sik boys night crawler...

[ghtpdm5]

the rovers are pretty much the stick by which all others are measured. they are a great choice for an upgrade tire, pair them with crawler innovations foam, and you've got a great combo. another option for off the shelf tires would be sedonas. the sedonas "paddle" through loose terrain very well in stock form, but they really come alive after a couple hours with a dremel. sidewall shave, tread clap, siping the tread, and again pair with ci foams. custom tires require a fair amount of commitment, the best option is to get used tires for the 2.2 sidewall, then truggy tires have the height. some truggy tires are pretty wide, and also have reinforcement ribbing and thicker sidewalls. depending on your choices for base tires and then foams, you're looking at a bigger bill. eddie at Crawler Tires, Crawler Foams, Parts and Accessories by Crawler Innovations has packages setup for many tires.

and what motor ya planning? ran a few brushed when mine was still an lnc, some worked, some not so much.

[SIK_BOY]

i have an old speed gem 2 that has a 21t pinion. thought about seeing the effects of that for starters. I really dont know much about the speed gems tho.
Also considering drawing up a new chassis for this turd now. not sure exactly which style ill end up with but it will be cut from from an acrylic material. Thought of building a tuber but want to see my options first...

[SIK_BOY]

little picture up date...
this is how the rear spring / shock set up was,


and now its more like this! lol


and some action shots from the last camping trip...






lol we rolled some rocks together to make this at our camp site, it was a fun spiral stair case, kinda

[ghtpdm5]

looking great

i ran a revenge of the monster stocker in mine, when paired with a modified can it actually ran really well for a long time, just depends on if your can has fixed timing or not. the fixed 24deg timing on most stock motors makes for a lot of heat.

and chassis design isn't bad, just takes a lot of staring for me. as far as material, i'd shy away from acrylic simply because it is more brittle that i'd like. delrin is a great starter and final material, i just order dimension "planks" of 1/8" for my stuff, then 1/4" for skids. delrin is very easy to work, and takes a pounding well.

[SIK_BOY]

i had the same concern with the acrylic material however i stopped by the shop that works strickly with acrylic all day and wow this material is strong, and as far as my brittle concern was, i slammed a peice on the concrete and nothing! Not even a splinter, and it was checked to the ground pretty hard. after i design the pattern and it gets cut out i wont be in to it for that much. so i hope my trial n error pans out. it should be a pretty legit chassis for the lnc/lcc platform.

[SIK_BOY]

hey everyone! its been a minute and that minute has equaled a pound of dust on this rig as the little thing called life rolls through i guess you could say. i didnt want to create a new topic in the forums seeing as how it pertains primarily to this crawler so, ive been thinking about swaping over to a lipo set up and re working some of the ways ive had this rig set up, any recommendations on the lipo? its all foreign to me!
look forward to reading some input, i do currently have a mild motor and have been running nimh packs because the weighed had worked well so idk...

[dentonmac]

Welcome Back. Just did a quick read through your thread. What great tutorials! Wish I found those when I got started.

I have been running these packs with great success. Note: I am comp minded in my build, so your mah can vary with your intended purpose. But, personally I would get as high a 'c' count as possible. AND try and keep the battery as low and toward the axles as possible.

Turnigy nano-tech 850mAh 3S 45~90C Lipo Pack

These are 3s batteries, being able to run these depends on your ESC. They have good 2s also, but you are leaving alot on the table with the Losi on just 2s.

Sorry. Just realized that I jumped straight into hardcore 'lipo lingo.' Please let me know if you need explanation.

Great time to blow the dust off and read up, there are alot of very exciting things happening on our Losi side of the planet these days.

[SIK_BOY]

sweet! im intrigued lol...anyone making tube style chassis yet? so yea, whats the 2s and 3s difference. is there just a no brainer esc/motor/battery combo out there?
im gonna need to tear into the axles and transmission, somthin is not right, you can hear it grind once per revolution. have more of a vibration felt in the trans then the axles tho but i still have the stock worm gear set up, never installed the losi hd gears.
also, if i ad rear steer, what class would that place my rig in in the comps?

[SIK_BOY]

wow! i went to the link you posted, those are small batteries and the're cheap! i know my current charger doesnt support lipo, its the onyx 220, so ill need to get the other model for them

[dentonmac]

I knew that I blew into Lipo geek speek on you, sorry.

The difference between 2s and 3s, is just another cell. A 2s battery has 2 cells that put out 3.7v each (totaling 7.4v). A 3s battery has another 3.7v cell (totaling 11.1v), and so on with 4s, 5s, and...

It just means more juice to the motor, but your ESC has to be rated to handle it.

My opinion for a no brainer ESC, motor combo. Castle Mamba Max Pro (MMP) and Novak 18.5 Crawler motor. And I would start with 3s batteries. The MMP is rated up to 6s (22.2v - insanity), so if you want more speed put in a 4s.

[SIK_BOY]

very nicely explained, thankyou! As far as speed goes, these losi axles cant spin that fast can they, just under walking speed is what i have now stock.

ive always had good luck with my duratrax onxy charger but going to need an upgrade for the ability to charge lipo. ive read up on the 235 and the 245, ther're the same except the 245 is a dual chargin station vs the 235 being a single correct?
thry both have a balance feature so thats a plus!

[dentonmac]

Originally Posted by SIK_BOY

very nicely explained, thankyou!

I have to learn it in a simple, relatable language, so that is the only way I can explain it.

Originally Posted by SIK_BOY

As far as speed goes, these losi axles cant spin that fast can they, just under walking speed is what I have now stock.

They can spin as fast as you want them to, it will just require more maintenance...sooner.

I use the speed in bursts, not for a long haul. Or to make up ground when I am chasing the cat. 90 percent of my driving is in the very low RPMs, then blip it to crest a climb or punch up a wall.

Also I have conditioned myself to come off the throttle slowly, I think that continual, abrupt stops just slam on the worms. Not good. That may be all in my mind, but that process has served me (and my worms) well over the years.

I do not run 4s often, but when I do I am very judicious with the throttle.

Originally Posted by SIK_BOY

thry both have a balance feature so thats a plus!

Yes, balancing lipos is a necessity. I have no experience with the duratrax chargers, but I have had good luck with this one. Very inexpensive and still rocking strong after a year or 2.

Thunder AC6 Smart LiPo Balance Charger/Discharger w/ AC Adapter for 1-6 Lipo/ 1-15 Nimh + USB to PC Software

[SIK_BOY]

the only real benefit i can see with the onyx 245 is the fact that you can set it up to charge x2 different batteries at x2 different rates simultaneously. Almost would be best used at the work bench perhaps.

as far as lipo "lingo" goes it is pretty simple and doesnt prove to be rocket science, appreciate that tho...

i can understand the feeling of gears "hitting" when you let off the throttle on these worm set ups too, kinda interesting youve seen an increase in longevity by changing your throttle control. I still have the factory set in both axles, but like i said now i have some sort of gear issue going on n need to tear it down for a full drive train clean/inspect.

and...lol
i would like to see this rig be capable of higher wheel speeds at times

[SIK_BOY]

okay ^^^ as it "was"! Very frusterated with the performance this rig has sunk to, it binds, acts under powered and started making some unpleasant gear noise.
ive never been in the lnc transmission and only cracked the axles once to regrease and inspect.
up until now its been a norm for the axles to get hot as well as the motor but started smelling some upset electronic odors n dont like that much lol

so now,

it went from this ...


to this...



crazy how little of work it takes to strip these rigs down to nothing.
had the same dam issue i had in the very begining with the driveshafts, had to drill one set screw out from the front pinion. wasnt to happy to see the wear on the worm gears tho, most likely the problem and noise i was hearing. there wasnt anything to find in the transmission but some dirt and signs of heated up plastic gears.

transmission/plastic gears







front axle




rear axle




so now my shopping list consists of;

tires/wheel upgrade
lipo/motor/esc upgrade
new gear sets for the axles
possible trans swap from a lcc, i have never used a dig set up tho, thought about just doing a 4ws set up

so, thats where im at as of now. Might have some old tamiya trucks up for sale to help fund this rig, not to sure yet.

[Tgreer]

1. Red and tacky grease for those axles!
2. HD gears, dlux chomoly worms if your lucky enough to find one!
3. Mamba Max Pro or tekin rs esc
4. 13.5t sensored brushless motor
5. If you don't need dig, I don't recommend the lcc trans, more stuff to go wrong!
6. Get the metal HR gears for the LNC trans
7. Tires and wheels are totally personal preference!
8. You will burn up that small servo, get a 7950th hitec and run a castle bec to it at 7.4v

[SIK_BOY]

with the stock tires that servo has lasted pretty well i think but yea, going larger might pose a threat huh?
are there any gear options on the lnc trans? i was excited to see the hr metal gears but just wondered the possibility of changing ratios.
13.5 sensored?
why wont the bec in mmp work?

and that was red n tacky...

[SIK_BOY]

is there a difference between the hr hd spool gear set and the losi hd spool gear set?

just wondering because i found these, but they are 25T
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hot-Racing-L...item2c7f46229a

[SilmarilS]

In my LNC, which as a 1600kV brushless, I got the 15/20/25 tooth motor pinion. And the choice of 2S/3S bat. So my range of speed is from really slow, to pretty fast for a LNC.

Just play with the motor pinion. It's cheap!

Here is the 25T pinion with 3S

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpXUIdHMskY

[Tgreer]

The bec in your esc is not enough, it may work now with that little servo, but it will brown out when your pulling juice with the bigger one. When you step up to a bigger servo it will need a bec devoted to the servo itself. Depending how much you run it, you need to clean a change the grease in the axels often. If you like the speed your at know, then don't worry about a motor. I'm not familiar with the HR spool gears, I only use there tranny gears.

[SIK_BOY]

i was reading up on the novak brushless systems, seems to be legit, any feed back on the novak esc?