Getting Ready for New Wraith Project

[Vengeance]

After buying my Wraith kit over a year ago I am finally, and slowly, gathering the mod and upgrade parts to build it the way I planned.

First though I would like to thank Harley for all of his informational posts as well as numerous other Wraith owners which without all of the information and feedback they provided I would not be able to avoid certain pitfalls nor build for the style and performance I want out of this project... THANK YOU!

Chassis design- BGR Fabrication parts with custom mods
Color Scheme- Red and Black
Wheels- RC4WD Militants (temporarily)
Lighting- Gear Head array on roof and front bumper. Axial Night Vision LED controller and lighting front inner sub bumper, rear bumper, and interior
Water proofing- Going with water resistant. lol I will be using the Flying Dutchman/Crawl Space electronics trays. I will not be submerging the truck but I will be able to run in rain and snow
Bumper Style- BGR front and rear

I will update this post as I acquire more of the parts... I am sure to some this build seems somewhat overdone. I know it is nothing new as there are better builds out there, but I am excited for it as I move closer to building the kit I wanted so badly last year.

Parts and Status started 7/22/13, updated 8/13/2013
Wraith kit- Purchased
Super Shafty Complete Bomb Proof 6mm OutPut AX10 Transmission- Purchased Installed
Castle Creations MMP ESC- Purchased
MIP 6mm Drive Hubs- Purchased Installed
Vanquish Standard Wraith Axles and ALL suspension hardware setup for 4WS- Purchased Installed
MIP C-Drive Spline Set- Purchased Installed
Airtronics 4PLS TX/RX- Purchased
Tekin ROC412 3100kV Motor- Purchased Installed
Castle Creations BEC- Purchased
Vanquish Ti 4-Links- Purchased Installed
Vanquish Ti Drag Links and Tie Rods for 4WS-Purchased Installed
Vanquish Front CMS w/Panhard- Purchased Installed
Vanquish VVD Axles- Purchased Installed
Shocks Gmade XD 103mm- Purchased Installed
Aluminum Skidplate- Purchased Installed
Crawl Space/Flying Dutchman Front Mounted Battery Plate/electronicsbox and rear tray- Purchased
Vanquish SLW 2.2 Beadlock Rims- not purchaed
Chassis mods/configuration parts- Purchased completed and ready for paint
Differential Spiral Cut Bevel HD 36/14-2.57:1 front and 38/13-2.97:1 rear- Purchased Installed
Gripfab Grip-Lok Locker ARB Edition- Purchased Installed
3Racing Winch- Purchased
Tactic HD BB Steering Servos- Purchased Installed
Fast Eddy Bearings- Purchased Installed
VP High Wear Bushing Kit- not purchased
Traxxas Oilite Busings- Purchased Installed


Vengeance

[Vengeance]

Well I am getting ready to order some more parts. In the mean time I built the chassis and stock axles so I could mock-up some things.
Tonight I mocked-up the interior set, more specifically the gauges and working scale stereo speakers.
I have painting and detail work to do, truck theme will be dark red and black throughout.
To see the interior mock-up go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0YC...e_gdata_player

Vengeance

[Vengeance]

Hood mod and hood pins completed today. As others have done I used the Traxxas battery strap pegs and will epoxy metal washers to the hood and cable the actual pins to the front horizontal tube for more realism.
I will throw up some images later tonight.

I have been giving some thought to the shocks. I want more scale realism but do not wish to totally sacrifice performance. I think I will go with GMade XD 103mm shocks with piggyback resivoirs and adjustment screws to change dampening. I cannot stand the blue of the King shocks and the Protrac shocks seem to large scale wise in diameter.

The one thing I have not researched yet is if any one has or if it is even reasonably possible to do a CMS for the rear steering setup as well as the front. If anyone wishes to chime in on this please feel free.

Lastly for the evening I am somewhat undecided on what to do for a driver figure. I am not sure which size I need either. I am somewhat leaning towards the Tamiya driver with a custom head/helmet like I have seen on others' rigs here but that driver figure is always missing his right foot. Again any input would be swell. I definately know I am NOT going with a wrestling figure or HeMan style... I just cannot bring myself to do that. lol

V

[Vengeance]

Last night I did the battery relocation mod prior to hittig the rack... By the end of this weekend I hope to have my interior painted and gauge pods permanently mounted and ready for the LED's I ordered.

As for today.... Well I pulled the trigger and purchased darn near everything on my shopping list. It is scary how fast items add up. The 4ws certainly did not help. lol

I made a gamble/compromise, rather than spend over $150 on Hitec steering servos I am going to try the Tactic servos for steering. LINK HERE
TowerHobbies.com | Tactic TSX65 Standard Digital Ultra-Torque HV MG Servo I know little about them but the price and the specs looked okay.
TSX65 TACM0265
High-Voltage Ultra-Torque Digital
Volts Torque Speed
6.0 323 oz-in (23.3 kg-cm) 0.15 sec/60
7.4 356 oz-in (25.7 kg-cm) 0.13 sec/60
Dimensions Weight
1.6 x 0.8 x 1.5 in
40 x 20 x 38 mm 2.3 oz
(66 g)

All that is left to buy to be up and running are the spiral cut bevel gear sets, aluminum servo arms, and beadlock wheels.

Other items such as lighting, winch, whips, driver figure, shock springs for tuning, and perhaps the BGR KOH V2 cage will come after that.

Hopefully everything will be here by end of next week... man I have a lot of work to do.

V

[Harley]

Nice parts list sir!

Get some pictures up!

[Vengeance]

Thank you Mr. Harley... I have read your posts... again thank you for all of your great info.

Okay, for pics all I have is Google + so here is the link. https://plus.google.com/113753033699...ts/Vq6PKjFSxZY

[Vengeance]

Well I received an e-mail back from Hobbico, the distributor for Tactic servos. In my e-mail to them I asked how well their high end servo, TowerHobbies.com | Tactic TSX65 Standard Digital Ultra-Torque HV MG Servo compares to the high end Hitec servos. Here is Hobbico's response;

"We do not have figures here concerning durability and longevity, but considering that the Hitec servos you mention are twice as expensive as the Tactic servos mentioned, and using the principle "you get what you pay for," I would expect the Hitec servos to be superior in those characteristics."

Good thing is that they seems to be honest. Bad thing, I already ordered two of their servos for the steering on my Wraith. Looks like I will be the guinea pig. lol However, the old saying of if it seems to good to be true...

V

[Vengeance]

WHOOO HOOOO All of my RPP parts have shipped! Thank you RPP. Now waiting on Super Shafty and Tower Hobbies...

Official project name is now "99 problems"

V

[Billy D]

I can't believe that was there response. Who doesn't have specs on something that you sell. That guy wont be salesman of the year.

[Vengeance]

Maybe he reps for Hitec on the sly. lol

[Vengeance]

Okay so the stars have aligned, not only has RPP shipped, but also Tower Hobbies and Super Shafty... I know what I will be doing all next weekend. mooooaaaahahahaha.

[Vengeance]

Painted the first coat on the steering wheel, shifters, speaker covers, driver, control panel, and fire extinguisher today. Images at https://plus.google.com/113753033699...ts/Ti9mMM6esSG

Not shown are the small front LED buckets. Going to go red LED's in them and painted the interior of the buckets gloss red as well.

The color I will use to accent the interior and exterior is oil based and I have to buy some thinner so I can spray this week and clean out my airbrush. Seems Faskolor is no longer being made and in fact, per my lhs, going out of business.

Just as well i guess, they never did have a good metallic red and I was never able to mix one that was close to what I wanted.

I also need one more figure, Marcus, from GOW to go with Baird which I bought yesterday.

NOS bottle, fuel cell, fuel pumps coming by Friday.

I also need to get some hollow metal tubing so I can do a temporary fastback top until I can afford a BGR cage.

For lighting I am gonna go with an existing Axial Night Vision system for the interior, front sub-bumper, and tail lights. When I have thw cash I will use a VP lightbar and mounting systemon the roof and possibly a short VP LED array on the front.

V

[Vengeance]

So the VP parts came in today and they are suuuuuuuuhweeeeet! However I overlooked a few things.

Since I am doing 4WS I forgot to order another set of 4 steering flange pipes, and the VP Ackerman arms.

SO next order will be for;
Axial flange pipes- set of 4
VP Ackerman arms- 2 pair
VP Wraith Racing Ackerman TI tie rod- 1
Testors Thinner- 1/2 pint
5/16th aluminium tube- 1ft
Pipe cutter- 1
38/14 Beveled HD Ring and Pinion- 1 set
36/14 Beveled HD Ring and Pinion- 1 set.

I will be so happy to get this thing built... lol

V

[altd896]

VP knuckles only come with stock replacement arms not ackerman you need these as well for the ackerman tie rod to work
WRAITH Racing Ackerman Steering Arms

[altd896]

ahh, I see by your edit you worked it out

[Vengeance]

Thank you sir, I just realized that... Slap on back of my head... of course RPP is out of them. .lol

[Vengeance]

Nothing llike having "ALMOST" everything you need. LMAO. Well at least I can spend more time on the interior.

Thank you again altd896, I do appreciate it. This forum rocks... Reminds me of RCMT.net back in the day when monster trucks were the thing.

Take care,
V

[Vengeance]

Post 1 updates today...

Well it is August 13th and things are coming right along, slowly perhaps with this back injury I have been dealing with since I was rear ended in May, but coming along none-the-less.

As of today;
-Interior is ready for paint then installation of detail parts and lighting

-Waiting on the Flying Dutchman electronics trays which will arrive tomorrow for electronics installation

-Shocks built and installed, not sure I think too much about the GMADE XD's. The composite caps took me back a little. One resevoir is leaking and the soft springs are not available at RPP. In addition, they are way too big for scale appearances

-I received the RC4WD Militant beadlock rims which I ordered for a temporary setup until Vanquish gets all of the modular SLW parts in the colors I want in stock. Read my post in the Tire and Wheel section on them.

-I have started to setup my Futaba 4PLS and the truck radio electronics... I am having some glitching issues with the digitial servos from Tactic. I need to re-wire the BEC's to see if that is what is causing it before I Hulk Rage at anything. lol

-The fast-back mod is completed. I just need to do a little sanding and some paint when I do the other paint.

-Hood mod is done except for epoxying the washers to the hood for a more scale appearance.

-Programmed all the BEC's and the MMP on Saturday night... running two for steering using alternate wiring method, one for Gear Head lighting, and one for the 3Racing winch.

-Lights will be hooked up to micro switches in the interior console while the winch will be on channel 4.

Anyway, I will take some pics after I get some other stuff done and then link this to my Google+ account.

Thank you,
Jason

[2manyprojects]

Can't wait to see some pics , sounds good this far! "Thumbs up"

[Yardracer]

Wow, what a parts list. Can't wait to see it coming together.