A Yeti in the Wolfpack

[Rockwolf]

THEN.....after that was all together a late delivery appeared at my doorstep containing the 2 sets of steel HD bevel gears i have had back ordered forever:flip off:

So now i have to go back and rip out that front dif and get those gears installed, oh well thats what i get for moving on before the parts arrive!!!

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[Rockwolf]

Here are pictures of one of todays projects; the sexiest RC upgrade I have ever had the pleasure of laying my dirty dick beaters on, the Vanquish centered Currie axle! Enjoy, i know I did.....



Here are the pictures of how it went from an old bag to the sexy bitch you just saw.

First I added an Axial HD bevel to the Vanquish oh so shiny (I Like shiny) locker unit:

** The locker does not come with the Currie so expect to shovel out even more cash on this upgrade as well**



While opening all the various bags of goodies that Vanquish packs in this kit I came upon the new axles...seemed like craziness not to compare them side by side with the stock axial units....Am I right, or am I right...of course I'm right

so here is the picture:



Here is the first assembly I finished up following the less than perfect (or complete for that matter) Vanquish instruction page:



Next they have you stuff the tubes full of axles and bearing and some purposefully irritating retainer rings, that made me have to get off my lazy ass and search through all my tool boxes in the barn, just to find the correct pliers to install



Lastly you put in 2,000 or so, little set screws, with like 2 or 3 quarts of blue lock tite and finish bolting on the brackets and truss and diff cover, which i think has like 200 little screws as well

Once thats all done its looks all sexy-n-shit like this:





After finishing I ended up back on the Vanquish website to order 4 new Fast Eddie bearings, because I managed (somehow) to lose one of the stock ones while building this. They all felt fine really, but were less than perfect, and this beauty deserves better, so I bought 4 and I'll swap those new bearings in when they arrive.

While I was there I also grabbed some silver Vanquish 12mm clamping hex adapters and a sheet of stickers. Why a sheet of stickers you ask? Well that would be because even though ya drop $175 bucks for a centered Currie, the asshats at Vanquish still don't send ya any Vanquish stickers!!! Which I personally think sucks large on their part, and quite honestly sort of pisses me off!!!! Though I doubt they give two shits about my sticker gripe.


Next up you get to watch me totally mangle my once perfect factory lid with my complete lack of even basic adherence skills.

[Sh0rtBus]

Yessir...That's one sexy piece of skillfully crafted metal ya got there! Points for strength and bonus points for beauty and scale realism.

I spy a set of EZ Loks in the background, too. Makings of another "let's take out a second mortgage to finance my addiction" Yeti build.

[Rockwolf]

Originally Posted by Sh0rtBus

Yessir...That's one sexy piece of skillfully crafted metal ya got there! Points for strength and bonus points for beauty and scale realism.

I spy a set of EZ Loks in the background, too. Makings of another "let's take out a second mortgage to finance my addiction" Yeti build.

OMG you got some eagle eyes SB! I see them plain as day NOW that you pointed them out! Damn i shoulda cropped those photos

I was trying to keep those rims on the DL until i debuted them on some special edition of this thread....or maybe just wheel, tire and foam day

Oh well, i still got a few tricks.....errr another coolio combo that is yet unseen by the general public, to fill air time on wheel, tire and foam day. ANNND if i get off my lazy butt and sell some of this extra stuff and miss buys for this yeti build I'm hoping to finance that same combo that Hobbes is running. Kinda digging( ok maybe I'm past kinda) the black rims and Voodoo combo.

And you said "makings of another second mortgage build"...... oh no my friend, this has spiraled well past that whole "makings" part. In fact if i don't qualify for some veteran assistance or a government bail out i might be living in this Yeti

[dasco]

Lol good stuff brother . Those are some choice products your going with����

[Rockwolf]

Originally Posted by dasco

Lol good stuff brother . Those are some choice products your going with����

Thanks Dasco my man! Choice...perhaps, but right now I'm feeling like many of those choices were bad!

I have three wheel sets for this ATM. The stock ones, a set of Gearhead trail king ez locks and a used but not abused set of really sweet Duuuude customs....Sounds awesome right!

Problem is after much test fitting, more desperate test fitting and near panic re test fitting.... not a damn one of them will fit the D Lux knuckles. The stockers could fit with some dremmel work to the CF arms...but thats last resort because who want to run the sub par gripping stock beadlocks.

did i mention the VP and gear head sow hubs i bought and didn't need either? yeah its been that kinda day

[Rockwolf]

OK fellas, here are the pictures of what i had hoped was gonna be a gorgeous, custom and most importantly....EASY stock RTR body transformation.

A while back I got ahold of the good folks at FrequeSkins.com and ordered a red and chrome flamed Yeti skin. I was able to add custom numbers or letters, so I chose...what else "ROCKWOLF" and had them put it into the vinyl. It took a while to cook it all up, but when it finally arrived....all i can say is WOW!! they do an absolutely gorgeous job!

The whole skin came still on the large sheet that i laid out flat and began admiring. They include perhaps the best instruction sheet i can ever remember seeing. I found it very user friendly in direction and explanation, and unlike most, I actually enjoyed reading it.

Now none of those things helped me even a little bit, I struggled with this whole giant decal placing thing from beginning to end. I cussed a blue flame almost continually. I drank copious amounts of Bud light, though I started slow, the worse I did, the more I cussed, and the more I drank...by the end of this medieval torture, I had stuck vinyl on almost every thing on my bench except the Yeti

I am completely convinced that a retarded spider monkey with a vision problem could do this, It really should be easy, and I do NOT blame FrequeSkins in the least. I simply found out that I lack even the most fundamental sticker skills that even five year olds have mastered. In fact, looking back, I should have had a five year old do it in the first place as I'm convinced he/she would have done a much better job!

ok enough of my babbling here are the pictures:


Ok starts out clean and simple enough, just strip the stock stickers off your RTR lid, and clean it up with alcohol.

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**WARNING** if you have a weak stomach, you may want to look away now

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So there it is. Im thinking if anyone with even an ounce of ability had done this instead of me....i really think it would have been bad ass!

In the next installment Ill show ya how my 3 active brain cells decided to try and fix this....well not fix so much as attempt to make it look decent enough as not to embarrass me out in the woods.

[Rockwolf]

Here is the mostly final product. There are all the scale touches yet to come, spare tire, roof rack, lights, gas tanks, radiator etc, but this is the base unit assembled and put to the side where i don't have to look at it too much

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SOOOoooo in conclusion, if you are a betting man/woman, I'd put my wager on me getting a new lid, and PAINTING it this time......

[Sh0rtBus]

With all the additional livery on top of it, the graphics actually don't look all that bad. Can't say I'd have done a much better job applying the skins myself.

[Rockwolf]

Well brother, you certainly couldn't have done worse! I'm honestly pretty disappointed, in my head this was gonna look so freakin sweet! Oh well, once it scrapes the rocks all bets are off anyway! I'm thinking one good mud run and it should look just right

[Cultus]

Don't be so hard on yourself! It looks good! Trust me, once you go out and get a little road rash, and get her dirty you will feel better about it. I have heard the yeti is challenging to skin with all the small subtle weird angles

[hobbez84]

I like it, good mix of colors!

I also really like the detail you put with the headlights. Silver with the orange turn signals look MUCH better than the black versions.

[Rockwolf]

Thanks guys, there are plenty of parts here n there that look pretty good, and from across the shop where I set it it, looks much cooler too!

In that sense, it kinda reminds me of that first rattle bomb paint job I did back in high school to a '76 El Camino....if you were 20 foot or further away, that damn thing looked like Chip Foose painted it...closer it looked like black Krylon sprayed over rusty sheet metal and unprimed Bondo...

[DickyT]

Originally Posted by Rockwolf

my dirty dick beaters

Is that a technical term?


The rig is looking great man! I'm looking forward to some action or on the trail shots.

[Rockwolf]

Originally Posted by DickyT

Is that a technical term?


The rig is looking great man! I'm looking forward to some action or on the trail shots.

Why yes it is Dicky, my DI introduced me to the term during basic training, and I have been using it in technical situations involving my hands ever since

Well it still feels like I have a 1000 hours to go before this thing is finished, but everyday it inches closer.

All I know for sure is that when it is finished, my next money hoarding project is saving enough to get me and that yeti down to Florida where this guy I know lives like 15 minutes from Crawler "Disney land" where I can put the rock wolf through its paces, watch an RC air show then take a ride on space mountain

[DickyT]

Originally Posted by Rockwolf

Why yes it is Dicky, my DI introduced me to the term during basic training, and I have been using it in technical situations involving my hands ever since

Well it still feels like I have a 1000 hours to go before this thing is finished, but everyday it inches closer.

All I know for sure is that when it is finished, my next money hoarding project is saving enough to get me and that yeti down to Florida where this guy I know lives like 15 minutes from Crawler "Disney land" where I can put the rock wolf through its paces, watch an RC air show then take a ride on space mountain

Space Mountain is 3 hours north, you will have to hit that on the way back home.

[dasco]

Coming along nicely Rockwood !

[Rockwolf]

Originally Posted by dasco

Coming along nicely Rockwood !

Did you just call me rockwood?

Thanks Disco

[Rockwolf]

OK some cool stuff today....that did NOT turn out badly!

Got my power plant in from Holmes Hobby, so I decided to start working on the heart of the matter, arguably the most important part of any good build...or re-build in this case.

The beast within the beast, the most bad ass thumper I could find, the water tight Holmes Puller Pro BL540XL 3500KV. But what good is power without brains, right? So following HH's suggestion, and other here on RCC, I also had them send me a water proofed Castle Mamba Max Pro and a Castle 10 amp BEC (which HH pre-set at 6 amps per my request) They sent it all pre soldered, shrink wrapped and ready to install! Pretty damn sweet if I do say so myself.



So I got right to work installing the Motor to the STRC super strong silver alloy motor mount. I added the Robinson Racing black geared slipper unit, which like all of their stuff, is over built and bad ass in its own right! I did end up having to file a few thousandths off each side of the stock tranny shaft (the shiny flats in the picture) to get proper fitment, but that ended up being all I had to do besides assemble, for the rest of this segment.

I set the gear mesh using the stock 16t pinion, which most likely will not hold up with this amount of grunt pushing against that hardened Robinson 64t spur, but ill get a extra hard RR pinion on order in both 16t and 12t. The 12t should get me into almost exact Wraith final gear ratio, according to Harley's post, so that should help me get my crawl on, when the mood hits me.

I finished off this center section with the "bomb proof" MIP center shaft. I doubt anyone here needs me to sing the praises of that company, as MIP's rep for quality and strength are legendary in most RC circles.

Lastly I had arts and crafts day in the workshop the other day. As you can see here the stock gear cover got a face lift...im just glad I couldn't find the elmers glue and dried macaroni

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th-th-th-th thats all folks

[hobbez84]

Looks like you're ready to blow up some rocks!