Further down the rabbit hole of the Other Big T....

[GooneyBird 938]

I'm sitting in the home office/hobby room, pretending to work from home but really watching our two young cats doing...well... cat-things, when the phone rings.
*Insert stupid gimmicky ringtone here*
" 'ello?"
"Hey man, it's [friend I haven't seen in a while]. How you been?"
"Decent. Coping with this whole Covid-nonsense. You?"
"Same. Hey, you still mess around with those little RC cars? 'cause I need your help with something."
"Sure, what's up?"
"Well, I got my boy one of them RC cars a few years ago, but it's all kinds of broken and sitting in the back of his closet. With this whole lockdown being a thing for almost a year now we figured we'd try to get it back up and running, but I can't for the life of me figure it out. Wanna come take a look at it?"
"Sure! Tell you what, I'll swing by later tonight so we can sit outside for a bit and not have to worry about getting too close indoors, and I'll see what I can do."

So I figured it's one of those crappy knockoff things from eBay which has broken a part that is all kinds of unobtainable due to it being aformentioned crappy knockoff eBay thing. Thus, the whole comparing OEMs and brand-names dance would begin and eventually end up concluding that it'd be cheaper just to buy a whole new car from Aliexpress or something.

But I was wrong. 

So wrong.

I rolled up to his place later that day, and outside he had the truck, with box and all, and some other odds and ends that came with it. It was not what I had expected.
Apparently he had, in a stroke of 'what-could-possibly-go-wrong' bestowed his 6 year old son with a Traxxas Rustler 4x4 VXL. 

Yeah.

I took the thing home, tore it apart and found several things wrong with it.

• First and foremost, it was disgusting. Sand everywhere, bearings felt gritty, and the spur was toast. I'm guessing the last run was on the beach?
• The spur gear had a wobble, and looked partially melted. This caused the motor to lock up. Likely due to the...
• ...slipper clutch being loose. The pads were mostly gone, and I'm surprised it held together to begin with.
• Scuffs all over the thing. Was to be expected.
• The lipo was SO FAR out of balance I couldn't save it anymore. It was a 3S pack and the values were something like 1.5, 2.0, 0.9. Gone. Completely flat. Hooked it up to a car light bulb to fully drain it, cut the plug off, soldered the leads together and took it to the recycler. 
• On that note, the AA batteries in the radio had gone sour and leaked. Probably the least of the issues. A bit of soda took care of that.

Everything else on the car looked surprisingly decent. Probably had maybe 4-5 packs on it before it blew up and got relegated to the back of the closet. The charger still worked, too.

I priced out what needed to get done it get it back up and running from my local hobby store, and shot my friend a phone call back.

"Hey man, it's me. I took your car apart and found a bunch of stuff broken on it. In parts you'll need about €X, and that's without a new battery."
"Oh. Well, I have batteries here. AA? AAA?"
"More like a squarepack 2S lipo."
" A wha..? Anyway, I've been thinking it over, and with that price in parts I don't think I'll repair it. Do you want it?" 
"... err? Yeah, sure. Seems like a fun project for me."
"Cool. Tell you what, you give me a fair amount for it that I'll add to the boy's piggy bank for a PS5, and it's yours."

So I gave him what I deemed fair for it, plus a bit extra because, hey, PS5s are worthy causes, and ordered the parts I needed (and, y'know, hopups)

I now have another Traxxas. This is...worrisome. xD

 

[GooneyBird 938]

And through the magic of the internet, parts had arrived!

Traxxas parts are actually surprisingly easy to come by, and the cars themselves are quite modular. The Rustler 4x4 shares a common platform/drivetrain with the Slash 4x4, the Hoss, and the Stampede 4x4, so it wasn't too difficult to acquire:

• A new spur gear
• A new spur gear holder-thing
• A slipper clutch rebuild set
• New bearings for the hubs and the outdrives
• 4 shock rebuild sets. (Actually, just 2 sets for 4 shocks, but you get the idea)

and get the thing back together. I was going to bind it to the same radio as my TRX4, and leave the other radio as a spare or something. I had previously cleaned up the battery tray with a bit of soda, and after a test I found it was in fine functioning condition. Removed the batteries (!), and put it away in the box. 
The radio for the TRX4 has telemetry. Or rather, a Bluetooth module on the back, along with a 3D-printed phone holder. So I also got a voltage/temperature sensor and RPM sensor for the truck, so I could get live voltage, temperature, RPMs, and speed from the vehicle.

After reassembling it, shimming it out to make the drivetrain nice and quiet (I'm still an indoor racer at heart, not gonna lie), I took it out for some fun. Now, keep in mind that I've never had a sensorless brushless vehicle, and my only frame of reference for quickness is my 13.5T sensored touring car. 

 

This thing is RAPID! I've only driven it on 2S (because that's all I own), but it's quick! I've yet to do a proper high-speed run with it and get a top speed from it, but from just bashing around on a local skate park and on some roads I'd say it'll hit 55 kph/35 mph. And that's far quicker than anything this size has any right to be. It has a good amount of body roll, pitching up and down with acceleration and braking, and it seems mostly unstoppable/unbreakable. xD 

Once the RC tracks start opening up again I'll have to take it to an offroad track or something, see what it can do in a controlled environment.  

And now I desperately need to go clean it again. Dirt magnet this thing is...

Also, I've found that these 3 holes in the front of the chassis are a perfect fit for a MyLaps transponder holder. Soo....future track-Rustler coming up?

 

[Mad Ax 9306]

We like to bash Traxxas (both literally and metaphorically) but they are very good at what they do, and parts support is great.  If only Tamiya had the same level of robustness and parts support - or, in honesty, if they just had one of the two - it would be so much easier to justify loving Tamiya the way I do.

It's great to have a basher that just does what it's supposed to do without any fuss.  That's exactly why I bought my E-Revo 1/16 VXL a decade ago (even though I haven't run it in around 5 years because I no longer have any LiPos that fit) and also why I traded some things for a brushless E-Maxx a few years back.

Although admittedly the mini-Revo is a bit too small to really be much use in a good-sized area and the E-Maxx is too big, one of those Rustlers is probably exactly what I want

[KEV THE REV 2307]

Looks like a MEAN machine

[KEV THE REV 2307]

1 hour ago, Mad Ax said:

brushless E-Maxx

Sweet !!

[nel33 870]

why is the Rustler stock body graphic design better than the Slash?? that Rustler looks great. there is a person in the same building complex that i live in that runs a 4x4 slash?? to give his dog some exercise. he doesnt run the body shell but i think its a slash. he said that if he ever chooses to sell the car he'd ask me first... god help me when that day comes, i dont know what i might do...

[GooneyBird 938]

It has some great graphics on it, doesn't it? Plus, the technicolor vomit hides any scratches and spots quite well. Almost as if that's intentional.

[kotaman 22]

On 5/24/2021 at 11:32 AM, Mad Ax said:

We like to bash Traxxas (both literally and metaphorically) but they are very good at what they do, and parts support is great.  If only Tamiya had the same level of robustness and parts support - or, in honesty, if they just had one of the two - it would be so much easier to justify loving Tamiya the way I do.

I couldn't agree with this statement more. I had a 1st gen Stampede back in the day, I think it was the 2nd or 3rd "real" R/C I had after a couple Tamiya kits and it was a fun truck! Traxxas gets the lowbrow's from the hardcore race crowd (Associated, TLR, Mugen, etc.) and some levels of Tamiya enthusiasts, but here's the honest truth...They've shaped modern R/C and their contributions have either driven or carried it through a couple generations of new interest in the hobby now. Not everything everyone makes is perfect, but they have their place being as good at what they do and the support is top notch. The T-Maxx was the game changer of monster trucks and Nitro. The Slash carved out the short course niche and apparently the new drag racing scene, but such chassis' also spun off into oval cars. If it hadn't been for an ugly distribution feud (from what I understand it was back in 2016-2017) we probably wouldn't have the direct competitor ARRMA. And competition makes everything better. I will always be partial to Tamiya for the building experience, quality of the finished vehicle, and scale details, but I own very few that I'll ever consider bashing with in 2022. The one and only Traxxas vehicle I do own is an 8S X-Maxx, and it was worth every penny as my basher and all-out fun vehicle to drive.

[GooneyBird 938]

Quick update: I still have the thing, and took it to a track last year. It did poorly. xD

I mean, this could potentially be due to the fact that:
a) I am VERY out of practice when it comes to tracking RC cars
b) I'm not experienced in doing off-roady stuff on track.
c)  the track itself was a bit shoddy and covered in dampness
d) Traxxas never meant for this thing to be a track car.

Still, I had fun and didn't break anything, despite my best attempts.

[GooneyBird 938]

Quick update on this thing:

A friend contacted me the other day, said his son wanted to get into RC cars after being very disappointed with toy-grade stuff, and if I had a bit of advice. Well, y'know, as much as I'd like to recommend a basket-case Clod or SRB to anyone just starting out (ha!), I pointed him towards something RTR. So quickly the word "Traxxas"was dropped. He liked them, liked the fact that they're built well, and ready to go out of the box. But; expensive. 

And then I looked at the Rustler on my shelf, just sitting there, being dramatically underused for the last 12 months.

So I sold him the Rusty for a very good price, and ordered 2 brand-new Traxxas NiMH-packs and a compatible charger from the local hobby store, to be delivered to his doorstep. I figured that while a 3S, fire breathing beast is too much for an 8-year-old, that same car on NiMH packs and the smallest pinion is actually quite manageable. Plus, if the kid gets serious about it and wants it to go faster, LiPo is always an option.

With that said, I'm now in the market for something new, as things go. Maybe a Slash? Maybe that new Raptor R TRX put out recently? Who knows?