Tommy R's TTC Build - "Big Oly"

[ecoli]

25C continuous and as high a burst rating as possible (also rated in 'C's).

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by ecoli

25C continuous and as high a burst rating as possible (also rated in 'C's).

Batteries were ordered last week. I'll be running in series a pair of 2S 1800 mAh Turnigys with 30C continuous and 40C burst ratings. Hopefully that'll suffice. I'll also gear it down a bit to help keep the motor cool.

On Saturday we got chance to play with the trucks again. Cory (STANG KILLA SS) hosted a great event where we all piled our trucks into his boat and tied up to an otherwise inaccessible location on a lake for some great scaler action and a cookout! Afterward, he offered his awesome boat for some wakeboarding and surfing. Cory, you kick ass, brotha!!

Since time was tight, I still didn't have time to start on the interior, but I at least got the driveline stuff all done (gunnar tubes, gunnar pins in my Axial CVDs (more steering!), metal driveshaft, and I vented my CAC wheels in hopes of getting some squish out of my Rok Lox.

Overall, the truck did pretty well, but a pin in my new driveshaft started coming out and chewed up my spur gear. Surprisingly the Axial CVDs survived with the new music wire pins. The mangled spur gear ended the day for me, but overall I was relatively pleased with the truck except for one main thing. The front tire-to-fender interference is becoming more of an issue than I'd anticipated. I think it's causing too much drag and making throttle control difficult as the motor tries to overcome it. Here's a mild example of what I'm talking about. Look at the driver side front tire getting into the tube fender.


The way I see it, I've got 4 options:
- Raise the truck and suffer a higher cg.
- Bend the tube fenders for more clearance and it'll look like poop.
- Dove nose the front of the truck, which I was hoping not to do.
- Install some bump stops and/or lower the upper shock mounts.

Keep in mind I've already stiffened up the front springs. Right now I'm leaning toward the last option, but am open to suggestions. I also swapped on Cory's RC4WD Spooky Crawlers or whatever they're called. The tires were a bit shorter and the wheels had a lot narrower track and I have to say I thought it looked a ton better. I think I'll be narrowing my truck's overall width soon.


Anyway, enough yapping, here's some pics from Saturday's awesome event. And yes, I know I really need to finish the interior/bed and get some inner fender liners installed!!










And some pics Cory took:


Running Cory's Creepy Crawlers:

[STANG KILLA SS]

tommy, remember your running 55" scale tires. Fn huge! there going to rub lol! thats scale!
i second the bump stops as well as removing the wideners.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by STANG KILLA SS

tommy, remember your running 55" scale tires. Fn huge! there going to rub lol! thats scale!
i second the bump stops as well as removing the wideners.

Well, isn't the Bronco body close to 8th scale? If so, then I think a 5.4" tire would be closer to a 44" or 49"? Regardless, I agree with you. I think a little less track width and a little shorter tire would work nicely!

[Nickle]

Great looking rig! Nice action shots too.

The only complaint I have about the smaller tires is that they make the wheel wells look too big (long). Because of that, my vote goes to the bumpstop option.

[Tommy R]

I agree about the size of the fenderwells. I wish they could be smaller, but I had to start off by cutting at the outline of the molded fenders and had to trim outward from there for the stretched wheelbase. Hopefully when I get fender liners installed it'll improve the appearance quite a bit.

Speaking of appearance.... I went home for lunch and decided to remove the wheel wideners just for grins. Overall, I like it. It may almost be a bit too narrow for a real TTC rig, though. I could always try running the wideners and flip the wheels to the narrow track option. That would make it narrower than before, but wider than this.


Just noticed the body is sitting way off the driver's side. Not sure what's up with that.

[Grizzly4x4]

You need to run your shocks with more droop than compression. You won't ever get it to work without rubbing unless you ditch the 3.5" shocks. Look at your shock in this pic. The tire is hard into the body and you still have a ton of shock travel left.


I suggest going to a 4" shock with just enough bumpstop to bottom out as the tire gets into the fender. Then you will be making use of some droop travel. You can use a center limiting strap like I do to control axle drop out but still allow articulation. I don't think there is any other way to accomplish what you want Tommy, and i think this is the best way.

On Guido you can see the fuel tube bumpstop on the trailing shock in the picture below. There is about 1/4" of uptravel, the fuel tube is about 1/4" thick, and the rest of the suspension is droop. Those are 4" HPI shocks.

[Code454]

you could always reduce the roc lox to give you some more clearence make it look like a 42inch 1.1

[Tommy R]

Thanks, Chris... I'm actually running 64mm piston shafts in the Axial aluminum shocks that usually run 50mm shafts. I'm not sure how long those stocks are initially, but I'm 14mm more than that.

Right now, I've got more droop travel than bump travel if you're simply pushing down or lifting up on my rig. I'd estimate maybe 25% bump and 75% droop. If you push straight down my truck, the tires don't contact the fenders. In roll, however, I'm guessing I'm closer to 50/50 and the tires definitely get all up into the fenders.

I think I need to lower my upper shock mounts to get the travel I want. I definitely don't want to raise the truck. With the new, narrower track, it'll probably be tippy enough!!

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by Code454

you could always reduce the roc lox to give you some more clearence make it look like a 42inch 1.1

Well, I've got some 2.2 TSLs on order, which look to be a little bit shorter than the Rok Lox so that may help out. I'd prefer not to cut them down if I can help it.

[Grizzly4x4]

Originally Posted by Tommy R

Thanks, Chris... I'm actually running 64mm piston shafts in the Axial aluminum shocks that usually run 50mm shafts. I'm not sure how long those stocks are initially, but I'm 14mm more than that.

Right now, I've got more droop travel than bump travel if you're simply pushing down or lifting up on my rig. I'd estimate maybe 25% bump and 75% droop. If you push straight down my truck, the tires don't contact the fenders. In roll, however, I'm guessing I'm closer to 50/50 and the tires definitely get all up into the fenders.

I think I need to lower my upper shock mounts to get the travel I want. I definitely don't want to raise the truck. With the new, narrower track, it'll probably be tippy enough!!

Ah, ok. But if you went to 4" shock body you would have more shock travel to work with and could tune the droop and compression separately but keep the amount of articulation you have now or get a bit more.

If you are happy with the articulation you have now you could just bumpstop the uptravel.
Lowering your shock mount would give you more droop travel for the same ride height.
Either one seems like a good solution. I agree with you, I wouldn't make Oly taller. I like the wide stance better myself but if you switch to the Proline TSL2's the wider tire might look better with the narrower track.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by Grizzly4x4

Ah, ok. But if you went to 4" shock body you would have more shock travel to work with and could tune the droop and compression separately but keep the amount of articulation you have now or get a bit more.

If you are happy with the articulation you have now you could just bumpstop the uptravel.
Lowering your shock mount would give you more droop travel for the same ride height.
Either one seems like a good solution. I agree with you, I wouldn't make Oly taller. I like the wide stance better myself but if you switch to the Proline TSL2's the wider tire might look better with the narrower track.

Yeah, I'm pretty happy with the articulation it has so I think reducing some bump travel in favor of some droop (by lowering the upper shock mount) will work okay for me.

I'll decide on the track width later after I do some testing. I just want it to look realistic and perform half way decent.

[ecoli]

Great pics from the weekend. Fancy schmancy getting ferried to the site by boat !

I like the tucked in wheel look myself. Need to find that balance between clearing gates vs. better stability. Guess it depends on what you want to do with big oly.

[Nickle]

Originally Posted by ecoli

I like the tucked in wheel look myself. Need to find that balance between clearing gates vs. better stability. Guess it depends on what you want to do with big oly.

Interesting. I like the appearance of the widened stance more. But function does trump form in this case.

Tommy, what are your intentions with this rig? Comps, playtime, or both?

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by ecoli

Great pics from the weekend. Fancy schmancy getting ferried to the site by boat !

I like the tucked in wheel look myself. Need to find that balance between clearing gates vs. better stability. Guess it depends on what you want to do with big oly.

Yeah, it was a pretty cool event!

Originally Posted by Nickle

Interesting. I like the appearance of the widened stance more. But function does trump form in this case.

Tommy, what are your intentions with this rig? Comps, playtime, or both?

It's primary use is definitely scale comps. I actually started building it when I thought our local club was going to have a TTC event, but we lost the property we were going to use and I got burned out on trying to organize it, but I digress.

From a performance standpoint, the width can help or hurt given our terrain. Sometimes we need to squeeze through stuff so narrow is good, not to mention the extra width can be a challenge negotiating gates. But obviously there are benefits to the wider track, too. Overall, I'd say it's a wash so I'll likely just go with whatever width I think looks best and see where the cards fall.

[STANG KILLA SS]

your crazy tommy, the new look with no wideners is perfect!
to me i always try to have 1/3 to 1/2 the tire inside the fenders, and thats exactly what you have. i think that setup is perfect. plus is leaves the wheels deep dish which i love.
i think its perfect imo. good call on the droop shocks griz

and tommy i remember you mentioning you only have weight in the front wheels. ive found in my rear top heavy tubers that rear wheel weight was really critical. you notice my mega narrow jeep rarely tips. id add 50-75% of whatever weight you added to the fronts, to the rears with the narrower track.

[eric113]

Tommy try the narrow version. You may end up liking.

I think it looks good narrowed. Your Also taking alot stress off the axle shafts by taking off the wideners.

Keep plugging away at it.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by STANG KILLA SS

your crazy tommy, the new look with no wideners is perfect!
to me i always try to have 1/3 to 1/2 the tire inside the fenders, and thats exactly what you have. i think that setup is perfect. plus is leaves the wheels deep dish which i love.
i think its perfect imo. good call on the droop shocks griz

and tommy i remember you mentioning you only have weight in the front wheels. ive found in my rear top heavy tubers that rear wheel weight was really critical. you notice my mega narrow jeep rarely tips. id add 50-75% of whatever weight you added to the fronts, to the rears with the narrower track.

Thanks, Cory. Yeah, I only have one strip of lead weight in the front wheels right now, but I will probably go ahead and add some to the rear, as well.

Originally Posted by eric113

Tommy try the narrow version. You may end up liking.

I think it looks good narrowed. Your Also taking alot stress off the axle shafts by taking off the wideners.

Keep plugging away at it.

Thanks, Eric, and you're right about the reduced stress. And I really like the idea of a reduced scrub radius w/o the wideners. I'll give it a shot and see how it does....

[Grizzly4x4]

Originally Posted by STANG KILLA SS

and tommy i remember you mentioning you only have weight in the front wheels. ive found in my rear top heavy tubers that rear wheel weight was really critical. you notice my mega narrow jeep rarely tips. id add 50-75% of whatever weight you added to the fronts, to the rears with the narrower track.

God call Cory. I run the same amount of weight in all 4 wheels to offset the weight up high.

[Duuuuuuuude]

Originally Posted by Tommy R

IJust noticed the body is sitting way off the driver's side. Not sure what's up with that.

Looks like the right side tube is bent and is pushing the body over to the left.

It also appears that I inadvertently built the same toolbox you did.

I guess great minds think alike.