Tommy R's Yokomo DRB RWD Drifter

[Tommy R]

Hey y'all,

So after 2-3 failed attempts at enjoying all-wheel-drive drifting (and hating it), back in August I picked up an Eagle TT02-FRD. It was pretty great and I realized RWD is the only way to go for me! But it took quite a bit of tweaking to get the suspension working well. Frankly, this should be expected for an all aluminum/carbon chassis at that low price point. Then I hesitantly sold it when the new Eagle TT02-RWD came out. After some more work, I got it working very well, too. But after being exposed to the high quality kits that my friends were running, I felt it was time to step up my game a bit. I decided I wanted a quality car, but I also wanted a chassis that looked really nice. And no, I never thought I'd say that about an RC car.

I really wanted a D-Like RE-R after giving it a lot of thought, but they were out of production (at the time), not to mention the price (~$700 USD for a roller!) was going to be a factor. So I opened up my search to a variety of brands, but wanted to keep with something that had good potential, quality components, and hopefully a half-way reasonable price tag on the used market. The Yokomo DIB was heavily on my mind....or maybe the new YD4? Then a friend told me about a Yokomo DRB someone nearby was selling. After some discussion a deal was made and the DRB was mine.

It's got quite few upgrades done to it such as Wrap Up Next suspension bits and quite a bit of Overdose parts, such as damper parts, spur mount, servo mount/arm, and front bumper support. It even has Carb-D steering wiper extensions. Needless to say I was pretty excited and here it is...








So I had two main goals immediately.... First I needed to get the parts required to get this chassis together 100%. Secondly, I needed to start sourcing electronics.

I've never been concerned about color matching or coordinating my electronics, but I guess I drank the Kool-Aid and now I want this chassis to look very sharp with or without a body on it! So after a ton of research I decided to go all Sanwa. But that ended up going much further than I expected and the next thing I knew, I was selling my Futaba radio for a Sanwa MT4S! In addition, I ordered a new Sanwa SRG-BLS servo and got a good deal on a used Sanwa Super Vortex Type D ESC. The gyro (for now) is a G-Force model. Batteries are 4200 mah Nanotech shorties.

So while my wallet was trying to cool off from those purchases (ouch), I started putting together a gameplan for the chassis. I ordered up some spur gears (going 64 pitch this time), got some Yokomo ball studs, got some bearings for the belt support, but there was one item I was having a problem with......the Carb-D wiper arms. Let me explain...

Here you can see the wiper arm installed. Obviously, one screw isn't going to support that arm sufficiently so something must be done.


Why not just install a longer screw that would extend beyond the arm, right? Well, it's a weird Yokomo-only kingpin so that isn't really possible.


And it turns out that kingpin is not a metric thread! Best I can tell it's a 4-40 thread, which makes NO sense to me whatsoever. So I drilled it out for a 3mm screw, used a thin bushing sleeve to keep things aligned properly, and bolted everything together. Should be good to go now, right?


Nope. Tighten it down and the steering binds badly. Loosen it up some and it has way too much slop. So I reached out to Carb-D and ordered their Version 2 of the wiper arms. They will also incorporate a tie rod so I'll be able to adjust Ackerman. I'm waiting on the parts to arrive, but here's a pic Carb-D sent me:


I also noticed that the rear ball stud was cutting into the hub carrier so I relocated it to the next hole over to prevent further damage. Not sure why they used a stepped design like that?


Nonetheless, with everything installed the steering throw isn't phenomenal. The wheels (10mm offset Scale Dynamics which are more like a 7mm offset) rub the lower arm at full lock. Looks like I may need to look into wider offset wheels or I'm told running more scrub radius may help me out.


Started working on the wiring. Picked up some blue Tetsujin wire, some wire clamps to keep things tidy, and began sorting out the locations for the electronics. The motor is the same 10.5 Speed Passion I ran in my Eagles, but I'll likely pick up something new in the near future. Thinking Acuvance, but am open to suggestions!




Then I got all my new wires cut/formed and got the receiver and gyro installed, too. Could be a bit neater, but I'm pleased with it for now.




Now I'm waiting on some items to arrive, such as the Carb-D V2 extensions, but I picked up some new stealth body mounts and here you can get an idea where I'm going with the body on this one.....

[Tommy R]

I ran into some issues with the G-Force gyro with my Sanwa ESC when I set it up to control the gyro via the transmitter. So a Sanwa gyro is on order. Only non-Sanwa electronic item on it now is the motor. Ha! The Carb-D V2 extended wipers made it in this week. Hope to get it going by the weekend.

I've also been working on the body. All the trim is painted and I've been building a roof rack for it.

[Tommy R]

Thanks! I wish the bike were a little larger scale. Kinda looks like a kid's bike on there, but I haven't found anything that's just a bit larger.

[STANG KILLA SS]

not sure if your looking for opinions, but ive never liked that rack or accessories on top your body. its just too Euro and Cheeky drifter looking.
i mean the only way you'd ever see that setup on a car in real life would be at some Stance car show or something. certainly not on a drift car on track.
i think a simple bar style empty luggage rack would look better.
http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/73...a2f508faec.jpg
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j1...mber/001-1.jpg
http://chevynova.com/uploads/1964%20...on%20400-7.jpg
http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/73...440dbe496d.jpg

my useless .2c

[Tommy R]

I hear ya, but being an old wagon it's not exactly intended to be the typical drifter. I'd have done another S13 or something if I wanted conventional. I don't mind my drifters being a bit more on the "stance" side of things, as opposed to a dedicated or competition drift car. The variety of the styles is one of the things I really enjoy about this niche of the hobby! But just in case I don't like it, that's why I'm mounting it with magnets so it can easily be removed when I want.

[CM9000]

sweet build! trinity d4 can with the purple endbell is a lighter motor so you might have to add a little bit of weight up front for better steer grip, but they are the best motors ive ever ran. I have a 13.5 with stock rotor in my m-06 and I have a high torque rotor in my 13.5 that I race with in 2wd sct mod class. zippy little cans they are!

and care to tell us how much you have in this slider? id like to know

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by crawlingman9000

sweet build! trinity d4 can with the purple endbell is a lighter motor so you might have to add a little bit of weight up front for better steer grip, but they are the best motors ive ever ran. I have a 13.5 with stock rotor in my m-06 and I have a high torque rotor in my 13.5 that I race with in 2wd sct mod class. zippy little cans they are!

and care to tell us how much you have in this slider? id like to know

Thanks! Actually, the Speed Passion motor is doing pretty well. I finally got the car up and running over the weekend and it's doing very nicely considering it still needs some tuning work. Lack of power certainly isn't an issue!

I bought the roller used for about $500, plus the electronics.

[Tommy R]

So I got the Version 2 Carb-D extended steering wipers installed over the weekend.


It has provisions to remove the fixed, stock bellcrank link and replace it with an adjustable turnbuckle so now I can tweak the Ackerman.


So far, the car is working quite well and hasn't been given a true alignment yet.

And then yesterday I finally finished up the painting. As mentioned earlier, the roof rack is removable and held on with magnets. Likewise for the rear bumper, it's held on with magnets, too, and may get yanked off on track if I screw up. The color is going to be a "team color" for our local group and we'll also have windshield banners so we'll be recognized as a team at out of town events.

[danmac]

So with a cs car why are you running a gyro

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by danmac

So with a cs car why are you running a gyro

What makes you think it's a CS car?

[rally racer #75]

the car looks cool!
will you put a interior?

[Shinjari]

Tommy that wagon looks great. Super detailed.

Not that I want you to screw up on the track but a short video clip of that bumper "ripping" off from getting too close to a wall would be pretty cool haha.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by rally racer #75

the car looks cool!
will you put a interior?

Thanks! I've debated about an interior and the short answer is "not likely". That being said, I'd like to add a simple 4 point roll bar that'd be visible through the back doors. Also, when you get close, it's really easy to look through the rear windows and see all the way to the ground. So I may make up some sort of basic "luggage tray" or something just to block off the area a bit more. Maybe I'll put a little RC car on it, too. Ha!

But no, it won't get a full interior with driver or anything like that. At least, not for a while. LOL

Originally Posted by Shinjari

Tommy that wagon looks great. Super detailed.

Not that I want you to screw up on the track but a short video clip of that bumper "ripping" off from getting too close to a wall would be pretty cool haha.

Thanks!! That kinda happened at RC Garage in Houston the other night! The bumper is held on by two magnets and one side of the bumper got pulled away and dropped while the other side held on. So the bumper was just sort of hanging all cockeyed. It was great!

I did get some short video of it in action, but it's nothing special so I wasn't going to bother uploading it to youtube or anything. I'll try to get some soon, though....

[danmac]

Originally Posted by Tommy R

What makes you think it's a CS car?

To be honest idk what made me think that I really don't my bad.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by danmac

To be honest idk what made me think that I really don't my bad.

LOL! No worries, man, it's all good.

[djjiz]

Get to drive it yet? Locked diff?

Had a FXX-D build going but chickened out. Sticking with CS chassis for now but always wonder what it would have been like.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by djjiz

Get to drive it yet? Locked diff?

Had a FXX-D build going but chickened out. Sticking with CS chassis for now but always wonder what it would have been like.

Yeah, I did... It's not quite there yet, but it's getting better. Had a bit of a setback last night and testing didn't go so well for some reason. I'm running a spool right now, but have the remaining parts on order to put a ball diff in it. I've got some recent pics to upload and will post them here once I do...

By the way, I absolutely hated AWD drifting. It never felt right at all. I find RWD drifting to be WAY easier and it performs more like a real car would.

[djjiz]

All i see is crab walking with local cars. Keep telling them to put a gear or ball diff in.

Started with a Sprint 2 and got pretty good really fast but peer pressure got the best of me. Now pilot a MS01D with an 8.5t motor and a .04 speed servo and it's a nightmare. Relearning was the hardest part. CS was like putting training wheels on after learning how to ride a bike.

Keep the pics coming. I'd update my thread but uploading to photobusket is harder than looking at your car.

[Tommy R]

Originally Posted by djjiz

All i see is crab walking with local cars. Keep telling them to put a gear or ball diff in.

Started with a Sprint 2 and got pretty good really fast but peer pressure got the best of me. Now pilot a MS01D with an 8.5t motor and a .04 speed servo and it's a nightmare. Relearning was the hardest part. CS was like putting training wheels on after learning how to ride a bike.

Keep the pics coming. I'd update my thread but uploading to photobusket is harder than looking at your car.

In my experience, crabbing is often tied to way too much KPI. I and others in the clubs I run with have experienced crabbing, but reducing the KPI helped a ton and also increased vehicle speed through the corners. Big improvement!

A couple pics from RC Garage in Houston:




And a couple unfortunate shots of me transitioning, but it looks like I'm just driving in a straight line. LOL!

[Tommy R]

I think I figured out a main reason why the car wasn't working as well as I'd hoped. The servo had very little throw for some reason. After talking about it with a buddy of mine, he suggested bypassing the gyro and I had full throw again. I forgot I'd adjusted the dial on the gyro a while back and it turns out it reduced my steering throw. I thought it would've adjusted the gain, but whatever... I increased it and my steering throw is back to normal again.

I'm also playing around quite a bit with the front end.....KPI, Ackerman, toe, camber, etc. It's looking like I'll need some deeper offset wheels soon to get it where I want it to be. Shouldn't be a problem to fit them.....soon.