I Cannot Believe I've Owned 3 of These!!!

[alexchen86]

Well when the HPI Mini Trophy Desert Truck came out with the original TSA Motorsports livery I had to have it. I dropped a basic VXL system in it ran it for about a few months but could never get it dialed in right. The suspension was always out of tune and the trailing arm rear end just complicated things more.

In the end it was just like their Cup Racer attempt. Sure it looks great scale wise but the trade off is the lack of performance until you drop another $200-$300 on a better chassis, shocks, steering rack etc...

Well I actually missed the damn Mini Trophy Truck just because the way it handled felt like a real trophy truck....plush suspension and just all over the place with power. On dirt it was okay but on parking lot asphalt....better throw some touring car tires on!

So I sold both of them with minor mods and gutted out all my electronics. Now after building so many rally cars, short course rigs, KOH rigs, Ultra 4 rigs, I am learning a lot on handling suspension tuning.

I decided to give it a go. I bought the Ivan Stewart MTDT this time haha. Bought the Ford body as a back up.

Scaled it out as much as I could inside so that it would be protected. Still deciding whether to put the radiator in the rear or a fuel cell....or a brake light bar.

Running Gear/Mods:
1. Hitec 645MG Waterproofed Years Ago (drilled a bunch of small holes in the chassis for water to escape the servo compartment)
2. Castle Sidewinder SV3 Waterproof Version (Hidden under the first spare tire)
3. Castle 1410 3800kv 4Pole
Stock Gearing for Now and I am so paranoid of the 48p and the pinion angles going into both differentials are CRAZY!....I bought a ton of spare parts including slippers, spurs, differential cases, spider gears, who knows how long these parts will still be around loll!)
4. HPI Aluminum Hexes all around
5. Stainless Screw Kit All Around
6. RC Gearheads Waterproof Trailbar (had to mount it inside for fear of a bad roll over destroying it!)
7. Custom (3) 5mm white LEDs on the day bar
8. Front: Junfac XO Aeration Adjustable Shocks 85mm
9, Rear: Stock HPI MTDT Shock Moved forward and modded a Traxxas Big Bore to fit the back trailing arm.
10. Raised the stock body mounts with aluminum spacers to accommodate all the extra items I added in order to fit properly and safely.

Final touch will be aluminum exhaust pipes I have on hand just need to cut them and age them a little.

The cool thing about this truck is the indy rear axle is the same width as a standard SCX10 axle so if the rear end goes I can always drop in an scx10 solid rear axle with the trailing arms! Then it would be a more commonly designed trophy rig!

Lmk what yall think!








Electronics:



Beefed up servo saver hope it holds. Also CA'd a lot of the play in the steering rack....threw on a cut off aluminum servo horn as well. Still a little bit of play but much better.


Exit holes for water and sand:

[tokdl]

Looks outstanding!

[alexchen86]

Looks is one thing...performance? We will see this weekend lol.

[going2fast]

i just sold mine .. same thing .. sold the old ones a long time ago .. thought i missed it .. found one and built it to the hills ... sold it asap because no matter how good they look they suck

[Fantuzzi]

I also never sold my MTDT, even if I was comparably disapointed with the performance. I think the overall weight is the killer on this truck. It weighs more than my SCTE.

Beside some scale and drivetrain mods, I improved the suspension to get more travel, but drivability got worse before it got better.
Where this car really shines is on wide sweepers with fine gravel and no jumps.

So how is your modded MTDT going?

[alexchen86]

ha its done and I just completely waterproofed all electronics but I doubt I'd run it in deep water. I really just did it to run it in the rain and light mud and ease of hosing it down and drying it via air compressor and WD-40.

I'm keeping it more as a show piece...no ones going to pay anywhere near 250-300 for it especially since this rig was a flop in the performance sector. Look what happened to the MTDT Flux lol.

Parts are going to be harder and harder to find so I purchased a few sets of complete diff gears, cases, and slippers. I don't know why they designed the drive system so odd especially with weak plastic trailing arms that roll with any turn, suspension that was way too soft giving it more body roll, and to top it off two different diffs and due to the tight space inside the ridiculous cage the driveline is obviously losing efficiency due to its odd bends.

Then they cover it up within unbreathable but super scale cockpit just to make everything hotter underneath. Maybe someday I will really tear into it and see what I can do.