AZ Blue TF2....yet another!!

[BoostCrzy]

Very nice build!....looks like it will handle some pretty rough terrain.

[Robs07junk]

Sir , Your Rig Lots Killer Now With What You've Done !

[DougJ]

The tan color looks great on it, and I love the stance. nice work

[lowpro35]

My suspension setup in the last set of photos was as follows:

In the front I was running the RC4WD Dual Spring 80mm Scale Black Shocks (Ver 2), I had them adjusted to sit about 1/4" from bottoming out. The reason was to get it to sit as low as possible without it being bottomed out all the time.

In the back I was using some stock SCX10 shocks with two pairs of the stock small springs stacked and the adjustment ring run all the way down. You can see them in this pic.




I recently ordered and received the RC4WD Rock Krawler RRD Emulsion Scale Dual Spring Shocks (90mm). I inteded to use them to replace the rear with something a bit more scale/functional. I went ahead and installed them and quickly noticed I had binding. The lower cup(with the appropriate spacing away from the axle) was hitting on the 4-link truss. It was stopping the shock about 1/2" from full compression. Having the SCX10 shocks i had removed just sitting there I decided to pull the lower cup off them and try it on the RRD shocks....it worked like a charm. I should add I tried spacing the shock out more away from the axle to clear the truss but it was just too big of a spacer. I also tried uprighting the shocks a bit more with the inboard/outboard adjustments but still was unable to completely avoid the binding. I just figured I'd throw this in there as a nice little bit of info.




The binding issue...




The solution...




The difference...



Problem solved...

[lowpro35]

After changing the rear suspension out, I also rearranged the electronics a bit and got the ESC mounted above the servo so as to clear out the passenger compartment a bit. Once I got it all back together I found that with the rear shocks adjusted all the way out I had a bit of a rake. I decided to compare the stock SCX10 shocks with the RC4WD 80mm scale dual shocks and found that despite them being longer shocks they actuall compress a bit more. I was a bit bummed out when I swapped to the 80mm shocks to begin with because they caused the truck to sit taller and I lost up-travel. I wound up swapping the SCX10 shocks in the front to see what would come of it. Im quite please actually. I've gotten my ride height a bit lower and gained back some up-travel. The suspension travel I have with this setup is a bit unreal, we'll see how it does on upcoming trail runs.


Esc moved.



The rake...



Front ghetto suspension...(lets call it a work in progress)




The rear. It flexes soo smooth.



......and my surreal flex.









I hate that the front spring unseats, maybe limiting straps are in my future....

[lowpro35]

As I was driving this thing around my house a bit I noticed the front axle looked a little close to the back of the front fender. It seemed like it should be pushed forward a bit more. So I promptly began to source some spacers and get about stretching the wheelbase a bit.

I took some rough measurements of the wheelbase to get a good idea as to where I was.






I was able to find three spacers that were roughly 1/4". Two of the spacers were the exact same, one was just a tad longer. I threw the longer one on the upper link to bring my pinion up just a hair. After doing this, my front driveshaft was very close to falling out. The rear on the other hand was almost fully collapsed.

The spacers.



My driveshaft dilemma.



Front driveshaft.



Rear driveshaft.



As it turned out the rear is longer than the front(or at least thats how my RTR was assembled). Here's the comparison.



I went ahead and swapped the front and rear and wound up a bit closer to even.



After the stretch that put the draglink and tie rod right above one another which made the bolt on the servo arm hit the tie rod. Being that im actually running the axles that come with a Gelande kit that have steering arms behind the knuckle, i simply swapped the tie rod to behind the axle to clear up the clearance issue.

This is after the tie rod was set behind the axle. So much space now.



I had to slightly bend the tie rod to clear the upper link.



Tie rod behind the knuckle.





Everything all buttoned back up I gained about 1/4" of WB. These tires measure roughly 4.1" in diameter and when turning under compression I was hitting the back bottom of the front fender. Now I have plenty of space and the truck doesn't look as awkward. Maybe I can step up to a slightly larger tire now without having to trim.





Here's a comparison photo. The top is post-stretch, the bottom is pre-stretch. Pay close attention to the gap between the back of the front tire and the fender.

[nsimps]

Seriously awesome work!

Thanks for being detailed with the build - it will help a lot when I actually get to building my own

[lowpro35]

This past weekend I finally took it out for a "shakedown" run. I quickly realized that as it was, it was exremely light in the back. I should have just called it then and gone back to the drawing board. Instead I took my chances and paid the price. There was a bit of carnage. Oh well, they are never truly finished right? On to the pictures.


The cage held up just fine.










I had a couple of pretty decent tumbles. One of them hit right on the corner of the bed and cracked the bob "patchwork".





It was a little bit rougher than I wanted its first time out to be, but what can you do. More pics of the aftermath.

[lowpro35]

As part of solving some of my issues I added a bit of weight to the tires (i was running none). I also decided to sipe them to see if I could squeeze a bit more flexibility out of them and gain a bit of bite. The difference in flexibility of the tire seemed immediately noticable to the touch, maybe it was just mental. Im hoping for some improvements.

Siped on the left, stock on the right.



Finished product

[1BadJeepBruiser]

Quality build and thread, keep up the good work

[lowpro35]

Its been a bit since I updated this thread so I'll catch up. Did some wheeling.












Broke some stuff





On a recent outing I happened to roll it into a pond and fried my ESC (didn't get around to water proofing) which meant I needed things. Placed an order into RPP and....



Switched to a Hawse Fairlead as we all know synthetics don't use metal rollers(sarcasm)



Proline Toolbox







Inner fenders for the front





Also tried something a bit different. Saw these exhaust setups and had an idea, gave it a whirl.









We won't get into the shitty "exhaust stain" paint job. It will be done better when I repaint, soon. I was trying some things out. So, final pics of how it stands today.

[1beatjeep]

This has to be 1 of the best builds on a tf2 for sure....

[lowpro35]

Thanks guys

[paintchip31]

I would like to see more of this rig!!

[2003EDGE]

Truck looks great! Suspension looks nice and flexy! Have you had a chance to run it on the trail with this setup?