New SSD Overdrive Gears

[antonio_cadiz]

me too. It does not roll thin. bad buy

[gottorque]

Just installed SSD OD gears in my Diamond pro housing. Needed two Traxxas shims to reduce pinion depth just a bit.
Not sure if this has been brought up but how much tang you have on your drive shaft yolks does affect the need to shim or not (I run MIP HDs). To test I put one side of the drive shaft on and then spun the driveshaft to feel for smoothness.

[powder4breakfast]

I have these on there way to go inside the offset Pro44 housings. It seemed like a few people here had issues. Any new news on these working in or shims needed to dial? The last post from SSD was no shim, so I'm going to start there.

Also, and unrelated to the overdrive gears, I ordered the offset metal tubes with integrated link mounts for the front where these overdrive gears are going. I'm still trying to find out if plans for metal rear tubes with integrated link mounts are in the works or not.

[boldfin]

Originally Posted by powder4breakfast

I have these on there way to go inside the offset Pro44 housings. It seemed like a few people here had issues. Any new news on these working in or shims needed to dial? The last post from SSD was no shim, so I'm going to start there.

Also, and unrelated to the overdrive gears, I ordered the offset metal tubes with integrated link mounts for the front where these overdrive gears are going. I'm still trying to find out if plans for metal rear tubes with integrated link mounts are in the works or not.

I have now built two different SSD offset front axles - both with SSD Overdrive gears in them. One with has the Pro44 center diff housing, and the other has the Diamond Pro center diff housing. Both were a little notchy when I first built them, but with one shim on the outside of the housing between the driveshaft and pinion, it smoothed out quite a bit. I did not have to do any shimming of the ring gear. The shim on the outside of the diff housing helped pull the pinion out a little. While it is still not buttery smooth, they are breaking in, and getting a little better each time I run them.

I had very poor results trying to use SSD Overdrive gear sets in other brands of axles. I tried using them in my Capra, my Vanquish D44's, and also in a set of stock Axial AR44 axles. They were completely unusable in all three of these axles, and no amount of shimming of either the ring gear or pinion was able to make them work. I ended up buying a set of the new Axial overdrive gears (which now also use a 6-bolt locker - just like the SSD gear sets) and they worked perfectly in my Axial axles.

I have heard that Axial changed the design on their center diff housings a little, so maybe that's why the SSD gears aren't working well in other brands of axles.

I'm not sure if SSD has any plans to roll out machined aluminum metal rear tubes. The front axle tubes you have with the integrated link mounts were designed as upgrades for the plastic ones that come in the Trail King chassis kit. The rear axle tubes for the Trail King are plastic as well. Instead they sell brass weights for the rear axle: Trail King Pro44 Rear Axle Brass Weights They add 52 grams to each side of the axle.

If you don't mind adding your own link mounts to the rear axle, you could always go with the Pro44 rear axle - which has heavy metal (cast zinc) tubes. 100 grams for just the axle and diff (no internals). Pro44 Rear Axle Case for SCX10 II

[powder4breakfast]

Originally Posted by boldfin

I have now built two different SSD offset front axles - both with SSD Overdrive gears in them. One with has the Pro44 center diff housing, and the other has the Diamond Pro center diff housing. Both were a little notchy when I first built them, but with one shim on the outside of the housing between the driveshaft and pinion, it smoothed out quite a bit. I did not have to do any shimming of the ring gear. The shim on the outside of the diff housing helped pull the pinion out a little. While it is still not buttery smooth, they are breaking in, and getting a little better each time I run them.

I had very poor results trying to use SSD Overdrive gear sets in other brands of axles. I tried using them in my Capra, my Vanquish D44's, and also in a set of stock Axial AR44 axles. They were completely unusable in all three of these axles, and no amount of shimming of either the ring gear or pinion was able to make them work. I ended up buying a set of the new Axial overdrive gears (which now also use a 6-bolt locker - just like the SSD gear sets) and they worked perfectly in my Axial axles.

I have heard that Axial changed the design on their center diff housings a little, so maybe that's why the SSD gears aren't working well in other brands of axles.

I'm not sure if SSD has any plans to roll out machined aluminum metal rear tubes. The front axle tubes you have with the integrated link mounts were designed as upgrades for the plastic ones that come in the Trail King chassis kit. The rear axle tubes for the Trail King are plastic as well. Instead they sell brass weights for the rear axle: Trail King Pro44 Rear Axle Brass Weights They add 52 grams to each side of the axle.

If you don't mind adding your own link mounts to the rear axle, you could always go with the Pro44 rear axle - which has heavy metal (cast zinc) tubes. 100 grams for just the axle and diff (no internals). Pro44 Rear Axle Case for SCX10 II

Awesome insight. Thank you for taking the time to respond in detail. I will use one shim on the outside like you did and see how they wear in.

As for the rear, I do have the standard Pro44 rear with metal tubes and separate link mounts. I just love that the integrated mounts eliminate the non-scale screws. Regardless, I still prefer the metal tubes over the plastic.

Since this is going on a hard body build, I don't mind all the extra weight I can get down low within reason, so I do also have weights for front and rear to go with the metal tubes and HD diff covers.

The Metal rear tubes with integrated link mounts would be the cats pajamas. It is already hard to justify any other axle for the money considering the balance of plastic/metal/quality. Integrated link mounts on metal rear tubes would seal the deal on realism.

[Clarkbre]

Purchased and installed the SSD overdrive gears this week. They went into a SCX10ii Raw Builder Kit with the 1 piece AR44 axles. The stock R&P meshed smooth with only a .010 shim on the outside of the pinion shaft. I found this to be the same on my son's RTR SCX10ii Trail Honcho as well.

Upon installation of the SSD overdrive R&P, the mesh was very clunky and noisy. With about a half dozen attempts using multiple shim combos, it still was not smooth.

After the above failures, I tried using the Axial pinion with a .010mm shim between the pinion and bearing and needed another .025mm shim on the outside between the axle housing and driveline. The ring also needed .040mm of shimming to push the gear away from the pinion. This gave acceptable results but still leaves a ton of room for improvement.

This was a frustrating purchase. My first upgrade to this rig was the SSD Pro Scale shocks and they are 100% great in every way. I do hope these overdrive gears last for my trailing needs; however, if they fail I will be purchasing another brand. It seems that even the Axial overdrive gears have better installation results with less headache. I may try those in the Trail Honcho as a comparison

[Postclanker]

Ok crawler family....
I’ve been searching and searching....and I haven’t found anything or anybody else with this little problem.
We’re talking gears hear....I bought a portal axle conversion from SSD for a rear axle. This did not come with the ring and pinion gears, locker and bearings.
I used a 6-bolt ring and locker from Axial. Fits great, spins really nice, only problem is....goes in the opposite direction of the front....front axle spins correctly forward, rear goes in reverse. Tried everything, checked everything, I’m at a loss....there’s no way to fix this.

What the H... did I do???

[Damion10]

Portals spin backwards from a non potal axle, its due to the gears in the portal housings them selves. You'll have to figure out a different transmission setup or look into a 3 gear portal setup.

Its nothing you did wrong, just physics at work

[TheLetterJ]

Which rear axle housing are you running? If it uses a removeable pinion support, you can flip your ring gear to the other side and install the pinion support upside down so that it is low-pinion and it will spin the opposite direction. If you don't have a housing that is capable of this... get one. Definitely the easier/cheaper solution compared to a counter rotating transmission. You can build either front or rear axle that way.

[Postclanker]

Originally Posted by TheLetterJ

Which rear axle housing are you running? If it uses a removeable pinion support, you can flip your ring gear to the other side and install the pinion support upside down so that it is low-pinion and it will spin the opposite direction. If you don't have a housing that is capable of this... get one. Definitely the easier/cheaper solution compared to a counter rotating transmission. You can build either front or rear axle that way.

I’m using an SSD rear axle portal conversion...
In all fairness, I didn’t state that I was only doing the rear axle as a portal. The front is a straight ar44.
My bad, actually thought of that after I posted the question.

Thanks everyone


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[TheLetterJ]

I understood that... look at this: Diamond Pro Axle Case for SCX10 II then read my post again.

[Postclanker]

Originally Posted by TheLetterJ

I understood that... look at this: Diamond Pro Axle Case for SCX10 II then read my post again.

I understood. I wish I had one... I’m going shopping now...thanks J


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[GTruj8]

I have a rear ssd portal with front straight axle with diamond case. I used the reverse cut diff gear in the front axle so it runs in reverse direction to match the rear portal. Works great for me!

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[marinearmeni]

I installed these OD gears in my Vanquish F9 front axle with the SSD locker. I've read about the mesh issues on here so I was ready to troubleshoot when I put it all together. I assembled the 3rd member to check out the mesh, it definitely had a notchy feel. If I pulled on the pinion (spread out the mesh) it got better and when I pushed on the pinion (tightened the mesh) it became worse. I was pulling on the pinion fairly hard to see what effect shimming the driveshaft would have and could tell it wouldn't be enough. While I'm doing all this I'm constantly spinning the gears contemplating just going with it and letting the mesh "break-in". I look at the locker and notice it has a bunch of marks on it now. So I keep spinning it and look at how close the OD of the locker is to the pinion gear and realize it's actually hitting! I remove the locker and dremel down the outside a little bit and re-install everything. Everything is nice and smooth now.
So what I've found is that the mesh is actually fine, it was just that the locker was hitting the corner of the pinion gear a little bit. Less than 5 minutes with the dremel and it was good to go. Just wanted to pass on what I've found.