 tooth pinion.  🤔 so far so good though 😊

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Paint finally arrived today.  I didn’t go very adventurous with a body colour as everything seemed to clash with the red chassis.  As it is the yellow cva shocks look awful but I’ll get some sticker decals on the body first to see if black cva shocks are next 🤔.  The super hornet wheels look good I think but a bit too fragile to bash with.  I’ll try and find either a set of black or red wheels to suit the tyres on those hornet wheels

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I think that’s about it for this build. Stickers finish it off nicely.  The yellow sponsor sticker under the cockpit window ties the yellow cva shock in and looks really good now I thought.  The red wheels are borrowed for the pictures.  They stop it looking fussy matching the red chassis and no guts no glory wing sticker.   Overall I’m pleased with the finish.  When the Welsh weather improves I’m looking forward to testing its performance using the small 2845 brushless motor ☺️

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Looks nice.

Is it just me or do the updated shock mounts, and the angle of the shocks, now give the body a more menacing angle stance (i know the body hasnt changed, it just appears more so due to the shock angles)

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8 hours ago, Ryz82 said:

Looks nice.

Is it just me or do the updated shock mounts, and the angle of the shocks, now give the body a more menacing angle stance (i know the body hasnt changed, it just appears more so due to the shock angles)

It does give the impression of a more angled stance 👍. I have tweaked the front suspension to sit a little lower also just by carefully tightening up the radius arms

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Been a long time waiting to test this car.   I went with a 3s lipo battery and thought see if the small esc fails.  Well with the low gearing acceleration is fantastic but does require a feathered throttle to stop the car simply spinning on the spot.  Not so fast top end to be out of control but easily faster than my brushed ea motorsport stock motor using a 8.4v nimh battery and 18 tooth pinion. 
Not bad for a 380 sized brushless motor conversion.  👍😊

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So as mentioned before I had a wizz around in the work car park using the 3s lipo battery  and the small brushless 2845 motor with the 10 tooth pinion and it was impressive.  So I thought, try it with the standard 18 tooth pinion and it was simply to fast to control and not much fun to be honest, more so as the car threw a tyre and then after a few rolls skidded to a halt on its roof.  The front wheels are missing chunks, the rear wheels are damaged and my lovely  body is scuffed.   A few pictures below.  The motor i fitted to an adapter to bolt up as a regular 540.  So it all works incredibly well but a 40k rpm motor in a frog with standard gears is simply too fast to control.  The 10 tooth pinion from a monster beetle is the ideal size for this combo I think, using a 3s lipo battery.   Use the motor adapter from a grasshopper running a 360 brushed motor for a brushless 2845 to correctly fit the monster beetle 10 tooth pinion to a standard frog gear set and for the esc I recommend a hobbywing 16BL30 so not very expensive. 
If you use a 7.2v battery The motor would still spin up to 28k rpm and still  be faster than a standard brushed 540 motor.  I just thought try a 3s lipo as the really fast version.   If anyone reads this and also fits the conversion themselves, let me know what you think.  Good luck 😊👍 

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All of my current or future kits will be based off of contemporary colors.  I am a product of the 80s so a lot of contemporary colors with some neons and fluorescents mixed in.  If I get stumped, I look at vintage liveries and look for color combinations that work together well.   And I can usually come up with something good.

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8 hours ago, JeffSpicoli said:

All of my current or future kits will be based off of contemporary colors.  I am a product of the 80s so a lot of contemporary colors with some neons and fluorescents mixed in.  If I get stumped, I look at vintage liveries and look for color combinations that work together well.   And I can usually come up with something good.

It was the red chassis that I found seemed to clash with any colour other than red, grey or black.   Now I’ve tested the motor and gearbox spec I might go back to the dark grey chassis with my version of a black edition.  No need to go uber quick and destroy it like I did with this one 😕

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9 minutes ago, Toolmaker72 said:

It was the red chassis that I found seemed to clash with any colour other than red, grey or black.   Now I’ve tested the motor and gearbox spec I might go back to the dark grey chassis with my version of a black edition.  No need to go uber quick and destroy it like I did with this one 😕

Yeah red chassis are a pain in the nuts.

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Been collecting parts with enough to put together a hybrid dark edition of a frog.  Motor will be a 380 sized brushless 2845 using the 52 tooth spur gear and 16 tooth motor pinion.  My trashed red chassis frog from the summer proved the motor works well but not with 3s (11.1v) as that’s simply too fast.  I’ll use a regular 7.2v battery, as it adds a bit of ballast weight.  Still needs some bits made to finish fitting the front shock absorbers.  Picture shows the motor mount to enable the small 2845 to bolt to the standard 540 motor position.

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Made the little spacer bushes to finish off the front dampers fitment.  Kept the radius arms as they help keep the front suspension stable.  The motor although red was a bit of a second hand bargain.    I positioned a beetle body over the chassis and it’s very tempting.  The upright front dampers look good in the wheel arch.  I also positioned the grey frog body from the red chassis frog I built before and that looked really good to finish off a possible limited Tamiya  frog dark version.  👍🙂

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On 10/25/2020 at 4:43 AM, Toolmaker72 said:

Hello all, I’m starting to get the parts together to build a Tamiya Frog and was after some ideas of models fitted with different wheel variations and non box art finished body but still using original frog decals.

I’ll use either a red or dark grey chassis but that depends on the body and wheel colour. 
Would be nice to see some pictures please if that’s ok 😊

thanks in advance 

Rob

I don't like much the Frog buggy, but I do have a vintage one that I've built to suit a bit more my buggy tastes:

1984 Tamiya Frog project RC buggy photo IMG_9349_zpszq6xocvv.jpg

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1984 Tamiya Frog project RC buggy photo IMG_9356_zpswmp1fals.jpg

1984 Tamiya Frog project RC buggy photo IMG_9358_zpshvjhownn.jpg

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On 10/25/2020 at 4:43 AM, Toolmaker72 said:

[...] I’ll use either a red or dark grey chassis but that depends on the body and wheel colour. 
Would be nice to see some pictures please if that’s ok 😊

thanks in advance 

Rob

Forgot to show you the painted wheels. I chose some vanilla yellow for them:

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Y'all stay safe and have a good week! :)

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Good to see new and vintage colour schemes for these buggies.    Agreed not the prettiest looking but with a little ingenuity they can look rather good 👍 😊

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