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Marcus2116

$50 Grasshopper II Super G Ebay Restoration

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Hi All,

I recieved my grasshopper 2 super g that I got on ebay for 50 bucks.

My brother had one and when I was a kid. I loved it but I put a 12t in and pretty much destroyed it. He ended up tossing it....... Now that I am back into rc I have been looking for one.

Recently did a super hornet that came out really good. It was in decent shape. 

Unfortunately this Super G is not....

Someone tried to repair the shock towers and holes in the chassis with putty and sheet metal. The wheels are in bad shape, and the shocks are missing components....... the shocks and the wheels were the whole reason I got this car.

I have ordered a rising fighter chassis, grasshopper gear box housing, bearings and gears.

I need to find original tires, and shock parts. The fronts are missing the lower caps and it looks like all the shocks never had o-rings installed. I have other tamiya take offs but the shock bodies are a lot smaller than the newer variants. 

I might be out of luck trying to find the blatter and lower caps to rebuild. Does anyone on here have the super g shock manual so at least I'll have part numbers?  

I'll keep updating this thread as I work on it. I really want to keep original but the shocks may be the problem. 

The Body is stamped 1988 and has no cracks so I know I can save it. 

Hope this project turns out!!

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I’ve brought a couple of these back to life.  The wheels with the lighter colour stress marks can be removed if you carefully heat the areas with a decorators hot air paint stripper gun.  Be careful as it’s a fine line removing the stress marks and burning the plastic.  

Original super G shocks were never oil filled.  It was a separate hop up after the kit purchase. 

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1 hour ago, Toolmaker72 said:

I’ve brought a couple of these back to life.  The wheels with the lighter colour stress marks can be removed if you carefully heat the areas with a decorators hot air paint stripper gun.  Be careful as it’s a fine line removing the stress marks and burning the plastic.  

Original super G shocks were never oil filled.  It was a separate hop up after the kit purchase. 

I read that after I posted.  Some people were saying some came with o-rings and some didn't and they were considered racing shocks.....  I might just go with some cva's I have on hand. Didn't realize how many shock components I'm missing......(2 lower front caps, retainer, lower mount) To convert them to oil I would need the orings, spacer and blatter. I might restomod this one.  Thanks for the idea about the stress Mark's. I'll give it a try. 

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I’ve found when you use original springs with the oil filled dampers the spring hasn’t enough strength to push back. That’s using very light machine oil. With stronger springs the suspension is too solid and starts flexing the chassis.  A couple of pictures below of the ones I have rebuilt 😊

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Nice builds @Toolmaker72 !!  I found that with the super hornet I just did and the two rising fighters.

The super hornet I used stock springs with a large pre-load spacer and used tamiya soft. I also enlarged the piston ports and worked really well.  

The rising fighters I did both with ampro super hornet relocation brackets. One I used dt03 shocks with shorter mounts. I also used the shafts from a spare set I had so you can swap pistons and enlarged the ports.  That was a perfect set up. 

The other set up ill probably change. Is way too stiff.  The shocks were more for show but are too small of a bore to work effectively. 

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The rising fighter you built looks fab.  I haven’t seen many on here.  Those ampro rear mounts give it a more natural stance.  Interesting with the damper mods.  I didn’t think about modifications to the internal piston 👍.  The rising fighter ive also built one about 3 years ago now.  I made my own modified rear mounts and the little bracket to stop the axle slap.  It’s never been used other than a quick test run.  I fitted a set of cva dampers from a super hornet chassis.  That chassis I’ve never found a replacement body at reasonable cost so that uses a grasshopper 2 body also with aftermarket shocks.  Looks quite nice tbh.  I didn’t apply the grasshopper 2 rear spoiler decal as technically it was a super hornet before.  A few pictures of it below.  I’ll dust the rising fighter down later and post a few pictures of it later 🙂

 

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Nice!  Yes the superhornet body is hard to find in good condition for a decent price. That chassis looks great!  I did the brace on my rising fighter from ampro but yours looks aluminum. do you have a mill? The rx wheels look great too. 

Post some up of your rising fighter. would love to see it.

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Thank you 👍.  Yes my axle brace is aluminium.  I used to make the little parts I needed whilst at work. So technically a Ford part lol.  The rising fighter I also made but different dimensions to suit the hex drive rear axle and the shock mounts also. Clear Perspex as it was available in the right thickness at the time.   Motor is a vintage ea motorsports 27 turn stock motor.  That has had the bronze bearings replaced with ball raced versions.  It moves quite nicely now 😊

Only regret is using aftermarket stickers.  The versions I bought are printed on white vinyl and fairly thick compared to tamiya originals. The other grasshopper 2’s Ive rebuilt I used original Tamiya decal stickers.

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9 minutes ago, Toolmaker72 said:

 Motor is a vintage ea motorsports 27 turn stock motor.  That has had the bronze bearings replaced with ball raced versions.

Do you happen to know a part number for those bearings? I'd like to replace the worn bushings in my old Yokomo stock motors with bearings at some point.

Lots of great looking cars in this thread! @Marcus2116 I had to laugh at your modified shocks :lol: I did the exact same thing the other night with a pair of shocks because the original shock ends/spring plates were too short which limited the suspension travel. When you don't have proper replacement parts, improvise!

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@Toolmaker72 that one looks great. I like the vintage hornet decals. It's a nice touch. The rear shock mounts look great too. I actually like the rising fighter. I've bought 3 over the years. Where did you get the decals?

40 minutes ago, El Gecko said:

Do you happen to know a part number for those bearings? I'd like to replace the worn bushings in my old Yokomo stock motors with bearings at some point.

Lots of great looking cars in this thread! @Marcus2116 I had to laugh at your modified shocks :lol: I did the exact same thing the other night with a pair of shocks because the original shock ends/spring plates were too short which limited the suspension travel. When you don't have proper replacement parts, improvise!

Lol that was an example of what the car came with. 

I made some progress yesterday. I built dt03 shocks using the super g shafts so I could use the plastic pistons. I had to polish the shafts due to the condition but no leaks. The super g shocks are done. One of the shocks the body is broken.

I will most likely run a esc but wanted to keep the heat sink in the back so I spent some time wet sanding and polishing. 

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1 hour ago, Marcus2116 said:

@Toolmaker72 that one looks great. I like the vintage hornet decals. It's a nice touch. The rear shock mounts look great too. I actually like the rising fighter. I've bought 3 over the years. Where did you get the decals?

Lol that was an example of what the car came with. 

I made some progress yesterday. I built dt03 shocks using the super g shafts so I could use the plastic pistons. I had to polish the shafts due to the condition but no leaks. The super g shocks are done. One of the shocks the body is broken.

I will most likely run a esc but wanted to keep the heat sink in the back so I spent some time wet sanding and polishing. 

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I have seen others run the resistor from the MSC on restorations . That’s polishing job looks sweet. Might want to either keep it oiled/ waxed or a coffee of clear paint to keep it from corroding again 

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2 hours ago, El Gecko said:

Do you happen to know a part number for those bearings? I'd like to replace the worn bushings in my old Yokomo stock motors with bearings at some point.

 

There you go 🙂

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4 hours ago, Marcus2116 said:

@Toolmaker72 that one looks great. I like the vintage hornet decals. It's a nice touch. The rear shock mounts look great too. I actually like the rising fighter. I've bought 3 over the years. Where did you get the decals?

 

The decals were off eBay.  I think it’s the same  seller which has a dark green sand scorcher body and super g yellow wheels with his version of blitzer stickers on it. 🤔

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6 hours ago, Dakratfink said:

I have seen others run the resistor from the MSC on restorations . That’s polishing job looks sweet. Might want to either keep it oiled/ waxed or a coffee of clear paint to keep it from corroding again 

Thanks, I have a polishing sealer that I use.  It works pretty well. I went on ebay trying to find a few but the only reasonably priced ones are traxxas and I am not sure of the dimensions. 

 

@Toolmaker72 I'll keep an eye out. I like that look. 

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Got some more work done last night. The body was in bad shape. So I wet sanded all the scratches out, then primed and wet sanded again to knock down the high spots. Had one crack repair but came out nice. I used an acrylic lacquer that worked well.

I decided to use this body for my rising fighter because I already have one with the grasshopper ii decals. I had some rising fighter decals and trimmed them to work. Came out pretty cool

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Another good looking model 👍.    You should have a try with the original mad bull type chassis as it works really well as a buggy.  The mad bull body is in essence a slightly modified to fit grasshopper 2 body.  Just thinking how difficult would it be to fit it with a rising fighter body?  The wing should fit using the adapter given with the rising fighter.  Then perhaps give it a super hornet look using blitzer beetle orange wheels?  🤔

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4 hours ago, Toolmaker72 said:

Another good looking model 👍.    You should have a try with the original mad bull type chassis as it works really well as a buggy.  The mad bull body is in essence a slightly modified to fit grasshopper 2 body.  Just thinking how difficult would it be to fit it with a rising fighter body?  The wing should fit using the adapter given with the rising fighter.  Then perhaps give it a super hornet look using blitzer beetle orange wheels?  🤔

Thanks!!  Funny you said that. I converted a mad bull to a buggy a few months ago. I now ordered wr02cb wheels to see how that would look. Rising fighter may be a fun conversion to a bull. When I get the comical wheels I'll post them here to see what you think. 

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Just as an fyi. Wr02cb wheels won't fit anything......they are too small. Have to figure out how to shorten the steering arms and make new turnbuckles. too bad I bought a ton of different colored wheels and centers...  oh well. 

 

Finished the grasshopper ii tonight and painted up a guy for it yesterday. here is how it turned out. The hornet in the background still needs body repair, paint and new decals. Let me know what you think. 

Also I noticed the super hornet  transmission has a different differential shaft than the grasshopper. Everything else seems the same but the drive shafts have a different center bore. Funny because I always thought they were the same gearboxes. So watch out when ordering parts. 

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Super G is looking good!  Although if ok to say the black cva dampers take a little away from it.  Perhaps fit a set of original white grasshopper 2 wheels to this one and save the yellow wheels for when you have a set of complete yellow cva dampers?
The picture below is one of mine mid build wondering about the original grasshopper 2 wheels.  I didn’t have black cva dampers but was fitted with the super hornet rear extended axle mounts.  Together with the axle brace it lowers the rear nicely and would look good as a plain white finish body with no decals.  Kinda like a sleeper grasshopper 2. 
 

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On 2/27/2021 at 7:29 AM, Marcus2116 said:

Just as an fyi. Wr02cb wheels won't fit anything......they are too small. Have to figure out how to shorten the steering arms and make new turnbuckles. too bad I bought a ton of different colored wheels and centers...  oh well. 

 

Finished the grasshopper ii tonight and painted up a guy for it yesterday. here is how it turned out. The hornet in the background still needs body repair, paint and new decals. Let me know what you think. 

Also I noticed the super hornet  transmission has a different differential shaft than the grasshopper. Everything else seems the same but the drive shafts have a different center bore. Funny because I always thought they were the same gearboxes. So watch out when ordering parts. 

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Yeah I had noticed that too.  Maybe it gives the axle a metal part to wear against rather than the nylon diff gear?! Maybe after 100k miles it might be noticeable lol ☺️

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7 hours ago, Toolmaker72 said:

Super G is looking good!  Although if ok to say the black cva dampers take a little away from it.  Perhaps fit a set of original white grasshopper 2 wheels to this one and save the yellow wheels for when you have a set of complete yellow cva dampers?
The picture below is one of mine mid build wondering about the original grasshopper 2 wheels.  I didn’t have black cva dampers but was fitted with the super hornet rear extended axle mounts.  Together with the axle brace it lowers the rear nicely and would look good as a plain white finish body with no decals.  Kinda like a sleeper grasshopper 2. 
 

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That looks awesome!  You're right I need the super g dampers. Do you know if I can dye the black ones?  If so what would be a good dye to use?  I also made adapters for my mad bull to run the comical buggy wheels. looks kinda cool. I'll post it up later tonight. 

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I’ve never tried to dye plastic so can’t help with that unfortunately.   Yellow cva parts are available though.
The comical wheels will be interesting to see.  I was after a set  for a regular frog but was simply told wont fit as axles are too short.   

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