Natedog's Vaterra ASCENDER

[Natedog]

Headlight buckets aimed and glued in, leds with resistors and leadwires installed.

[rockhugger]

Wow!!!! That looks mean and nasty Natedog..

[Crawler Cads]

Originally Posted by Natedog

Going lower profile and COG, added aluminum Axial crossmember in place of fuel cell mount. Cut out two 1/4" thick black kydex spacers to go inside frame rails, slid the cell down and back as low as it could go and not limit suspension movement, glued it to the spacers, drilled and bolted in place with rear shock tower mount screws. More to come...down lower.

Those Cody sliders are soooo damned good. Wish I could braze like that!

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk

[HumboldtEF]

I finally installed my sway bar and I wanted put together a thread on the process but I'm not sure I can get pictures as good as yours, plus I mostly followed yours and Yetistealth's guides. Would you mind I compile your info and pictures?

[Natedog]

Originally Posted by rockhugger

Wow!!!! That looks mean and nasty Natedog..

Thanks!

Originally Posted by Crawler Cads

Those Cody sliders are soooo damned good. Wish I could braze like that!

Thanks, Ernie does great work, pm him if you’re interested, but I don’t know if he has time to make more.

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

I finally installed my sway bar and I wanted put together a thread on the process but I'm not sure I can get pictures as good as yours, plus I mostly followed yours and Yetistealth's guides. Would you mind I compile your info and pictures?

Hey Casey, thanks for asking, go ahead and copy whatever you want, post away as it’s here to help everyone!

[MPG1959]

Originally Posted by Natedog

Helpers cleaning up shop.




How she sits now, got spare tire glued up after scraping chrome off the rim for the beads to CA, would be nice if Horizon put the little masking tape over the bead area like Traxxas does, so that there's less chrome scraping to do. Note the rear swaybar connected and sitting underneath. I outboarded the rear upper shock mounts with 5mm Axial green aluminum spacers, those spacers are super handy, I've bought several different lengths just to have around for such needs. Measured and the rear lower mounts are 10mm outboard by just moving them to the outside of axle mounts. Outbaording the upper mounts gives little more room for sway bar ends and links, plus fights TT. Next is lower swaybar link and then the lower link in stock position. I was going to use Ascender end links for swaybar because they are so beefy, but space is tight and so I'm testing with Traxxas Big Bore lower shock ends, then maybe Axial shock ends. Vaterra plastic is best, then Traxxas, with Axial plastic the least durable, but should be ok for swaybar. The shorter plastic end links help reduce interference between the links and shocks lower spring seat. Traxxas steel end link balls come in several different widths, I used calipers to measure the ones that I have on hand (0.249", 0.273", and 0.315". I've settled on the narrowest (0.249") since they provide enough flex travel without binding. Ascender ballss are 0.275" wide. Axial balls are 0.274" and 0.246". There is also the flanged on both ends, flanged on one end and the offset of the ball center from the ends of the steel piece to consider.




Pics of measuring where to drill the frame holes for swaybar to pass through. The tiny silver dots are the best looking spots when considering all aspects of flex, travel and bar end angles. I want to get the bar back as far as possible to keep the links vertical at ride height if possible, this is not possible with my setup, so I'm going for best for my setup. End links in the pics are 40mm eye to eye, I'm going to try some 35mm, seems they will provide best geometry overall. That dot is 6mm straight down from top of frame rail, and 17mm back from center of factory hole in frame. Red mark was my initial guesstimate before all the measuring and flex testing while holding swaybar and link in position. What do you all think?

Whats the reasoning on going through the frame rails with the torsion bar instead of going off the rear mounts like some have tried?

[Itali83]

The cage uses those rear mounts. So they're not available for Sway bar mounts.
Ben

[MPG1959]

Ok gotcha, will the hot racing sway bar kit work in this setup as well?

[HumboldtEF]

Originally Posted by MPG1959

Ok gotcha, will the hot racing sway bar kit work in this setup as well?

I assume you mean their kit for the Wraith? If so it should work, but just like the Axial kit it probably needs some slight tweaks or modifications so don't expect a bolt on affair.
Also you just need the front half, it comes with front and rear (same price for more). It does have a few extras though, 3 different sway bars front and back (soft, medium & hard) instead of the 2 in the Axial kit and it has 3 different mount points for the links which I know in 1:1's can aid in tuning (they were street cars though).
I noticed Natedog and Yeti.Stealth mentioned wanting even softer bars for the Ascender and maybe the extra sway bars included in the HR kit can be used to play with making a softer sway bar. The size of the notch in the sway bar is what determines how firm or soft it is. Now I'm not sure if there's enough material to play with here or not but at some point this will just snap in 2 when its too thin.

Ok I think I've ran far enough with this idea.

[Natedog]

Yep yep yep.

Going through the frame kinda must with K10 cage back mount, with other bodies it helps rear ground clearance a little, also just cleaner and less parts count. My next bar will move rearward about 5mm more through the frame.

Axial Wraith front bar set is much better quality. Axial and HR included bar will all break someday, that and softer bar is why Casey and I both made our own bars utilizing smaller diameter music wire.

[MPG1959]

Originally Posted by Natedog

Yep yep yep.

Going through the frame kinda must with K10 cage back mount, with other bodies it helps rear ground clearance a little, also just cleaner and less parts count. My next bar will move rearward about 5mm more through the frame.

Axial Wraith front bar set is much better quality. Axial and HR included bar will all break someday, that and softer bar is why Casey and I both made our own bars utilizing smaller diameter music wire.

Why move it back? increase the angle of the linkage?

[Natedog]

Better bar end link geometry, look back at my pictures. It works great the way it is, but I’m trying to optimize everything.

[skybolt]

Hey Mr. Dog, our buddy Ben has been trying to ween me off of the Axial Cool Aid, so as you've likely seen I ended up with Nemo ('68 Ferd).
I'm gonna copy your sway bar set up and had a question- did you sleeve the sway bar with anything where it passes through the frame rails? I'm just OCD enough to worry about chaffing and possibly changing the diameter of the torsion rod. I know, seems petty but these things keep me up at night!

[Natedog]

Congrats on Nemo, Ben's a great influence and I’ve seen your good looking new Ascender! Copy away and the bar goes straight through the frame without any sleeves.

[Shinchu]

Haha just noticed your shop minions!
My furry ascender mascot is nkt allowed in the garage :( i let her in once and she darted underneath my sons corvette. Bad keetah!!! She has since been banished.
I do need some pics with her and the finished truck though. I know, i know, they are never "finished" lol!

Nice work on the swaybar. I do notice a bit of TT on my truck if i am not gentle on the throttle, but it wont have 4 links out back for long ;)

[MPG1959]

Originally Posted by Itali83

Thanks Nate! Now I have more work to do. Can't believe I didn't notice the fuel cell could be dropped some. I'm keeping my battery tray floating but I've lowered that 5mm in the front and 10mm in the rear already.
Plus I'm dropping the whole truck with my new braven Ironsides that are on their way.

Ben

Any pictures of how you lowered your tray?

[Natedog]

Originally Posted by Shinchu

Haha just noticed your shop minions!
My furry ascender mascot is nkt allowed in the garage :( i let her in once and she darted underneath my sons corvette. Bad keetah!!! She has since been banished.
I do need some pics with her and the finished truck though. I know, i know, they are never "finished" lol!

Nice work on the swaybar. I do notice a bit of TT on my truck if i am not gentle on the throttle, but it wont have 4 links out back for long ;)

Originally Posted by MPG1959

Any pictures of how you lowered your tray?

Yes, love my minions! Escapee under the Vetter eh? Ah Cartman reference too lol!
Thanks, swaybar really helps a lot. Looking forward to your rear leaf setup.

Starting post #182
My baby blazer

[PoorManRC]

Between you, Ben and Cody..... You've REALLY got me jonesing for an Ascender!!!! I've wanted one since day one. In fact, that was the Truck that got me back into RC since I left in '94.
Fortunately, I never drink ANYONE'S Kool-Aid..... I CAN have a Vaterra and an Axial in my stable!!!

All I need is Money.

AWESOME, innovative Build you've got here!!!

[StomperCrawler]

Originally Posted by PoorManRC

Between you, Been and Cody..... You've REALLY got me jonesing for an Ascender!!!! I've wanted one since day one. In fact, that was the Truck that got me back into RC since I left in '94.
Fortunately, I never drink ANYONE'S Kool-Aid..... I CAN have a Vaterra and an Axial in my stable!!!

All I need is Money.

AWESOME, innovative Build you've got here!!!

This should help: Amain and Horizon have them all at $40 off this month!

[PoorManRC]

I really appreciate that! I just don't have ANY money.
It'll happen, I have Faith! I want one too badly. SOMETHING'S gonna give.

Besides, I'm still deep into building my Wraith - which was an incredible GIFT from the Wounded Warrior Foundation!!! I've got to figure out how many on board accessories I can MAKE for it.... and eventually give her a NAME!