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slydar

DF01 Rebuild for 13.5 Stock racing

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This is my DF01.
 

IMG20210811165142

 

It started life as TA01T? Porsche Cayenne, Which I built up about 10 years ago?? with some FRP chassis plate's and J parts taken from a Top Force ReRe, normal TA01 arms etc, and ran it as a drift car, with a GS300 Tamiya body.

It sat dormant for quite some time, but after retiring it as a drift car I always had the idea to covert it into a buggy, and finally got around to it about 6 months ago as my re-introduction to the hobby and foray into more off-road.

It has definitely been a pretty steep learning curve and a bit of a battle with reliability. But its at a point now where I have just enough skill and faith in the set up/potential to spend a little time/money doing a rebuild with some new parts and a couple of small improvements.

The general gist is a rebuild with new chassis plates as the original ones are very worn, replace the gearbox's as they're both quite broken, which will give me a chance to prepare them properly for a little more reliability in that area.

Will be adding a proper race esc, nicer servo, reposition the battery mounts for shorty lipo's, and replace all the bearings and most of the ball ends/nuts/cups. I'll also be taping all threads for machine screws and switching to hex, and making a rear skid plate which I'll also use to anchor the rear of the rear gearbox a bit better, which is an issue I haven't heard being spoken about really yet. 

It already has DF03 Aluminium dampers, gear diffs which I'll shim/rebuild with Tamiya AW grease, CVD's in the front and Tamiya uni's in the rear, and speed tuned gears which help get the car geared right for the 13.5t motor. 

I'm running a Plasma Edge/Gravel hound body currently, but I have a Top Force body on the way. 

Here is where I'm at today. 

Have done the drilling on the gear cases ready to cut some threads, have the old J parts ready to clean, and starting to have a look at positioning the battery.
 

IMG20211001210446

 

More over the next few days :)





 

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1 hour ago, slydar said:

The general gist is a rebuild with new chassis plates as the original ones are very worn, replace the gearbox's as they're both quite broken, which will give me a chance to prepare them properly for a little more reliability in that area.

Will be adding a proper race esc, nicer servo, reposition the battery mounts for shorty lipo's, and replace all the bearings and most of the ball ends/nuts/cups. I'll also be taping all threads for machine screws and switching to hex, and making a rear skid plate which I'll also use to anchor the rear of the rear gearbox a bit better, which is an issue I haven't heard being spoken about really yet. 

Wait...

You mentioned that this started life as a TA01. 

If you'll be replacing the chassis plates, and the gearboxes, and DF01 has nothing else in common with a TA01....

Am I missing something? It sounds like you will eventually end up with a DF01 that is made completely from scratch.

Right?

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13 hours ago, DeadMeat666 said:

Wait...

You mentioned that this started life as a TA01. 

If you'll be replacing the chassis plates, and the gearboxes, and DF01 has nothing else in common with a TA01....

Am I missing something? It sounds like you will eventually end up with a DF01 that is made completely from scratch.

Right?

It's just a bit of a background story, just to give some explanation as to why someone would want to try to race a 30 year old design :)

They're just new standard part's because the old ones are worn out or broken, and incorporating some useful mods and upgrades. The chassis plates are Yeah Racing Top Force. Which are a pretty close copy of standard, just a little thicker and without the C cell holes which almost no one will (or ever) use. 

 

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Todays update is a pretty small one, but here goes.

Cleaned all the J parts as they were being re-used, front shock tower holder had a small crack, I have an alu version ordered but we have a timed practice session in a few days, so glue will hold it till the new parts come. I also glued the press nuts in that anchor the upper deck to the rear gearbox adapter. being able to remove the upper deck quickly without having to worry about loosing the press nut is the aim here.

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I also cleaned up the alu' columns, were getting a little corroded, so spun them up in the drill chuck and buffed them with some 800 sand paper. Here's a before shot.

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And here fitted up to the chassis. I drilled through/deeper most threads before taping, and drilled the driveshaft side top cover holes out to 3mm, so I can use a nut and bolt. 

IMG20211002221745

 

 

 

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23 hours ago, DeadMeat666 said:

Wait...

You mentioned that this started life as a TA01. 

If you'll be replacing the chassis plates, and the gearboxes, and DF01 has nothing else in common with a TA01....

Am I missing something? It sounds like you will eventually end up with a DF01 that is made completely from scratch.

Right?

 

triggers-broom.jpg

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30 minutes ago, Superluminal said:

Are you putting in a ball diff or keeing the original front and rear gear diffs?

Gear. our track is super high grip, so gear diff with thick grease front and rear I think out perform a ball diff, more traction, and also probably less maintenance/chance of damage.

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Little bit more done today.

Battery mounts re-positioned to suit shorty lipo, and little bit forward too, mostly to have some clear space to drill the holes, though I think it should be better for weight distribution, and also a bit more clearance to remove/install the battery, the lipo is a bit taller and doesn't fit tucked under the gearbox. 

Also got the steering all mounted with new ball studs, bearings and hardware. Replaced the turnbuckles, and modified the new alu' servo horn (not pictured). I started to lay out the wiring, and it looks like that will all mount really neatly now with the esc on the opposite side to the motor in front of the battery working well with the orientation of the terminals on the Zombie 13.5.

IMG20211003214537

 

 

 

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Battery mount done.

Stoked with this. found some 4mm I.D bylon spacers, the perfect height and O.D they sit under the split pin screws and you can barely see them. battery is snug but comes in and out easily after removing just one of the tie down plates.

IMG20211005230525

 

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Wiring done :)

 

IMG20211009171957

 

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This is something I've been putting effort into improving. Fairly happy with my effort this time. 

Few mods to make it all happen. 

Ground away the battery strap to clear the terminals.
 

IMG20211009172031

 

Plugged in here. Also shows the countersinking of the screws for the fan on the esc, so it can squeeze under the top deck.
 

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Nice and short. actually pretty tricky to fit it up on a Top Force. RX is oriented this way to plugging in a transponder is easy.
 

IMG20211009172117

 

This photo and the last also show the modified servo horn, wanted one with enough offset to run the ball stud on the back, this one worked just needed a little trim.
 

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Rear gear case drilled out to 3mm and nutted to prevent cracking. Also screws to mount the rear damper stay reversed to prevent the gear case braking in this area.
 

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Top deck on :) 

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Detail shot.

 

IMG20211009172737

 

Next step is a custom skid plate, which I want to tie into the rear gear cover with an L bracket, it try to help stop the rear gear case coming loose from the chassis.

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Well I did finish the car this past weekend, and raced it, sort of. 

It didn't go so well, some reliability issues, somewhat expected from a freshly rebuilt car with some changes.

Anyway here is one detail that did work out well.

I built this skid plate, which is a must have for our surface if you don't want to very quickly destroy your chassis. Also though this tie's the rear of the gearbox in as well. I've had quite an issue with the rear gearbox, which is also the suspension bulkhead coming loose very quickly. This seems to have solved the problem :)

 

 

IMG20211011221519

 

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We need more pics of the finished car !! Looks great, love the neat wiring and just how compact everything fits in the chassis. 

James.

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10 hours ago, InsaneJim69 said:

We need more pics of the finished car !! Looks great, love the neat wiring and just how compact everything fits in the chassis. 

James.

It's broken, haha, so disassembled. 

Broke the main shaft while racing it, which is fairly well used.

One will be here tomorrow it looks like. I will fit it and rebuild the shox with heavier oil tomorrow, and take it for a run Thursday or Friday. 

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All "new" shafts and new tamiya alu servo stays :)

Main shaft is Yeah racing "modified", to replace the broken GPM one.  And some carbon idler shafts out of my TA02.

IMG20211013210833

 

IMG20211013201905

 

 

 

 

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On 10/12/2021 at 1:25 PM, slydar said:

It's broken, haha, so disassembled. 

Broke the main shaft while racing it, which is fairly well used.

One will be here tomorrow it looks like. I will fit it and rebuild the shox with heavier oil tomorrow, and take it for a run Thursday or Friday. 

Assuming you got some running in before it broke - how did it do handling wise / against other cars?

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17 hours ago, BuggyGuy said:

Assuming you got some running in before it broke - how did it do handling wise / against other cars?

it has had it moments.

I did have it running well in a prior set up, with CVA shocks, and tyres with miss matched foams. 

I drove it today and it was looking good, enough so to want to gear it up a tooth, and in the process a solder joint broke on one of the motor wires. Which in my defense, the terminals are a different style than I'm used to and I kinda knew I didn't nail it, but I've re done them all now :) 

It was enough "data" for me to be able to get some idea's for some changes. going to stand the dampers up front and rear, jumping is definitely it's weakness at this stage. going to change the front shock pistons too. it's nice and slow in the rear but even with 55wt in the front it it still a bit fast at that end. Going back tomorrow hopefully with a little more time to actually drive.

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48 minutes ago, slydar said:

 a solder joint broke on one of the motor wires. Which in my defense, the terminals are a different style than I'm used to and I kinda knew I didn't nail it, but I've re done them all now :) 

I know exactly what you mean. I often look at these brushless motors that have "C" shaped solder tabs and wonder what is the proper way to solder wires to them.

Would you mind sharing a pic and/or description of how you redid them to ensure a strong joint?

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1 hour ago, DeadMeat666 said:

I know exactly what you mean. I often look at these brushless motors that have "C" shaped solder tabs and wonder what is the proper way to solder wires to them.

Would you mind sharing a pic and/or description of how you redid them to ensure a strong joint?

Sure. basically 2 things.

Not enough solder. I'm more used to splcing ~1mm wires in automotive looms. For those joints less is more, but the guys at my hobby shop hate my joints lol. 

Basically tinned the end of the wire liberally, and and added some to the terminal, then rested the tip of the iron on the terminal and then held the tinned wire on top of the iron with pliers. Once the tip of the wire is molten, slide the iron out. this got the wire istting right down in there, and gravity helped some solder drip down the front edge of the terminal, which helps hold it in place. 

I've re-done all these, so they're not as tidy as starting from scratch, but it reshaped them all as best i could by crushing the tinned ends back into a decent shape after removing them and before re-tinning.

 

A wire is the one that came off at the track, tried to re join it with a propane torch I had in the car, didn't work lol. But did melt the insulation  :S hence the bit of heat shrink there.

IMG20211014214628

 

 

IMG20211014214652


 

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Looks like I will probably get to race this in a couple of weeks, against some "similar" cars :)

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Cut the body last night and made the window masks, other than that, this is a 2 hour paint job, pretty happy :) But I think I'll swap to white wheels.

 

IMG20211117215159

 

IMG20211117215308

 

 

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Great colour scheme! Really suits the top force (wish id been more inventive with mine as opposed to green)

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