Baja Wraith

[Melhugg]

nice work on your wraith steelfish and cool video

[Steelfish]

@ bigdog1972.. cool man, as you said, its nice to see someone from IV here, I will send you a PM to keep in touch, another coincidence if that number in your knickname its your BD year is the same than mine.. so we are just some old guys playing with toycars.


@ melhugg, thanks amigo, glad you like it, Im looking for a bigger motor and have more fun on the dirt dunes, so, I hope the make some videos soon.

[Biggdogg1972]

I don't wanna grow up, lol 41 still playing with toys..

[Steelfish]

new heart for the Baja Wraith..

a 3656sd HW Xerun 3400kv sensored motor.. 4-pole and 550 size rotor inside of a 540 can.


temps outside arent good for running RCs yet (still in the 115f-120f range) so, without any rush I will solder motor wires, 4mm ESC plugs
and I also get a new VP Ti tie rod link that I get I forget to take a pic to it but I will put a new glam pic once installed.

[Steelfish]

new motor is ready to go..

I wanted to know how much smaller was from a true 3660 motor and how bigger from a 3650 motor, so,
this is the comparative of a brushed 540, xerun and tacon 550 motor, in case someone was wondering that too.

[Steelfish]

well here some minor changes to the Baja wraith.

first new upper metal links front and rear, and of course the xerun motor


second, .. VP Ti steering link (gotta love bruce face in this pic)



and last, some custom rings from MThead for my axial 8-hole wheels, on those I wanted to have my two passions, fishing and RC, they were based on the spiderlock rings but with a twist.



and here are they installed..


looking good, right? not videos this time cuz I havent had time to go to my favorites spots but this thing really hauls in the patio testing.

[otis683]

What length are your lower and upper links?

[2manyprojects]

Nice build!!

[Steelfish]

@ otis, hint hint.. I made those upper links from some axial lower links that I found really cheap on the "for sale section" just bent them a bit to match the curve on the stock plastic ones, got some 3mm screws and some long rod ends that were on the kit box as spare, as you can see they match the stock length pretty well, about the length well you can see they are 87.5mm + the long rod ends.







@ 2manyprojects, thanks pal, glad you like it, I really enjoy to tinker this truck up.










BTW I knew I was forgetting some of those small changes, I installed some aluminium axial 55mm posts (thanks again to R2J he add them for free on a recent purchase), one in the front and one in the rear, both for adding stiffness to the chassis and they worked pretty good, 110% recommended.





PS: dont pay attention to the excessive zip ties since this is just temporal while I do or getting a flat bed to attach my electronics better.

have fun..

[Steelfish]

well guys, its been almost a month without updating
this thread, busy at work, busy at house, waiting
for parts, ordering the wrong parts, waiting again
for the correct parts, getting short on 3m screws,
etc, etc. well finally the Baja Wraith is rolling again
and now with a new heart and new muscle.

well lets start the list of upgrades and changes
with the some 15mm 125mm shocks, this are
monsters and was a really difficult task to make
them fit into the wraith, main reason to go with
these big and long shocks is looking for more
stability on the speed runs and jumps, to my
surprise they work wonders on mild crawling too.

here they are along with the ones I had before on
the wraith, they were 100mm long.


in order to keep the stock or lower height with
those shocks I needed some lowering kit, but
since Im cheap and always looking to tinker my
cars on DIY, I made my own lowering kit from
some alloy shock towers I had on hand, this is
after several cutting, drilling and filing.



I also switched the rear shock mounts the gain
some mm, and this is how my custom lowering kit
look installed on the rear, by the way, in order to
add some strength to the lowering kit and ordered
some 6x80mm tubes and took off the axial 55mm I
had before..

and this is how they look on the front


for my next mode, the main idea was taken from
"theJang" (the wrath thread), but the difference
was in order to kep the CoG low I opted for attach
the shocks on the same position of the lower link,
just add some 30mm 3mm screw some spacers and
taddaaaa!!! you have your wraith lower than stock
height and also it turns better due to the more
open angle of the new shocks bottom mounts
position,also, got a new Vanquish steering rod and
finally trow away the stock plastic one. check the
new angle of the shocks on the bottom.



this is how the shocks looks installed on the rear,
I also had to get some buggy stand-offs to reach
the lowering kit.


now the rears shocks installed


see all that space below the "false speakers tower"
of the interior?


thats the new home of the tiny Rx of the new radio
I also got, I found this acrylic box on a fishing lure
and later it becomes the new home of the rx and ESC.
made some holes to the bottom and sides to help
to cool ESC faster, RX went really deep inside and
the ESC is behind the new alloy bar, that leave a
lot of room on the cargo to add something later.



last mod was to properly attach the stock battery
tray in the front for the battery


not mod or hopup but and upgrade, new radio, a
turnigy 3XS radio, multicar memory, a lot of setups
and changes to steering, throtle curve, etc..


and a tons of 3mm machince screws of several sizes,
hoping to dont wait again for one o two screws to
have my RC rolling again.


now Im more than happy on how the Baja Wraith
finished, I dont think it need any other tinkering or
mod for the moment, just keep on rolling and now
is time to apply.. upgrade as it breaks.

[Steelfish]

all those changes were on the last days, today I took the wraith to test all those mods, along with the new gearing 60t/11t, to try to not being too hard on the gears, this are some action pics (taken from the video sorry for the quality) and some glam shocks of the Baja Wraith finally upgraded and really to run any kind of terrains.

this were some speed runs and small jumps to test the gears, custom lowering kit and the rest of the mods.

















not a single issue to report, everything is strong and ready for some more challenging quest.
I will post this small video soon.

take care and have fun..

[Steelfish]

ok, this is one of the videos of my last weekend, in this video I tested the sensored motor at low speeds on some hill climbing in crawling speed (never though how slow I can go with this sensored system without cogging), the throttle response is as smooth as baby azz and if I need power I know is there just waiting for the smallest pull on the trigger, I havent saw many videos of the underdog hobbywing xerun 3656sd 3400kv motor so, this may help other to at least check how good this motor perform in mild crawling or trailing in a mountain all covered for some lose small rocks, it was almost as smooth as running with a brushed motor, those suddens hard starts are because I have a basher finger this is my first ever run with a sensored motor on low speed, so please consider that.
sorry for the coloring of the video but the camera had the settings all messed up courtesy of my kids and I didnt noticed until finished recording all day LOL, I adjusted it the best I could on the video editor.

wraith xerun rocky mountain climb HD - YouTube

this small mountain was very steep and the small rocks were pretty lose and slippy, on the 2:30 min mark you can check how high was this mount on the other side there was a deep creek, my initial idea was to conquer the top of the hill but called it quit where I was having problems to follow the truck on the way up so, I just turned it back.

I will try to post another video tomorrow of bit of speed on the xerun, the gearing is set for low speed 60/11, pretty low, right? I will change it to 56/13 later since I was waiting for the parts which arrived today.

[Steelfish]

second video is up and running.
a little bit more of testing the xerun motor on slow driving, then some sharp turns to check how the shocks angle worked and at the end some speed runs, seems like everything is working good and ready for some really hard work.

wraith xerun 3656sd and new 15mm 125mm shocks - YouTube

have fun

[Bronco Bobby]

"video schmideo", nice screws! I am jealous

[Steelfish]

well I dont know that "video schmideo" and also I dont know If Im allowed to post where I got those screws cheap, maybe I can send that info for PM if you interested.

[Bronco Bobby]

Originally Posted by Steelfish

well I dont know that "video schmideo" and also I dont know If Im allowed to post where I got those screws cheap, maybe I can send that info for PM if you interested.

Bring it...I'm all ears

[Steelfish]

well, finally I went to the Lipo world after 20 months in the hobby, and this is my first ever run on 3s 6500mah Gforce lipo battery, since Im still on the breaking-in period (5 packs), I went ahead for some slow runs on some rocky mountains "close" to my town.
this is a mix of trail run and some crawling, although the Baja Wraith is more suite for speed runs than crawling but I think it did it really well, feel free to tell me how you saw it and what can be improved it

I also changed driver, dont get me wrong I love my former driver the dragon Bruce Lee, but he was just too heavy, and I found and X-pilot perfect for that task, he really wanted to try luck on the wraith and get so air (but that will be later), this new driver weights almost half than Bruce.

this is when he just meet Bruce and went for a ride as copilot to know the Baja Wraith tricks.


once he kicked out Bruce he went for a better driver suite, more appropriate for the Baja wraith colors.






yeah, driver seat feels better than the a co-pilot seat.



another small change was the steering shock, now it has a new spring (mini-t shock spring)


and the x-pilot went to his first run to some salvage terrains



these are some still pics from the video which will be ready late today or tomorrow.










stay tune for the video and have fun..

[Steelfish]

video is up and running

I hope you like it as much as I did

Baja Wraith 3s lipo xerun 3656sd 3400kv - YouTube

[Steelfish]

feeling like sharing a cool non-sense thing of my wraith..
useful? nop
cool? maybe

the white stripes on the top are from a "glow-in-the-dark" paint that used on my fishing lures, so, the more time running on sun light and then direct to a really dark area it glows like having a source of energy.. yeah I know, not useful at any way, but it looks really cool when I called a day and put the rig on the truck and those stripes shine like a mofo, same deal when I play on the street and later put the wraith on its dark spot on the garage.

this is with bit of sun light




and this is with NO sun light




these stripes were done when the body was just paint moths ago, and it was done like regular lexan paint on the interior of the body and its holding just great.
couldnt get better pics cuz my camera is a cheapo one but they shine like any good glow in the dark toy/lure

[crazy nick]

Yes usefull! What if your out at night and the alternator goes.....lol?