exceed rc maxstone 16 upgrades and tuning?

[braq]

Another electrical "upgrade"

on the Tx mainboard the battery leads connect to a simple 7805 voltage regulator.



The black square in the middle (on the border) of the board is the voltage regulator, here 9.6V get stepped down to 5V, seems to drive all the components on the board.

From the 8 x 1.2V cells (9.6V) it generates 5 V, basically wasting half of the energy and converting it into heat. I have no idea why the heck they have you put 8 cells into the Tx but tested with a 6 V battery pack and the signal transmission to the Rx works just fine. Back in the days the FM transmitters would require more voltage to actually power the HF portion but with 2.4 Ghz a lot of the systems actually run on the 5V level (there is more in depth and also a hack for a low-drop 5V regulator on the turnigy 9CH radio all over the web). The low voltage alert (red and green LED flashing) will kick in, but as long as the 7805 is able to deliver 5V the system works. If it was a more sophisticated radio I'd bother to find to alter the low voltage alert, but for now I just ignore it.
All you need is an alternative power source (5 cell NiMh or 2s lipo) and connect them instead of the 8 cell battery tray.

A tiny 5 cell NiMh pack with 600mAh to replace the bulky 8 cells tray

[braq]

Bought 4 sets and made 3 rigs out of them;

One is running a Bruder Unimog Cab and has 4 WS, the next is a 8x8 using two kits and some extra axle halves for the througput axles and I'll start with the K5 Blazer

Converted the rear axle to 4 link


Replaced the stock servo with a standard size servo



Made brackets for LED running lights and red/blue flashers



Strapped 2200mAh Lipo cells to the sides for extended runtime



Side, the wheels are from the Mini-T. With the stock gearbox it is really slow now (smaller diameter), so now a cheap brushless motor with 4300KV is used and it is back to the speed of walking



The front lights actually have 5 warm white LEDs on one chip



Front



Red LEDs flash two times very short and then alternate to the blue



I programmed a microcontroller to evaluate the on-off from the CH3 switch. If the toggle switch is pressed once the white LEDs will flash, pressed twice turns on the running lights (red LEDs in the rear and only 2 of the 5 LEDs on the front white LED chip), pressed three times will engage the flasher, here is a vid of it.

ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting

[mytuner2002]

Braq, where can I get a microprocessor and how do I go about programming it? Thought using servo internals and hooking up motor leads to lights but they just strobe can't control it either, could what I tried work and im going about it wrong?

[idealconceptz]

Hey braq im really interested in this 3rd channel for my lights is there any way you can tell me what chip,circuit board or switch u used to wire the third channel to make the lights change and were i might be able to find it???...by the way ur blazer is legit that thing looks damn good!!! Great job on those lights!

[idealconceptz]

So mytuner and I took another forest river run wanted to post some pics waterproofing was a lil sketch stock esc didnt make it but all in all good day!!!

[braq]

Thanks for the comments I really appreciate it.

Excuse me for cluttering a thread about maxstone 16 upgrades with general electronics , at some point it may be better to move it to the appropiate section.

I am using an Atmel AVR, Attiny 25 currently


Here is a bit more about these microcontrollers
Atmel AVR - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The upper version (PDIP) is really simple, Vcc (5V via the Rx) on Pin 8 and GND to Pin4.
PB0 to PB5 can be either inputs or outputs. I use PB2 as input and with the internal clock evaluate wether the channel is on center (1.5ms) or in the vicinity of the end points (1.0 and 2.0ms). A little logic routine counts how many times these end points are pressed within a time frame of 1 sec.

One time to left, turn signal left
One time to right, turn signal right
Two times left, hazard flasher
Two times right, headlights
Three times left, strobe LEDs

Some Pics



AVR isp mkII programmer (USB to computer), 8pin housing and Attiny25 in foreground



Soldered on board, only needs resistors for the LEDs (there is a max current it can deliver tough) and some capacitor(s) for stabilization, yellow is signal from Rx, grey Vcc, black GND



Connector for LED pigtails added, finally underside plasti-dipped and it goes into shrink tubing


The video

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cheers,

braq

[idealconceptz]

Good stuff Braq!! I really appreciate it!!! I can tell this isn't your first walk around the electronics! Hopefully ill have some new posts pretty quick just got my new servo, LED lights and hopefully some of these pointers will have me strobing and flashing down the trails!! by the way anyone know what scale or type of bumpers we can make fit this blazer body???? A lil fabrication is definitely on the agenda but I want that full trail look for this 1/18 scale body any help is great thanks!!!

[e_w_b]

Got some new 1.9 tsl superswampers. These tires are HUGE! they are the best tire i have used yet. Highly recommend these if anyone is planning on some new treads. I see that alot of you are finding scale bodies, like braq, idealconcepts, and mytuner. the only thing i have found that looks like they would work is the 1:18 scale proline bodies. If any of you know where to get good scale bodies please post the links!!

[sick86burban]

for bodies,measure the wheelbase,and go to town with a tape measure at swap meets,thrift stores,garage sale ect.

[e_w_b]

Here is the difference in the tires.

[sedative]

They are a little bigger.. Are you using the stock axles/gears? Curious how they hold up with the bigger meats.

[e_w_b]

Yes the gears and axles are stock. I just split the axles and packed them with grease when i first got it. I just rand three packs through it today on rocks, dirt, sand and they did fine. Thats with the fireball 370 too.

[mytuner2002]

from my search I've found that anything other than a lexan body needs to be 1/14 or 1/12 scale. amazon has a couple like range rover, escalade, mercedes g wagon that are around $40, I've also found a land rover defender and lr3 but they are like $70. Sedative is right a measuring tape is going to be your best friend just get the wheel base right. Mind you I spent $40 to get my body and then another 20 on scale accessories and my wheel base is still a little short. Sorry bud can't tell you where I found chewy's rig but, because of the non scale wheel base mine is 1/14 scale suburban cheap RC car that was taken apart for just the hard body, came with real head and tail lights though which was a huge plus for me in my quest for a mini scaler, I have my regrets about not finding one with interior but it was hard enough to find one I knew almost no one would have. the ones on amazon have head and tail lights too with interior. Fyi my suburban was way easier to paint vs idealconceptz lexan blazer he had tons of masking and only got one shot at it, on the other hand if I didn't like just painted over it.

[mytuner2002]

I want to build a trailer either a tear drop trailer, pop up tent trailer, or a camper. Something to complete the trail look. Anyone have any suggestions on how to go about it I have started building a teardrop trailer but have reached a point where I'm not sure if its what I want so probably going to start over. Also we put frenzy 370's in and all we've had is damage and destruction I have a novak mongoose and idealconceptz has stock esc #2 both our epa's are at like 40% and we are on nitrorcx trying to determine what's going to break on our next outing, between the 2of us we've grenaded a transmission, broke 4 drive shafts, countless C hubs, front diff. Almost every component in the drivetrain.

[e_w_b]

wow snapping all kinds of shit up, but thanks for the info about the bodies, ill just keep my eyes out for one. until then i might get the proline rockstar crawler body. So is the frenzy 370 more powerful than the fireball? I was thinking about getting a frenzy to try it a few times but didn't know if the pinion, and size of the can would fit in the truck.

[mytuner2002]

ewb, it will fit with minimal fab you just have to elongate the motor mount holes do it while pinion is installed to get gear mesh right, I used stock pinion, but you have the cutting board trans mount mine is stock, don't think it should matter much. frenzy vs fireball not sure if its more powerful or not was the only thing LHS had in stock when I bought my esc. Idealconceptz's chick has the rockstar body there's a picture a couple pages back, its cool looking but its tiny dude.

[rampa202]

Many People will hate this, but I converted my Exceed MaxStone 16 into a 2WD brushless, diecast metal, WWII Ford searchlight truck. You might ask why do this to a crawler, and the answer is correct gear ratio. I would have prefered 4WD but the front end of the crawler was way too wide.

Stock front-end on the diecast truck


I remade the front end out of brass so that it could connect to the Exceed suspension







I made a new bracket for the servo mount





The servo was positioned more toward the middle of the chasis




I had to make a servo arm as well as the ball link connector. I was happy to see that the stock Exceed servo had metal gear(s).



The Exceed wheel and tires are twice as big as the ones from the Diecast model. The stock Exceed wasn't that fast to start with, and now it was going to be even slower, so I ordered some medium speed brushless motors from HobbyPartz.com $10 each



The Diecast model was so heavy I had to bolster the springs, so I used 2 springs, one soft and one hard on each of the 4 shocks.



Here is the chasis with the diecast truck wheels, still with the brushed motor, the truck body in the backgroud. I had to widen the frame of the truck to accomodate the width of the Exceed chasis



Here is the truck body and bed on the chasis. I had to cut out the back of the cab and the front of the bed to fit the back half of the chasis



Here is a cover I made. I will represent the electrical generator for the searchlight truck



The light I'm going to use is very heavy and the bed is mostly flimsy plastic, so I reinforced it with some aluminum plate above and below the bed, sandwiching the plastic



Here is the brushless motor I used. Made by Exceed, but not intended for this crawler. It's 20mm diameter kv 3600 which I'm going to run with a 3S lipo, so It should be faster than stock.



Here's the truck after a sloppy panzer gray paint job (Supposed to be German Ford) You can see the brushless esc (18 amp from Hobbyking) at the top and the brushless motor at the bottom.



This shows the completed truck with the light on the back. The light is on a pan/tilt mount controlled by two servos, and the light on-off is on a radio controlled switch




The battery fits very snugly under the hood



A video if you are interested, shows a bit too much body roll. The light works ok, later I added a third inner spring to the rear shocks and this helped

Highly Modified Exceed Crawler - 2WD Brushless Diecast Ford Searchlight Truck - YouTube

Russ

[e_w_b]

The TSL SuperSwampers snapped all the gears in the tranny. axles are still surviving though. wish rcx just sold the gears not the whole damn gearbox..

[sedative]

That searchlight is awesome. Very impressive build you have there.

This is just a suggestion, well more of a "what I would do", but have you thought about taking a piece of aluminum tape and putting it on the end of the battery to help hide the fact that it's a battery?

Other than that you just need to find a way keep the doors closed during use but still operational and I would call that perfect.

Nice work.

[braq]

Wow,

nice truck!

As for bodies, I like the Losi MRC or Exceed 1/16 for actually accomodating a lot better the cabs I am interested in than with TLT axles.

Almost anything from Bruder Toys (except their Wrangler or Landrover) will look pretty good on the 1/16 chassis.

Here is one with the Unimog