Fun with Tiny Cars

[2mtech]

Originally Posted by JatoTheRipper

We just race in parking lots for fun with a couple of guys - nothing formal. There are some on-road tracks about an hour away in two different directions, but I've never raced there. I do have a Tamiya semi (one of the vehicles I'm dreading painting) and I'd love to race it, but I don't know of a local series.

Sounds like fun anyway! I have parking lots a lot closer than trails!

If painting doesn't do it Tamiya decals will make you hate your life. There's usually a ton of them and they are almost never precut!

Long as they're not water slide...if they're water slide, it's no way Jose!!

[Shinchu]

BUT
one can argue tamiya makes the best bodies in the biz!
So its worth the pita imo. I mask off each color for transparrent painted taillights. I have a bit of OCD for bodies ;)
I mean, tamiya actually got thier start by motorizing static models so... I appreciate they still try as hard as they can for scale accuracy in RC.
Just wish they would get on the ball for scale chassis options!
I'm looking at you, on road and cc01!

[2mtech]

I just got done cutting out all the decals for the BOM, including window frames (do you hear me? WINDOW FRAMES!!), so I ain't skeert.

[Shinchu]

You didnt PAINT the window frames?! Pfff.. Amateur... ;)

[2mtech]

Originally Posted by Shinchu

You didnt PAINT the window frames?! Pfff.. Amateur... ;)

I'll take that. The only way I've ever painted window trim was cutting the overspray film as masking, and THAT sure wasn't happening with the flimsy Gmade film.

I managed to fawk up my BOM fuel cell yesterday, so obviously I still need more technique refinement before attempting any tiny cars.

[OSRC]

Impulse "Ebay app while on the toilet" buy...Another M06. Great shape, basically new an built. Not sure what I want to do with it yet. Pulled apart for some hop ups that are on the way.

[2mtech]

What's that body, an Opel?

[durok]

That's an Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTA (gorgeous little thing):

[2mtech]

Would've never thought Alfa from the half profile.

[Shinchu]

Omg another one of my lotto dream cars...
Nice choice!
Here I am sitting on my duff not doing anything to raise money to toss a couple hobbywing esc into my other on road cars...
I guess a newborn will derail a bit from hobbies haha

Nice living vicariously through you all in the meantime!
To quote doc brown... I think after the holidays.... "You're gonna see some serious shit." ;)

[OSRC]

The body came without a grill or any body detail parts. Amazingly, I had a grill in my spare parts box! Just waiting on an RCMart delivery. They were blowing out M06 parts, so i picked up a bunch on the cheap.

[OSRC]

I built this car a long time ago for Scale4x4's drift build-off. Being time sensitive, it ended up functional if a bit dodgy in spots to make the deadline. Here's a quick poorly shot video of it whipping around.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPQz_SYY-Sg&t=95s

I put a few battery packs through circling around the driveway and then put it on the shelf for a few years. Well, 8 years to be exact (Really?? Seems like yesterday, holy moly) I decided it needed a rebuild to get it back up and running as well as do some modifications to the dodgy parts.

Here's the car in it's former state. It's a Nikko 959 body on top of a shortened widened TA02 chassis. A Tamiya 959 is on my want list, though it's WAY out of my price range. Plus, I'd be scared to death to drive it. I thought this was the next best thing. I don't feel too bad about sliding this one all around, spares are all over and cheap, and while it's not super detailed, it looks pretty good cruising around. I've robbed some parts off it over the years, but it's mostly intact though in rough shape.

I'm not much for flashy paint schemes. Not sure what, if anything I want to do to the body. Love the color. No wheels, no shocks, and I cleaned off 8 years worth of dust for the pics.




Chassis is custom 6061 that I painted "carbon" ...Seemed like a good idea at the time. It's about 30cm shorter than a standard short tub to fit the WB of the Nikko body.


I've got serious stress cracks all over the chassis. The front gearbox was actually breaking in two. The rear was in good shape, though I had painted it silver and it's not aging well color-wise. Wondering if the paint helped it survive? No cracks anywhere on it. Interesting... Anyway, these bits have led a hard life in many vehicles, I can retire them with honor.




Some new silver gear cases just showed up! Time to get wrenching...

[Shinchu]

that... is RAD. how did you widen it?
any pics from the old thread on the other forum?
i would LOVE to build a hard body drifter. i had one in mind but cant figure out the exact scale. looking for a 1:10 AE86. Jada made some but i think they were 1:8 and 1:24. was going to use a CC01 for the chassis, for solid rear axle scale accuracy.
might change it up and hack an MST FXXD in half, hang a yota axle off the back somehow.

[OSRC]

Front gearbox is swapped over. Has a one way ilo the gear diff and a custom output for the center shaft. I cut up a TL01 center shaft and modded it to use a TLT outdrive.


I gotta say I love the pearl effect on these silver gearboxes. They are absolutely gorgeous! Not sure if it's intentional or not, but they look great!

Suspension bits back on. Nothing fancy here, just standard TA parts. I did use FF01 lower arms, not sure if they are shared with TA01/02's or not. These gave me a nice width up front that filles the tire in the fenders.


Added a few tricks to the front shock tower to help prevent future cracking. I drilled out the body mount holes and shock mounts with a 3mm bit. I'll attach parts with through bolts ilo threading them into the plastic which should take some of the stress off..... In theory anyway! Drilled out the camber link holes with a 4mm bit and put in some brass inserts. They now take the brunt of the stress. I've done these little tricks with various TA chassis along the way and it seems to help quite a bit with the stress cracks.


Mounted to the front gearbox. It's hard to tell, but I shaved down the upper shock mounts as well and use a through bolt with an aluminum spacer. Those shock standoffs are usually the first part to start cracking. Not here!


Some 3Racing shocks found their way on and the front is good to go!

[OSRC]

Time to move on to the rear. This gearbox was in pretty good shape. I originally painted it with a metallic silver and it's help up well. But I wanted to swap it out to match the front. The shock mount was badly cracked and had to go in any case.


I had the aluminum/nylon spur in here apparently, I swapped it over to the full nylon setup. Plenty strong enough imo, I'm not sure what that aluminum gear's purpose is. More strength for buggies? I don't know. In any case, I'm sticking with the buggy spur for now to give plenty of torque, though I have a speed tuned spur here should I ever need more wheelspeed.


Bolted back together...Rear diff is locked with a second set of spider gears and has a custom output to match the front. Can really see that pearl marbling effect on this one. I'd love to have an entire chassis made of this plastic!


Same anti-cracking mods done here, and shaved off the body mounts since I use a custom setup for the 959 body. All links are adjustable ilo fixed.


And ready to go with the body mount and shocks installed!

[OSRC]

And onto the chassis.. This is where a lot of the quick and dirty fab work came into play. It drove, it was square and solid, but not quite as functional as I'd like. Note the "carbon" paint...it came out pretty decent actually! (As long as you aren't looking too closely at it.)


I spent a ton of time removing the paint and refinishing the aluminum..


Even made a battery tray of sorts to match


...Then I ended up tossing it in the trash. Figured I could do better than that, so I baked on it for a while and eventually had an idea.

Enter the Super TA. Carbon long chassis with a TB02 suspension grafted on. Great project, handled incredibly well, but the wheelbase was stuck at 267mm. I'd have to cut a new chassis for it to fit proper touring bodies. Fun project, but I have plenty of other std. wheelbase TA's to play with. So I started tearing it down. I'll move that cool suspension somewhere else eventually.


The donor car being carefully stripped down.


Ah...that's what I needed!


Designed a new lower deck using the carbon chassis as a template. Can see how much shorter it is compared to the long chassis. This will be wider than the previous effort and use all the standard mount points..should be a much better chassis overall. Really, this is what I should have done in the first place.


From rough cut to finished chassis. No fancy CAD or machine work here, just a man on a mission with a jigsaw, drill press and a few rusty files. I added a few holes out back for motor cooling. Sanded it down to 800 grit in a swirl pattern and called it good. May spray it black eventually once everything is test fitted.


Just hope it fits!! Spent a ton of time keeping everything square

[OSRC]

Got all the bits transferred over to the new chassis. This is much more solid than the rubbish I had originally - glad I made the swap. Found an aluminum bearing steering set in my stash as well - much less slop then the usual bent linkage setup.*


Cut an upper plate to match, again using the original carbon piece as a template. The shorter than stock propshaft was a dogbone I had in my spares box that I cut in half, then press fit into a piece of steel tubing. The press fit was pretty solid (gently used a BFH and carefully tapped it together) but I brazed the ends in anyway just to be safe. It's very solid, it doesn't get taxed much on drift duty, but I'm sure it will hold up for street running too should I ever go that route. Very happy with it.


I moved the battery posts off to one side to offset the motor weight on the opposite side. I can run a shorty pack now, and leaves a lot of room to mount electronics. I did drill the holes for a standard size pack as well just in case. It's good to have options!


Really starting to come together now!

[OSRC]

One of my winter projects. A little birthday present for myself..I had one of these MF01X's before, and sold it off. Kinda wish I didn't. Pretty cool little car, and very versatile for various different builds since Tamiya is the king of mix and match. Picked this one up at Tower during Black Friday, and ordered a bunch of parts from all over. Planning to build up as an on road speedster. Also painting and giving my M06's a makeover too, got quite a few mini bodies here to mess with.

[Brake Weight]

Banggood has some Tamiya size lexan bodies for a fair price now.

[2mtech]

Santa brought me s'nthin fun...



Anything i HAVE to get before diving in?