OS's 1.9 Junkyard Yota

[OSRC]

Another day, another project from the underground lair. I've always wanted a Yota in the fleet, and I've had a body sitting on my Bruiser forever. (Really as an excuse to not screw up painting the Bruiser body, which is very likely given my painting skill, or lack thereof)

Can't afford a new chassis, so had to sacrifice something laying around. My Deadbolt is my best performing rig, and just got a nice new body and axles...but it had what I wanted to steal on it, I haven't run it all summer, and change is good!! So I started tearing things down.

Before shots. Alas, yon deadbolt, you have served me well. Most of your parts will live on somewhere else, so your sacrifice is not in vain.



10 minutes and some reluctant threadlock later..


Took the easy route...$10 Toyota body mount of Ebay.


Boom! Easy Peasy


Had this on the shelf. Leftovers from my Ascender and spare parts I've picked up along the way. Hmmm....


Might be an entire Ascender in here, not sure.


Lookee here! I think these will work. I'm thinking I'll narrow them up a bit to better fit the Tamiya body. Might be a sin of some sort to put Ascender axles on an Axial chassis. I will live in sin...


More to come.

[OSRC]

So lets start mocking up and see what we have here...Not sure how the Ascender axles and Axial chassis are going to play together.

Front axle went on with suprising little fuss since the chassis was already set up for CMS. Have to tweak the link lengths a bit, but geometry worked out well. Rear went on with the existing links and was spot on in the wheelwell. Can they all be this easy??


Narrowed axles will look much better. Even with high offset 1.55's, I'm not out much past the fenders. Feeling good about the axle swap.


Side note - after mounting the body several times with 4 screws and quickly realizing what a pain in the rear fender it was, I found some link connectors and made life sooooo much easier. Not I can just pop the body on and off. Got to work this into the body mount somehow.


One thing I didn't like right away was how high the body sits in relation to the chassis. Good if I was running 4.75" tires, not good for a more scale stance. Note the chassis comes out right at the bottom of the body up front. Would look incredibly goofy with a steel bumper coming out down there.


So of course, used it as an excuse to hack up some metal...made new plates with -5 and -10mm holes to give me some options where the body sits.


-10 was the ticket. Perfect! Bumpers should be at a good height, and just enough chassis hanging down to get sliders out. Can always go up a bit if I need some more clearance.

[OSRC]

Now onto rear shocks. Front towers fit fine, but of course the rears won't work unless I hack up the bed. I've got the parts for a cantilever setup (possible drop bed in the future), but I wanted to stick with standup shocks for now. They just need to lay down a bit to clear the bed. More metal!


Went a little crazy with the holes.... I like adjustability!


And done...

[alexleblanc]

school me, what are you using to cut those aluminum brackets so flawlessly?

[OSRC]

Don't tell anyone, but I just change the resolution on my camera to hide the flaws.

Jigsaw and files. I smooth out the edges with a flapwheel.

[OSRC]

Now that the majority of mockup was done, time to get the axles together. I splurged on some SSD brass knuckles to add some weight up front. Hmmm..first time I've had a fitment issue with SSD parts. Ton of space between the C and the knuckle. The knuckle moved up and down quite a bit and was binding the CVD's. Unless I was doing something wrong, though no idea what it could be.


I futzed around and ended up glueing some 1mm washers on the C hubs top and bottom to shim everything up. It's very solid now and everything spins freely, but it was a total pain getting everything assembled. Way harder than it needed to be.


Front axle all buttoned up. Narrowed about 10mm per side, C's clocked back about 8 degrees, HD pinions, 5mm output adapters, and all red and tacky'd up. Knuckle weights add a ton of beef.


Rear narrowed about 12mm per side so the front is just a bit wider, just as the good Lord intended. Really like Ascender axles - flexible and strong, wish Vaterra would sell them as a seperate set.

[OSRC]

Got the axles hung on the chassis. Front is chaos with all the links, but it all clears with just a touch of bump steer. I can live with it.


Rear axle was much less drama. Very smooth with the laydoown shocks. All the shocks are outboarded to counter the inevitable Ascender axle torque twist.


Got to work on the driveline. Used the same setup I had before pretty much. Eventually I'd like to do an interior, but not right away. I had a ton of dead space where the motor used to be, so I made a plate so I can tuck the receiver and ESC in there. FDR with the Ascender axles and HPI GRU is 51.55:1 if my math is right - very close to stock Axial gearing. Should do good!


Motor is about as low as I can go. Could maybe queeze another few mm out of it, but didn't think it was worth the effort. Wish it was a little further back in the chassis, but I'm pretty happy with the setup overall.


Chassis is pretty much done except for electronics.. Lots of aluminum, have to paint it at some point.


Dropped the body on and VERY happy with the stance overall. Narrowed axles were totally the way to go.


Was going to use 1.9's, but thinking now 1.55's are the way to go...these just look too cool. Classic combo. If any mods are paying attention, may as well move this to the 1.55 section...

[OSRC]

Bumper time! Trimmed up the front of the body and hacked off the front bumper. Looks great, but not going to cut it for trail duty. I started with an RC4WD steel bumper I had laying around - nice start, but stuck out quite a bit, and the bumper is a bit rough looking imo.


I removed the top plate and trimmed off the wings so it looked more like a tube bumper. Used the winch mount as a template and drilled the holes right into the plate so the winch would sit lower.


The bottom of the bumper had a steel skid. Just to break it up a bit, I cut a new one out of aluminum. Really just a chance to cut up some more metal...


Drilled some new holes in the bumper and ground off the back at the shock towers so it sits almost flush with the front of the chassis. So much better! Also ground off those silly circular hoops on the front. They catch on everything!


Shot from the bottom...showing off the new skid. Would have looked better with some stainless screws, but I'm fresh out.

[calcagno45]

Nice job on this build. I like where you went with this.

[Natedog]

Truck turned out great, but you assembled the axles correctly and there should not be anywhere near that amount of play at the brass knuckle weight! Gluing washers on as shims works, but SSD needs to fix their tolerances and QC.

[OSRC]

First time I've ever had a fitment issue with their parts. Glad I got it working, they really make a difference.

I was a bit apprehensive about ripping down my #1 performing rig, but glad I did. Really like how it's turning out. With the right set of tires and setup, might even match it performance-wise. Plus everyone should have a Yota in their collection somewhere! Been building a lot of jeeps lately....

[1BadJeepBruiser]

Nice to see some people are still building Looks good, nice job on narrowing the axles

[OSRC]

Thanks Mike - the build is the fun part. I've got a ton of cars/trucks on the shelf that I built but never got around to running.

Had some nice Scalerfab sliders on when it was a Deadbolt. They were not a good fit for the yota body though. Out came the knife! (well, the Dremel anyway)


Longer sliders cut up and brazed on. I'm not that great at brazing, but they seem to be pretty strong.


Mounted up, wanted them tight to the body - came out just about perfect. Had to do some bending to get everthing to line up just so, but very happy with the result. Not to mention I can now use the RULR holes to mount the rear upper links. Again, to help with Ascender axle torque twist. So much win it hurts.


Took a lot of digging, but found the grill lenses and rear window! Would have preferred the clear lenses so I could paint them, but the yellow will do - just glad I found them.

[OSRC]

Thank you sir!

Wired up finally...clean wiring is not my thing. I tried, I really did. This is as good as I got. It's a hot mess, but it all works.

Powered up and setting endpoints I found that the drivetrain had a TON of chatter to it. So much that it jumped off my jack stands!! After tearing things apart, I found the Wild Boar HD shafts were binding something fierce..both front and rear. No idea why, everything was in phase and I've never had trouble before. I swapped everything around to the old style WB's and now it's smooth as silk. I'll eventually tear down the HD's and figure out what the issue is. Just rotating them by hand they are very notchy - assume there's some flash in the pin slots. I've had that before with Axial outputs.


Weigh in time.... currently at 3118g (6.9lbs) with a 59/41 front/rear balance. It's a bit nose heavy but not too bad.


Hmm....to bob or not to bob. Debating...Need to decide something before building a rear bumper.


Despite the musical wheels, I'm back on 1.9's. Further rant coming on that. Still have lights, shock tuning, interior, and some sort of rear bumper to do.

[PERCY]

Great Build, keep them updates coming

[Teng]

Originally Posted by Natedog

but SSD needs to fix their tolerances and QC.

I agree with you Nate. SSD needs to fix their tolerances I found the Axial original AR60 better in finish and fitness


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[doubler]

Great build so far. I would normally say bob it but..... It looks good untouched with the stance you have currently.

[mewalsh100]

Looks great! Awesome build!

[OSRC]

So the 1.55 Rock Stompers have some molding issues.. I have 8 of these tires, and 4 of them are molded poorly. 1 shoulder is higher than the other. Sad. I thought I had 4 decent ones, but the rear right was way wobbly during a test run. After I reseated the beadlock 3 times (and a few choice words) I finally clued in that it's warped, but differently from my others. Oh, and now stripped 2 the 1.5mm screws on the wheel so it's stuck on there. Put them on the shelf before they went sailing into the field out back. I'll figure it another day when I have time to waste chasing RC4Wd's quality control. End Rant.

So I'm back on 1.9's. Some basic Axial wheels for now with dress up rings so they don't look too big. The tires are Gmades, siped the treads so they flex better and stuffed with dual stage foams. Really like these tires - not super grippy, but nice and predicatable in all conditions - no hopping or grabbing on the rocks. Plus, they run nice and true!!


New stance...I like the agressive look...


Did a bunch of rear shock work..was way too soft back there. Swapped in heavier oil, added some limiters, and tried a bunch of springs before putting the Prolines back on. I'm sure I'll be adding a swaybar at some point. Want to get in some driving before I tune any further. I had a lot of fle/travel out back due to the laid down shocks. Think now it's just right.


Dug in my bruiser box...hey!! Lookee! Clear window, driver, and interior!


I was worried about fitting in an interior, but the Tamiya interior is fairly shallow - JUST clears the upper shaft by a few MM. Win!

[nosser]

Looks great!


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