New Gen8 AXE Edition. Choices, choices, choices...

[AK KRAWLER]

So, I made it home and it’s here.... but it’s been commandeered as a Christmas present.

After Christmas , I’ll have a few days to check it out before heading back to work.

[AK KRAWLER]

So, I opened up my Gen8 AXE Edition on Christmas Day. Pretty nice looking for sure. Pulled out my Onyx 235 charger, charged up a 4500mah 3S Ovonic battery and took it for a spin. Really good low speed control, good torque and decent wheel speed with the 3S battery.

I have already made the changes listed below:
CI Dual Stage Foams
SSD Lower Front Link Mounts
Club5 Front Skid Plate
Club5 Widener Hexes

Crawling around the house, it’s pretty nice.

A body that would allow the front and rear bumpers to be moved inward would definitely make a huge difference in ability.

Overall, very pleased and cannot wait for spring/summer for some good outdoor crawling.

Pics to come in a day or two.

[White Bear Smith]

Originally Posted by AK KRAWLER

So, I opened up my Gen8 AXE Edition on Christmas Day. Pretty nice looking for sure. Pulled out my Onyx 235 charger, charged up a 4500mah 3S Ovonic battery and took it for a spin. Really good low speed control, good torque and decent wheel speed with the 3S battery.



I have already made the changes listed below:

CI Dual Stage Foams

SSD Lower Front Link Mounts

Club5 Front Skid Plate

Club5 Widener Hexes



Crawling around the house, it’s pretty nice.



A body that would allow the front and rear bumpers to be moved inward would definitely make a huge difference in ability.



Overall, very pleased and cannot wait for spring/summer for some good outdoor crawling.



Pics to come in a day or two.

Did you go with the 8mm or 12mm hex extensions


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[AK KRAWLER]

I went with the 12mm, with the longer stubs.

[djr01974]

Has anyone messed with the timing on the axe yet? What benefit would it be to run it say at 10 percent.

[R/C controls YOU]

Originally Posted by djr01974

Has anyone messed with the timing on the axe yet? What benefit would it be to run it say at 10 percent.

10 degrees will net you more top speed/more RPMs than 0. And then you set when it activates (how long after full-throttle is reached).

It’s fun, but it’ll suck your battery dry in record time. It’ll also heat everything up much quicker.

[Nogman]

Originally Posted by AK KRAWLER

So, I opened up my Gen8 AXE Edition on Christmas Day. Pretty nice looking for sure. Pulled out my Onyx 235 charger, charged up a 4500mah 3S Ovonic battery and took it for a spin. Really good low speed control, good torque and decent wheel speed with the 3S battery.

I have already made the changes listed below:
CI Dual Stage Foams
SSD Lower Front Link Mounts
Club5 Front Skid Plate
Club5 Widener Hexes

Crawling around the house, it’s pretty nice.

A body that would allow the front and rear bumpers to be moved inward would definitely make a huge difference in ability.

Overall, very pleased and cannot wait for spring/summer for some good outdoor crawling.

Pics to come in a day or two.

Agreed 100% on the bumpers. The overhangs seem massive. I made some tucked simple tube bumpers f/r and it made a noticeable difference. Rear bumper loves getting hung up too. Did some small single tube sliders and it helped a lot, the stock ones seemed to snag everything.

[AK KRAWLER]

Originally Posted by Nogman

Agreed 100% on the bumpers. The overhangs seem massive. I made some tucked simple tube bumpers f/r and it made a noticeable difference. Rear bumper loves getting hung up too. Did some small single tube sliders and it helped a lot, the stock ones seemed to snag everything.

No good crawling outdoors here yet, but it’s been fun crawling around the house. Spent some time working on my sons SCX10, got my Tamiya TA01/TA02 Baja F150 up and running, as well tearing down my XTM X-Factor getting ready to convert it to electric and stretching it out a bit.

I turned the throttle down to 50% on the AXE and let my 4 year old daughter and niece drive it around the living room and crawl all over throw pillows, they had a blast!!!

[AK KRAWLER]

mgputer did an awesome job on this body!!! Thank you sir, and Sprong lives!



Still some figment to do, but I love it.

[mgputer]

Originally Posted by AK KRAWLER

mgputer did an awesome job on this body!!! Thank you sir, and Sprong lives!



Attachment 387486



Still some figment to do, but I love it.

Just awesome. Glad it worked out for you.

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[AK KRAWLER]

Thanks Gus, as soon as I have some dedicated time, I’ll work out the body mount.

Cleaning up the “craft” area, I decided to make a quick hanging mount for the AXE body. All scrap and left over stuff, it even magnet mount

[AK KRAWLER]

Well, managed to break the first part on my Gen8 today... Snapped the steering mount off of the right front inner portal housing.



It was my own fault. I hit a 3" ice ledge pretty hard at too high of a speed. In other words, full throttle on 3s batteries.


I just ordered an aluminum set and will use those along with the C-Hubs another member sent me for free when I bought some stuff from him.

The darn thing was handling the soft, melting snow pretty good. I was pretty impressed where I could get with a little wheel speed chowing through the snow

[AK KRAWLER]

Well, the new aluminum portal housings showed up today amd I got them installed this evening. I ended up not being able to use the aluminum C-Hubs I had (SEE EDIT), because I think they are for an original Gen8, not the AXE Edition. They didn’t have the hole for the shock mounting screw to go in.



Got the magnet mounts done for the Ford Truck body. She’s ready to run tomorrow at lunch. Possibly before :twisted...



I still need to make little filler plates that fill the gap between the body and the Redcat inner fenders. I got a couple ideas that hopefully will work out.

Anyway, pretty excited to get her back outside again.


EDIT: Well, I went back to check the part number for the correct C-Hubs and it’s the same dang part number... WTF. It’s missing the hole to mount the shock in the same position.
The plastic C-Hub has a hole directly above the top center hole that holds it to the axle housing. The aluminum one does not, it only has a hole off to the side. Which would put the shocks slightly angled toward the front on the bottom mount and then they wouldn’t have the double catchment mounting. I guess it’s not needed on the aluminum parts. Oh well, I’ll change them the next time it’s down for maintenance...

[AK KRAWLER]

Well, went outside for a little snow crawl and it was pretty underwhelming...
The snow is in that “starting to breakdown” state and it’s hard to get a around if you don’t find some hardpack. Unfortunately, I only got about 5 minutes in and it stopped dead in its tracks. The transmitter batteries were getting a little low, so I put fresh ones in. Ran it for another 5 minutes, or less, and it shut down again. Checked under the hood and felt around, hot damn, just about blistered my hand on the motor. That baby was hot!

I was running it on 3s, but I’ve done it before and it never got this hot before.

Not sure what gives, but not super happy...

[djr01974]

Was it doing that before your aluminum parts install. Maybe something is binding or causing a lot of drag making it heat up. Just a thought

[AK KRAWLER]

I thought about that too. I’ll dig into it later and see. Good time to install the aluminum c-hubs...

Everything seemed to spin okay before I inserted the axle shafts.

[AK KRAWLER]

First test at embedding a video. My son and I did a little night crawling in the snowbank tonight.
I wanted to test it more crawling than pushing it so hard, did the whole run (much more off video) and didn't get hot like it did earlier in the evening.
I will still take a look in the portals to ensure nothing is binding up.



My son's SCX10 with the new (used) body:

Off video, he came back and pulled the same line I did.

It was starting to cool off, around 24 degrees at the time of the video.
FUN TIMES!!!

[AK KRAWLER]

I did a little testing last night and found out that if I was just crawling around, everything stayed cool. If I put the coal to it, she would overheat and shut down.

I tore the portal housings off the C-Hubs today to see if anything was binding. No binding at all, so not sure what the issue is???

I went ahead and installed the aluminum C-Hubs from mgputer, thank you sir!When you install them, you will lose the "double catchment" lower shock mount. Which, per the response from Redcat, is not needed once you upgrade to the aluminum parts. I let them know that the product description should state such, as well as tell you what additional hardware would be required. You just need a couple new screws for the shocks since they mount different.

I also moved the upper shock mount to the rear one hole to help compensate for moving the lower mount rearward.

I'll make another run tonight using 2s and see if things still get too hot.

By the way, it's freak'n snowing here again....

[mgputer]

Check the inner side of your tires for rub marks. Stock wheels rub pretty bad and can cause some issues. If you put the steering Link under the the hub it usually clears.

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[AK KRAWLER]

Originally Posted by mgputer

Check the inner side of your tires for rub marks. Stock wheels rub pretty bad and can cause some issues. If you put the steering Link under the the hub it usually clears.

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Because I read that was an issue, I added the Club5 wider hexes before I ever ran it. Lots of clearance between the wheel/tire and the link.