Jato Tries to Define Rock Rey

[Arctic Cat ZRT]

Originally Posted by Jim85IROC

Those front arms sure are an odd design. It seems like a normal, open 1-piece arm would have been cheaper to manufacture & assemble, lighter in weight, and just as strong.

I found that they flex a ton. Ended up replacing them with the Hot Racing aluminum arms for the RR. They are actually pretty nice pieces, same with the spindles.

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by smog

Using Tamiya rattle cans?

Yes, most likely. Or Duratrax. I know I have some at home.

[Jim85IROC]

Originally Posted by JatoTheRipper

I'm still trying to decide on the paint color(s).

Have you considered going with a simple-ish paint scheme and adding interest with vinyl? That's what I've done in my last few projects, and I really like the result. It also ties my fleet together.

Bomber was just black paint:


Gen7 was the factory silver color:


Yeti was candy orange and black:


It cost me about $35 for the two vinyl colors, and I've probably got enough left for 5 or more vehicles.

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by Jim85IROC

Have you considered going with a simple-ish paint scheme and adding interest with vinyl? That's what I've done in my last few projects, and I really like the result. It also ties my fleet together.

It cost me about $35 for the two vinyl colors, and I've probably got enough left for 5 or more vehicles.

I like that Kryptek looking vinyl.

Funny you posted those because metallic orange and copper were on my mind for this build. I haven't yet done that color. The candy orange looks great. What brand is the paint? What color is the backing? And how does it hold up to use?

Also, who makes the wheels on your Bomber?

[smog]

Originally Posted by JatoTheRipper

Yes, most likely. Or Duratrax. I know I have some at home.

It’s Christmas, go for red and green...


Edit...with white

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by smog

It’s Christmas, go for red and green...


Edit...with white

Then I'd probably offend somebody on the trail.

[Jim85IROC]

Originally Posted by JatoTheRipper

I like that Kryptek looking vinyl.

Funny you posted those because metallic orange and copper were on my mind for this build. I haven't yet done that color. The candy orange looks great. What brand is the paint? What color is the backing? And how does it hold up to use?

Also, who makes the wheels on your Bomber?

It's Duratrax Candy Orange PC296 from a spray can. I backed it with Duratrax silver. I rushed and wound up with some sags, but fortunately they were mostly in spots that the vinyl covered up.

I don't have many hours on the Yeti yet, but so far it's holding up fine. I've used Duratrax paint on most of my vehicles, and even on my bashers that I beat mercilessly they seem to hold up. I broke the body on my Stampede in a million places and the paint underneath never chipped. The vinyl doesn't hold up real well to sharp rocks as i found out on my Bomber, and I doubt it would look good after a 30mph roof slide on a basher, but in the locations I put the vinyl on the Yeti, it should be fine. 90% of the marks in the vinyl on my Bomber happened on my first time out when I was in some sharp rocks in a drainage ditch. Since then it's gotten very few additional scars.

The wheels are a no-name from Ebay. The seller I bought them from had them in a zillion different color combos. He's not selling them anymore, but there are others still selling them. Here's one that seems to have most of the flavors:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/4Pcs-2-2-Al....c100008.m2219

The wheels seem to be durable, but they're pretty heavy. Since you're happy with your 50lb rear axle, I'm guessing that's not going to concern you anyway. I'm trying to keep unsprung weight as low as possible on my Yeti to preserve the handling, so I didn't opt for this wheel style for that vehicle.

[iridebikes247]

Just in time for Christmas

Looking forward to watching this build come to life, thats a nice stock of parts you've got there.

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by Jim85IROC

It's Duratrax Candy Orange PC296 from a spray can. I backed it with Duratrax silver. I rushed and wound up with some sags, but fortunately they were mostly in spots that the vinyl covered up.

I don't have many hours on the Yeti yet, but so far it's holding up fine. I've used Duratrax paint on most of my vehicles, and even on my bashers that I beat mercilessly they seem to hold up. I broke the body on my Stampede in a million places and the paint underneath never chipped. The vinyl doesn't hold up real well to sharp rocks as i found out on my Bomber, and I doubt it would look good after a 30mph roof slide on a basher, but in the locations I put the vinyl on the Yeti, it should be fine. 90% of the marks in the vinyl on my Bomber happened on my first time out when I was in some sharp rocks in a drainage ditch. Since then it's gotten very few additional scars.

The wheels are a no-name from Ebay. The seller I bought them from had them in a zillion different color combos. He's not selling them anymore, but there are others still selling them. Here's one that seems to have most of the flavors:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/4Pcs-2-2-Al....c100008.m2219

The wheels seem to be durable, but they're pretty heavy. Since you're happy with your 50lb rear axle, I'm guessing that's not going to concern you anyway. I'm trying to keep unsprung weight as low as possible on my Yeti to preserve the handling, so I didn't opt for this wheel style for that vehicle.

Thanks for the link! I have seen those wheels before on eBay. They look great when mounted up.

The axle isn't light, but 50 pounds? In scale pounds maybe?

Originally Posted by iridebikes247

Just in time for Christmas

Looking forward to watching this build come to life, thats a nice stock of parts you've got there.

Thank you!

[JatoTheRipper]

Today is my day off from work. So I am about to resume building. Here's what happened last night.

The manual doesn't mention grease during the assembly of the transmission, but these are metal on metal gears so it's getting lubed whether it likes it or not. So far I've only applied this Vanquish grease, but I'm really liking it.

I tightened the screws on the transmission and it felt like it was binding. It had too much drag for sure. I loosened the screws and that freed up the transmission. I can't stand when you can't have plastic parts tight without causing binding. Up to this point I've been extremely happy with the quality of the kit, except maybe the two-piece suspension arms. But this shoddy transmission case sucks. Arctic Cat told me there's a metal case on eBay so I might have to check into that one eventually. Actually let me do it now... BRB AFK (only you old school internet nerds will know that last one! )



And I'm back! The aluminum trans case is made by Vs (chickity China) and it's $70 so I'm going to hold off for now and see if the stock unit (LOLz he said "unit") gives me any problems.

The battery door is interesting. It's a plastic piece on the outside and a metal plate goes inside and it slides out and in to lock and unlock the battery door.



The tab/handle for this battery door is held on by a screw. That screw hole is covered with foam. Kinda cheap, but the foam will also be there to protect the battery so that's good.



Battery door installed. The pivot screw for this door is the only screw that felt like it wouldn't get tight in the plastic. The plastic part has a cheap Axial feel about it. That is frustrating, but every other screw going into plastic gets tight with a solid stop. If you have never felt what "tight" feels like in quality plastics this kit would be a good example.

The battery box, again made of cheap Axial-like plastic, gets attached to this big, rear plastic piece with one screw.



But it also locks into place with these tabs. Small details like this are what impress me. This will be much sturdier than if it had only been held in place with that one screw.



More parts with odd "sprues". These lower, rear suspension mounts had rounded cube "sprues". Odd, but cool. But we won't be using those so the sprues can stay comfortable nestled in the part.



We gots upgrades...Boom!



All of this is mated to the chassis. You can see the Boom mounts hanging out the back like some shady bar rat.



And then the transmission gets mounted to the chassis.

[JatoTheRipper]

More of zee upgrades from Losi. This is the aluminium (isn't that how Brits spell it?)



Aluminium mount installed on zee aluminium chassis.



Then comes something else that strikes me very odd and something dumb that Axial would do. The steering bellcrank mounts to this little, plastic piece that's held to the chassis by one screw. Very odd. I'm not a fan, but I haven't heard any complaints about it. The underside of the chassis top plate also gets one of these and the bellcrank is sandwiched in between.



Speaking of bellcrank, that's a Losi aluminum (I got tired of needlessly adding syllables to wordseses) upgrade as well.



Bellcrank on the chassis with the links installed.



And the chassis as it sits now. You can probably tell my patience was wearing thin because my sentences got shorter as this post went on. I just wanna get back to my bench and build!



Oh and...let's rock! The ROC412 3100kv will go in this rig. But there's a problem that I didn't foresee. The pinion is for a ginormous (I think it's 5mm) motor shaft. The ROC isn't that. So now I have to find a pinion. And since I have to order a pinion I'm not sure if I want to stick with 12T.

[SSD]

Dont worry your bulkhead will be fine. As you said, all the other parts attached to it will hold it together when installed.

[mond]

If you're frustrated now, imagine how mad you'll be extracting that front diff to change fluids. I keep wanting to change mine but then I remember that open heart surgery is possibly less time consuming.

[JatoTheRipper]

Originally Posted by SSD

Dont worry your bulkhead will be fine. As you said, all the other parts attached to it will hold it together when installed.

I figured as much. I trust your products.

Originally Posted by mond

If you're frustrated now, imagine how mad you'll be extracting that front diff to change fluids. I keep wanting to change mine but then I remember that open heart surgery is possibly less time consuming.

I'm locking my diffs so that's a task I won't have to perform.

Oh and open heart surgery is much more painful. I've had three.

[2mtech]

Dang, Tim, you've been busy!

This kit looks like a strange amalgamation of solid, robust parts with not-so-quality, why-did-they-do-that pieces. Will be interesting what the final outcome will be, if the whole is in fact greater than the sum of the parts.

Great thread so far!

[JatoTheRipper]

As I get closer to the finish and as we move closer to Christmas the build is moving a little slower.

Up next we have aluminum upgrades from Losi - rear shock mounts and these other small pieces that came with. It took me a minute to figure out what those small pieces are for. More on that later.



Also have the Boom upper link mounts that were packaged together with the lower rear link mounts.



As I said above, it took me a minute to figure out what the small, aluminum pieces are used for. I thought they would be the sway bar mounts, but it didn't have a slot cut into them. So I compared the aluminum parts to the stock parts and it became clear. The small pieces go underneath the large piece to create one solid piece that mimics the stock, plastic piece. I understand this was done to cut costs, but it's a ghetto solution. Not a fan of this at all. There should at least have been a notch and tab in the mating parts to align them. No such thing so you have to eye it up and hold it while tightening the screw.



Once it's installed you can better see what I mean. It seems like it will work fine, but I would have been happier with one piece.

You can see the Boom upper link mount underneath of the Losi pieces.

Oh and for the lower swaybar mount you are stuck using the stock, plastic piece as you can see in the photo below where these are mounted to the chassis. The parts are too expensive for this IMO.



I will caution you that if you are reading this build before you start building a kit (probably a rare occurrence since Losi killed the kit ) you will want to ensure the nuts for the link do not fall out. I installed the left side mounts and then the nut fell out. So I had to disassemble it and I held the nut in place with the screw.



At this point I have to question if I'm building a Rock Rey or a Batmobile. I'd be fine with the Batmobile, especially if Kim Basinger was in it (SCHWING!!!). I dated myself with those last two things. Getting old sucks, kids. People tell you it sucks, but they don't warn you how bad it really does suck! Do not get old! You have been warned.

In this photo you can see that I've been boned by T-Bone again. The piece is formed wrong and the holes were countersunk on the wrong side. As a result, the top two holes do not line up with the chassis. I've had bad experience with T-Bone in the past, but I gave them another chance. I emailed them about the issue and haven't received word yet, but it is coming up on Christmas and I've read that they are Bible bangers. From what I've heard T-Bone has gotten their stuff together and they will stand good for it. To be continued.



Oh and one last thing. Pennsylvania is now a rain forest, for some odd reason, but it subsided enough to get a picture of the sexy Vanquish axle in natural light. SCHWIIING!!! There's that getting old thing again...

[iridebikes247]

Wow that axle looks fantastic with the red calipers.

[mewalsh100]

Indeed. The Baja Rey / Rock Rey front end is a pain in the a— to extract, install, work on.

[Thloftus]

No doubt the solution Losi used for the rear shock tower is less than ideal. They're not exactly cheap, seems fair to expect a better design or at least a straightforward copy of the plastic part in aluminum.

Small comfort (and possibly useless comment) - the Hot Racing versions don't appear to use the same two-piece design, although I don't know how the materials and other factors compare. I'll probably try them at some point ... I haven't used Hot Racing before, but will get to know them now since they're one of the few companies with aftermarket parts for the RR.

The T-Bone flipped holes are pretty weird. Haven't they been shipping this part for a while? Hopefully it's just a fluke and they fix it for you quickly.

The VP axle is sweet. I'd love to have one, but there'd be too much sobbing the first time I scratched it. Too bad no one makes a Kevlar cozy, Lol!

[JatoTheRipper]

Now that Christmas is over it's back to the Rock Rey.

My Robinson Racing reducer sleeve came in to make the stock, 5mm bore pinion fit on my Tekin ROC412 with the 3.2mm/.125" motor shaft. To be honest, I don't think I even knew these things existed probably because I don't ever remember having the need for one.



It, literally, is just a sleeve with about a quarter of it cut out for the grub screw.



You can see the reducer sleeve inside the pinion in this photo. Everything fits together nicely. Hopefully that sleeve stays in place.



Now that the pinion fits we must acquit, err, I mean continue. Let's install the motor.

In this photo you can see the pinion meshing up with the transmission gears lube with Vanquish grease.

I have to say I've never lubed a spur or pinion gear before, but I've also never used a metal spur gear.



Here is the motor cover. You have to put this adhesive piece of foam on the motor cover. I'm sure this is an attempt to keep debris (pronounced duh-briss) out of the transmission gears, but it is a feeble attempt and I don't see it working well. Hokey engineering here.



Here is the motor cover installed.

The bottom loaded motor is great for easy access to gear changes and such, but for day to day use I'm not a fan. You can see relatively large gaps around the motor cover. Those gaps, coupled with the foam, means I see a lot of dirt and water getting through these gaps and into the chassis and transmission. What were they thinking?



The front screw goes into the aluminum servo mount on the other side. This is a good thing and an added bonus of the aluminum servo mount.