LNC to Comanche, first scaler!

[newmarketeod]

Hey all,
So I got a stock LNC from a friend of mine a few months back for $100. Never had a RC crawler before, and got hooked the first time! I have a 1 ton Jeep 1:1 so I have always been a huge fan of crawling.

First thing I did was add an old school stadium truck Jeep Comanche body my dad had in storage. Liked the more scale look much better than the full comp look.

Got a few extra bucks saved up and decided to add a few parts. Did a rear steer conversion using the Losi kit and the 3 position switch 4ws controller. Using a modified Traxxas older reciever from my old Emaxx for now. Also converted over to LiPo, amazing difference from the old bad NiMH.

Drove it for a while like that, then decided, after the bad influence of this forum that I wanted a more scale look. Added some basic frame rails that I tried brazing using generic Silver solder. It worked, but not very well.

Bought good Safety-Silv solder and flux so I could continue, what a huge difference it made! Spent all day today starting the cage work, got the cab portion done.



Next step will be to re-do the main frame. Going to make it sit lower on the LNC chassic, and hack the top off of the LNC pieces.

Overall goal will be scale shocks all around, 1.9 Axial wheels on TTC claws and some more scale plans..yet undecided. Going for that Large TTC truck styling.

[Sul]

Welcome and congratulations on your new acquisition. It looks like your making good progress. This site is a wealth of information, best of luck with your project.

[newmarketeod]

Got a new set of frame rails bent up today. Need to add a couple crossmembers to strengthen it up. But much happier with the profile. Also cut the LNC chassis down. No more cell phone pics this round either! Disregard the 2.2s, waiting on my 1.9s to arrive, they should be here tomorrow!


Also a shot of the rest of the shop, my 1.1YJ, my snocross race sled and my mountain sled. Now that the race season is over, I'll have a little more time to work on this before Jeep season.

[ngward79]

Nice toys! Good start on the scaler too.

[newmarketeod]

Did some more work on it this weekend. Wasn't happy with the fit and finish of the cage, so I hacked it up. Brazed the remaining rocker bars to the chassis. Also finished a home made set of shock hoops and rear bumper/crossmember.
Also got 1 TTC claw and 1.9 Axial wheel mounted up, going to be the plan for shoes...for now atleast.




Also a quick shot of the bender set-up I'm using. Slowly refining it more and more.

[newmarketeod]

Haven't done much on the crawler lately. Got the rest of the TTC Claws mounted up. Had to do some grinding on the knuckles and wheels to get them to clear. Also changed the rear shock mounting around to clear better. Also really have hit a wall with the HeyOK 4WS controller. Can not get it to consistantly work correctly. It's either my Rx/Tx or my controller. Sersiously thinking about either putting a reverser Y on it to make it permanent 4WS or switching it back to a straight rear axle.

On a better note though, I did some landscaping on the front of my house and decided I didn't like all the landscape stones. After thinking about it I decided to start to put together a small scale course out back.

The beginning, two trails to the right side, and you can see where the loop will eventually come around to the left, in the hole in bushes.

Closer up of the two split trails on the entry

Then the trails come around and meet. Followed by a second split. Eventually the trail with the cinder block will be the "hard" trail.

And this is as far as I got. It will come around from the left then go up the hole in the bushes to the right where the sun is coming through.

Not much, but it's a start!

[newmarketeod]

Got it usable today, wll mostly.
Since the cage is going to be built separately then added to the chassis I figured it wouldn't hurt to make some mounts to allow me to use it without the body, plus I really want to try out the new mini course.

First thing was I made a small temporary rear steer lockout out of some brake line. (Sorry about the blurry, camera didn't want to behave)

Used some alluminum angle and some plexi to make a somewhat light weight battery mount. I had to keep it on the rear to allow me to keep my 6000 MAH batteries and maintain the ability to eventually do an interior.

Last up was another aluminum angle and plexi mount upfront for the ESC and Rx.

Took it out, and the new scale set-up is so much fun! I much prefer it over the set-up before. Got about 30 minutes in and destroyed a front worm set. So now it will sit again on the bench until I buy a set of HD worms.

[DEynon]

Hey man if you swap out the axles to a scx10 type or even a wraith type you will get more wheel speed which will help with larger obstacles. Worm gears are cool but not for scaler trucks. Sweet ass build though.

[newmarketeod]

So i feel dumb, starting disassembling the front end last night and the front drive shaft fell off. Upon looking at it closer I realized that the set screws on the axle end had backed themselves out. Tightened them up proper and reinstalled the axle and I'm back in business!

Originally Posted by DEynon

Hey man if you swap out the axles to a scx10 type or even a wraith type you will get more wheel speed which will help with larger obstacles. Worm gears are cool but not for scaler trucks. Sweet ass build though.

Thanks for the compliments! I've thought about it, but the ground clearance of the worm drives is really nice!


Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

[newmarketeod]

So I know I haven't updated this in forever, however the army has me 9 hours from home for 2.5 months for a professional development school. Anyways I have been doing a bit of parts collecting, I love the classifieds section! Also ordered up a trail ranger body on the re-release, not sure if it is going on this or not yet. Either that or I stripped the paint off the old school Comanche body.

I also think a set of the new 4.75 TSLs will be on order as soon as they are in stock!

[newmarketeod]

Crappy cell phone pic teaser

New Trail Ranger body, 1.9 axials with MT Head rings and proline TSL XLs. Actually brought my rc stuff with me to the hotel for my final 3 weeks of training here in Virginia.

[newmarketeod]

I like my lime icey!

[z71baja]

Looks good, but you should build a 10th scale version of your 1:1YJ. That thing looks freak'n sweet. Dump the trail ranger body and pick up a Tamiya YJ. There's even scale pit bulls to match your tires.....just my humble opinion.

[newmarketeod]

Took the crawler to the beach while I'm back home in NH. Found an awesome spot, but lost a pin in the front driveshaft so fixing that now.

[AxialJeepster]

yeah I agree 100% with that other comment. that 1:1 YJ is dam nice why not build a scale version of that? thats what I run is a YJ and i love it. you can even get Pits for it. looks like you can do some cage-work too!!

I run a YJ and love the way it drives. Nice work on your first rig tho




not to hi-jack but heres some fire under your ass to do just that

[newmarketeod]

So I hadn't done much to it for a while, just been having fun with it! I'm over in Afghanistan now, and brought it all with me and have been tinkering. I've added the Proline front bumper and Axial JK rear bumper. Also added a Tekin 17.5 sensored and have a MMP on the way. (Thank you classifieds!) Also lowered it more, it's now on a full droop set-up. Next step is to raise the LNC center the rest of the way up so it has a more scale belly and switch to a SCX/Wraith style scale driveshaft. Sorry for the color, lighting isn't the best in this room!

[newmarketeod]

Did some more tinkering on the scaler this week. Got the MMP soldered in, as well as switched to Deans (Wired the male/female flipped accidentally but still works). Can't use it as I need to program my MMP and RPP changed their shipping policies so you can't ship to an address besides your billing...extremely inconvenient for shipping to an APO so all the parts I ordered are sitting in NY now. Also sunk the LNC chassis into the rails more so it is more realistic, although now my LNC driveshafts won't work. Will try some SCX/Wraith shafts.
So since I can't use it, I decided to play around with switching to a CMS. There is a small aluminum subframe that supports the battery tray so i mounted it to the underside of that. Actually went surprisingly smoothly. Hangs down a bit, but I am happy with it.
Now I need to tackle 2 new issues. I need to figure out a new tie rod/drag link set up. The drag link needs to be longer, but can't double stack on the knuckle due to wheel clearence. Will have to try playing with some aftermarket Axial parts to figure it out.
Second issue is it definately needs a 3-link with panhard conversion. Sort of have a plan for a panhard, but it wont be super sexy looking as I couldn't bring my map gas torch with me!

At ride hieght

Full droop

[minicooperzoom]

what is the green pick up truck body?

[old man 52]

Originally Posted by minicooperzoom

what is the green pick up truck body?

Its a Trail Ranger body , And there cool as heck.

[newmarketeod]

So started working on this again.

Since I'm over here, I couldn't bring my metal fab stuff with me so I have been trying to figure out how to make some mounts for the panhard. After reading around online, looking at premanufactured kits etc. I came up with a solution. Although it was expensive (Mostly the shipping from the UK) I ordered a bag kit of suspension mounts from rcchannel.com.

I think the top right mount will be perfect for my frame side, and the bottom right will be perfect for the axle side. Should give me a nice long panhard bar.
Might also use two of the bottom lefts to triangulate the rear uppers better.

Also think I can fix my steering issues by mounting a new tie rod to the bottom of the knuckle and a new drag link to the top. Now just have to have the GF mail me some all-thread and brake line and order some rodends.

Also, since I miss actually using it I bought a MRC Pro off of the classifieds, looking forward to that getting here so I can use it while building the scaler!