Picked up a Yeti XL recently....

[MachLid]

Hello everyone,

This is my first ever post here. I’m from the Macomb county area in Michigan. Been in to RC cars and airplanes since the mid 1980’s. Not gonna hide my age,,, I’m in my mid 40s and have loved RC toys since I could start to spend my Paper route and grass cutting money on them!

I usually don’t post much in RC forums, but decided to try to keep and eye on this one to learn a few things, (since I recently purchased a Yeti XL), and to give some input occasionally.

I’m nothing more than a backyard basher when it comes to RC. I’m not super abusive, but me and my fellow RC buddies know how to have some fun with these things. We really mostly goof off on low cut grass, packed and loose dirt, and lots of pavement and black top as well.

I bought the Yeti XL purely because of its size and nothing else, never owned an Axial RC vehicle previously. Most of my previous RC cars and trucks have ranged from; Optima, Blackfoot, Turbo inferno, Madforce, various HPi savages, E-Revo, and most recently the 1/5 scale HPi Baja Super 5sc Flux stadium truck. Sadly as you some of you may know some of this, the Super 5sc was a great 1/5 scale truck ! But for me it was for only about two months. After burning up three ESC’s, and two motors in what I considered to be a very short period of time, and relatively normal use,,, I knew this thing was flawed with its choice of stock motor & ESC, and its giving weight/ load. So I ended up selling it back to my local HS. It really hurt to get out of the 5sc. It was a perfect size for me, handled great, and I had no trouble with anything on it other than the electronics. And at the time I didn’t want to figure out what it would take to make its motor & ESC survive its weight and size. So I got out of it.

Since I got rid of the 5sc, I stayed away from surface RC toys for a while because I couldn’t bring myself to get into anything else after getting spoiled with the size of the 5sc. And the key thing I wanted out of my large RC trucks was they had to be Battery operated. I’ve seen lots of other 1/5 scale two-stroke stuff and I can’t take how they have no grunt from a dead stop. Just too boggy and slow for me off the line. And not to mention how loud they are and etc. Plus I didn’t want to build a “Brushless conversion” 1/5 scale at this time.

So I got the yeti XL about four weeks ago. My local HS got about four in stock with their first batch, and I picked one up about two days after first seeing it. Once again; bought it pretty much on its size alone, and the fact that it’s not nitro or gas.

I decided to make mine rune on 6s, (two 6000ma 3cells). The reason I went with 6s instead of 4s was because I kinda compared it to an E-Revo I had about four years ago. My brushless e-Revo was on 4s, using a very high “C” rated battery, plus I added one tooth to the pinion on the Revo, and it was a blast like this, and trouble free too. So when I seen that the Yeti XL would end up weighting about 5-6 more pounds then a E-Revo. I thought it would be best to make it run on 6s rather than 4s so that I wouldn’t get bored with it right away.

I think I did the right thing going 6s, but because this thing needs a rear sway bar, (or anti-role bar) so badly that in order to control some of the crazy twist out of the hole with this thing, I ended up doing some programming on the ESC to manage some of the power from a dead stop. And also tweaked the reverse settings and braking power and etc. All in all; it’s got a ton of power on 6s, and I seem to get about 15-18 minutes out of it.

And no matter what for basic use and bashing, I believe it needs a sway bar (as many of you guys are suggesting) regardless of 4s or 6s battery. Axial should have ether supplied one on it, or included it in the box, or at minimum had one ready as an option part upon the release of this model. I’ve come up with a very simple one that I’ll share pics of very soon.
I’ve had a couple of problems with my Yeti that I wanted to share with you guys. On its very first battery, with in the first ten minutes of playing with it… Both my rear tires started to come un-glued or pop off a little from the rims. Then after re-gluing the rears. The fronts started to do the same. I’m convinced that this was just a crappy glue job from the factory, because once I re-glued them, they held up significantly better after running several more batteries through it.

The next problem I had was one of the front Dogbones started to come apart. The little shaft part that is pressed into the ball-end of the inner side that is near the diff started to slide out somehow, and partially cut up the diff case and the part where the upper arm or link attaches too. Luckily I caught this in time and was able to re-press in the little shaft and peened it to try to keep it from happening again.

But on about my 8th or 9th battery through the XL, I found that it was starting to act funny, shake and drive weird. After closer inspection I found that the rear diff spun tight and bound up when rotating the rear tires. At first thought it was something wrong inside the actual diff case and side gears. But when I pulled it apart, I found that the inner dogbone/axle-shaft on the left side did the same thing as one of my fronts did a few days earlier. This time I took PICs to show what has happened. Because I didn’t catch it right away, the dogbones little shaft proceeded to move outward and basically tried to cut up/grind the inner axle housing. And when it did this, it sliced up the area where the diff cover bolts screw into, which weakened the housing. So now the diff or axle housing needs to be replaced, and also the axle diff cover too.

I’m not one to usually complain about RC problems and repairs, but certain things just aren’t acceptable in such a short period of time. So I took it to my local HS for them to take PIC’s of it and maybe somehow make axial aware of what’s going on with their product. (Plus I tried to get replacement parts warrantied possibly).

Sorry for the long post, just wanted to break the ice I guess. Looking forward to more info here, and some aftermarket stuff too.

[BillBergman]

Strange that the dog bone is rusty...

[RustenPaines]

Interresting to read that you liked your Revo. Mine was/is s POS that you can't and should never run more than 4s on or you'll blow a diff or diff housing or axle or some other part. Sorry to hear about your experience but we all have our own experiences. That shaft sliding out is odd!

[Gso125]

I've had that happen on a few short course truck they just fall apart sometimes.