My XR "ridge back"

[DKSnipes]

Drove my XR all last season and half this season all stock, sense I don't like being "generic" I decided to build my own chassis with the premise on having the front axle bolted to the chassis.

so I started with some poster board, cutting board and a sharpy, with some sketching, cutting, drilling, redesign, tweaking, a 2nd cutting board and some lexan sheet I have a prototype.







and a short vid
ottsix_schism.mpg - YouTube

[elsewhere]

neat idea
looks like it works well, wonder how well a pro driver would do with it...

[Hittman]

This thing actually does really well. And it looks pretty good too

[DKSnipes]

It does drive well and is surprisingly stable, just need to draw it up in cad and get it milled out in delrin and carbon fiber.

[J-FAB NOR-CAL]

You could go with a way thinner material and cut down on weight huge.Just my opinion,looks cool.

[TJ Steve]

Great design!
I have went through a similar process and it is quite rewarding to make your own vehicle and then comp it. I have found mine works quite well after about five or six style changes now. I call it "Morphing" and I'm getting ready to tweek the design again. Anyhow, I'm just wanting to give you a few things to consider before you get too excited and go to the expense of having some made up. It's hard to tell from the pics the exact size, but it doesn't look legal competition size to me. It should be 3/4" taller than it is wide, and it will also have to have detachable side panels. Here's the overall dimension rule.
▪ 2.3.5 - 2.2 Crawler class bodiless 8" overall length, 3" overall width, and 3.75" overall height.
And here is the link to the rest of them..............
United States Radio Controlled Crawler Association
Please don't take offense to my comments as none are intended.
I am really glad to see more people building their own! To me this is where it is really at!!!!!
Good luck my friend, I will keep an eye on this one!!!!!

[leather]

I like the idea, the thing I notice is that your COG moves with the front axle. If you could make the body spin, even just a couple of degrees agains the front axle it would keep the high side of the body from getting so high. It would be like a pivot point. You could still have the all the force on the front axle it would just rotate a hair. That way when a wheel drops the opposite corner wouldn't go sky high and put your weight up.

[DKSnipes]

OK finely a long overdo update, first off TJ no offense taken, I have been working on the aforementioned.

During the last comp at about gate 6 on course 2 I found the weak point in my design, the "spacers" that attach the chassis to the axle broke.






Luckily I was able to fix it enough with zip-ties to get half way Through course 3...




Will post up my progress on Version II later.

[asian195]

that thing is crazy. Love it.

[DKSnipes]

quick update, made some new sturdier chassis/axle mounts out of 1/4 aluminum.


started a new chassis with a 12x24x.093 sheet of polycarbonate then used one of the old chassis plates as a template, and after some tweaking on hole placement hit the band-saw and drill-press.

Heres where it sits as of now.




now to get the roof,skid, and hood mounted up then wire it up for the comp this saterday.

[tlsrcs]

That looks awesome!! I want to.do.something similar as in making my own chassis. Do you think a thinner cutting board can be used and still be rigid enough for comps? Also I am thinking about a rear axle mounted to the chassis instead of the front. Do you have any thoughts on that idea? Sorry for reviving an older thread even though its only a few months old.