Yeti's on the loose in Australia

[millzee]

After a very long wait my Yeti XL finally arrived today. Thanks to Stu at Oneten Crawlers, he's look after me very well and managed to get one in my hands. My first opinion on this rig is that it's a beast headbang I love the design, it looks to be very well thought out and built strong. It's a very basic, easy to work on platform and I'm sure once I change the battery plugs over, I'll be able to have a lot of fun with it. The body looks awesome, I'm not just saying that because it's red and black (bonus), the red paint is a metallic mica type paint and really pop's in the light. You'll get an idea of the size from the pic's bellow, it makes the 1/8th buggy look like a 1/16th. I'll keep this post short as I want to get back to swapping the servo out for a turnigy 910 that I've waterproofed and swapping the battery plugs to suit my lipo's.
As promised, PIC'S

[millzee]

I finished off the servo swap and added a set of 8mm bullets to suit my lipo's, then took it for a quick spin, WOW!
At this point I'll say that 4s is more than enough until a sway bar or some kind of stabilizer if fitted. I can lift the front wheel very easily due to the torque of the motor. It's a quick big buggy on 4s and seems to have heaps of power. The Turnigy TS-910 servo seemed to be able to turn the big wheels without any issues and kept it in a straight line with ease, time will tell how it holds up. I'll get a few batteries ready for my kids trucks and we'll head somewhere tomorrow afternoon to get some video.

[millzee]

I drilled out a set of 17mm hex's to 8mm and they fit perfectly, I'll get a set of black covered wheel nuts to suit the truck better but they'll do for now. One thing I did notice is that the stock wheel plastic is pretty soft in the hex, I don't think it'd take much to chew them out so I'll have to look into a set of stronger rims and I'll probably cook the tires off the stock rims as the tires seem very good, they hook up well.

[Sneetches]

Nice, what hexes are those? Should have gotten some red ones to match

[millzee]

That's a set of traxxas ones that I had laying around in my parts box, the black covered nuts will fix the mismatch.

[Sneetches]

I see, so aside from drilling them to 8mm, they then fit right up? I think a couple people on the forum here were wondering about that.

[marsterg]

I have also just converted to a full 17mm setup using the traxxas splined wheel hub set. Much better! I used part number tra5353g. The g is for green. Tra5353r are the better suited red ones but they were out of stock when I went looking. You have to drill out the back of the traxxas hubs to 8mm but only about 1cm in. The rest of the hub will perfectly fit the thin ends of the existing axial axles.

It looks the part used above by millzee are actually traxxas 17mm wheel adapters (tra6856x). I am sure they work, but the outer ends have an 8mm inside diameter which don't fit the existing axle ends well. Part tra5353x may be better if you are going to buy parts just for the conversion.

[millzee]

http://youtu.be/VG_c4XcWL3I

[millzee]

anyone know hoe to expand the youtube links

[Kennybrook]

Awesome video. That thing was taking a beating. Was that on 4s or 6s?

[millzee]

2 sets of pack running 4s and 1 set running 6s, I really think I'll be sticking with 4s with this truck as the electronics stay much cooler, it's easier to drive and less damage. Soon after running the 6s packs I noticed the tires coming from the rims in a few spots and on 6s on that surface, it really wasn't much faster because the extra voltage only caused more wheel spin / less traction making harder to drive. 4s rocks all the way!!

[tyree123jggu]

Nah

[rockhugger]

Originally Posted by millzee

http://youtu.be/VG_c4XcWL3I

1:09 in holy crap

[millzee]

I thought that one may have caused a bit of damage but nope, just flipped it over and kept going.

[millzee]

I fitted up the 5ive-t sway bars onto the XL using a few bits and pieces, I'll try to get it out for a test run soon and see how it goes.

[Sneetches]

Interesting, is it a stiff bar? Should tone down the twist by a lot already, but the zip ties look really official .

[millzee]

The black bars are the lightest in the 5ive-t sway bar kit. I'll start with this one and see how it goes, then I could try both of the heavier ones if needed. I love cable ties, so useful for so many things, lol. I'll see how it all holds up.

[millzee]

Although I haven't used this truck a lot yet I have found the battery trays a bit tight with the lipos I have so this morning I decided to whip up a trial battery tray that can fit my largest battery, a 5000mAh 6s Nano. The tray can also firmly hold all my other lipos and combinations that I can use. I'll say it's a trial at this point as the cog of the truck will now have the weight a bit higher and slightly more frontal, this might help to keep the front wheels on the ground better but I'm just hoping it won't create a nose heavy flight path while in the air, I don't think it will too much but I'll have to test it out and see how it goes.
Here's a few pic's of the materials that I used and hoe it come together, I'll let you know how it handles.

[millzee]

I'm waiting on the postie to bring a few things that I've read on here will improve the truck. I've ordered a Dhawk steering set up and a few o0ther things that I hope to get this week. I messaged a fella I know that has a few Losi XXL's and he's sold me a set of XXL shocks for a great price and another mate is going to give me a set of RC Raven springs, I'm looking forward to getting them fitted up. Yesterday I pulled the diffs out and have filled them both with 300k wt jelly (fluid) and replaced the stock bearings with Avid's, I've been using Avid bearings for years now and find that they hold up very well for the price.
I decided to spend a bit more time on the sway bars this morning. I've used the dremel to make a grove at the bottom of the front bumper for the losi 5ive-t sway bar to fit into and use the screws that hold the bumper on to secure it in place with a plastic tab. The rear 5ive-t sway bar now runs through the holes that are intended for a sway bar. I had to bend the bar to make a better fit and also dremel out the space in the lower arm for the ball end to fit into.

What do you guys think are the best wheel / tire combo for the XL's, I don't want a set of heavy weights that will cause more diff issues, just a good set of wheels that will be a similar size to the stock wheels and give me plenty of traction??

[millzee]

The LST XXL shocks arrived this morning so I gave them a service filling the front with 45wt and the rear with 40wt fluid. They fitted up easily enough on the rear, I only had to dremel off about 1mm of the plastic below the lower ball end so the screw could line up better. The front end had me looking around everywhere in my parts boxes, the top had to come out enough so the springs can clear the cvd's and turnbuckles. After looking around I found a couple of body post's that I think may have been off a traxxas slash and they fit perfectly through the hole in the shock cap and extend out just the right amount. To keep the shock body from sliding back I made two spacers out of brass tube and then screwed the body posts on using a long screw that extends most of the length of the body post. I'm really looking forward to getting the raven springs as I know they are 100x better than the stock LST springs but I can already tell by the way the truck sits that it'll be much better than the stock Axial shocks.