Twin hammers kit build

[Toyotarc]

So picked up this cheap kit today for a price i couldn't pass up. This is going to be a budget build for now to see if it can handle 2s brushed without a ton of problems.

Items for this build:

Twin Hammers kit
Flysky GT3C with reciever
Hobbywing 1060 brushed ESC
RC4WD 20 turn motor with 28 tooth pinion
Hitec might mini servo 67oz torque (shift servo)
Savox 0251MG servo 222oz torque (steering servo)

As you can see I went budget friendly for now If any one has any aftermarket parts I can buy in Canada that would be rad to!!





Let the building begin!

[HumboldtEF]

Nice score finding a kit and a cheap kit!

I was just hunting around to see if I could find a kit, I'm jealous and subbed!

[Toyotarc]

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

Nice score finding a kit and a cheap kit!

I was just hunting around to see if I could find a kit, I'm jealous and subbed!

190$CAD shipped to my door!!!

Anyways I just got the tranny built up and motor attached. Nice that the kit version is all metal trans gears!

[xv-townboy]

Originally Posted by Toyotarc

190$CAD shipped to my door!!!

Anyways I just got the tranny built up and motor attached. Nice that the kit version is all metal trans gears!

Any more at that price?!..I would snap up another for that price

First upgrade your going to want to address is the steering..I just happen to have one that I wont be needing anymore https://www.shapeways.com/product/MB...li=marketplace

The steering is night and day over stock if you are interested..I am out of pocket approx 50 bucks CAD with shipping and taxes..I can ship it to you in a bubble wrap envelope for $30CAD ..You are going to need a some hardware/bearings (read the description on the link)..I can email you a pic of it installed if you like.

The twin hammers is an awesome platform,i think you will like it

[Toyotarc]

Originally Posted by xv-townboy

Any more at that price?!..I would snap up another for that price

First upgrade your going to want to address is the steering..I just happen to have one that I wont be needing anymore https://www.shapeways.com/product/MB...li=marketplace

The steering is night and day over stock if you are interested..I am out of pocket approx 50 bucks CAD with shipping and taxes..I can ship it to you in a bubble wrap envelope for $30CAD ..You are going to need a some hardware/bearings (read the description on the link)..I can email you a pic of it installed if you like.

The twin hammers is an awesome platform,i think you will like it

It was an amazon deal and it was last one in stock unfortunately.

I might be interested in that steering. I do have my own 3d printer but I had to move it into a closet for a few months so I might try and make some room for it now.

Maybe its the plastic they used but a lot of the threads aren't very easy to screw the bolts into.

Electronics and motor are in! Had to take some breaks as this is a LONG build up.

[Toyotarc]

More build pics...

Front end finally together, theres a ton of screws here and this took a long time



Rear was pretty simple



Cage sucked, the holes should of been drilled out like 1mm bigger atleast as it was very hard attached some of the screws.



Last thing is installing beadlocks which is straightforward.



Should be done this tonight maybe time for a test run!

[jchammbone]

re: plastics... use a small amount of black grease/ or chapstick on the screw before installing. Helps them go in better.
Built both my daughters and mine couple of years ago and I find they are really well built platforms . No breakage as of yet. Just trailing around though fwiw.

Good luck!

[Toyotarc]

Originally Posted by jchammbone

re: plastics... use a small amount of black grease/ or chapstick on the screw before installing. Helps them go in better.
Built both my daughters and mine couple of years ago and I find they are really well built platforms . No breakage as of yet. Just trailing around though fwiw.

Good luck!

Thanks I will defiantly try that next time!!


Quick electronics test before the cage went on.



Everything worked good, had a very hard time getting the radio to set the limit points on the shifting servo but I did get it eventually. Wasn't a huge surprise a cheap 3 ch radio might be difficult to use but this is a budget build after all

Here's a nice shot put all together. I will eventually paint it I just don't have the paint I want. I don't think I will put in the seat/interior just so I have more access to the inside.



WELL SUPER CHOKED....

Was doing some test laps around my property and managed to loose the front drive shaft cross pin some how

Not sure how the spring popped off the part it sits on but I'm pretty annoyed as I didn't drive it very long. Kind of a bad design for the driveshaft but it was probably my fault that caused it to pop off.

Well one up side is I still have rear wheel drive and a 2 speed tranny

Currently going to see if there's any upgrades for that, probably order a couple spare parts when I put in an order too.

[Toyotarc]

Managed to fix the driveshaft with parts from stealing parts from the rear driveshaft

I had a RC4WD punisher shaft 3.9" - 5.1" that I was going to use on my TF2 but it would work on the rear twin hammers shaft so that would allow me to steal the rear shaft parts to fix the front. Here's a comparison with the old twin hammers shaft, the RC4WD is on the left.



Had to file down the shaft a tiny bit because I couldn't hit the flat spot on the driveshaft with the set screw.



Here's a shot of the RC4WD shaft on the rear, wish I had a longer driveshaft but whatever.



For the new cross pin I used some glue on the pin and the spring to keep them in place. Shouldn't matter if its glued because you won't need to take that off again. Here's the glue I used,

[Toyotarc]

So did a sweeet run this morining with it, did great no break downs!







The tires than come stock on the kit version have very good traction. I was originally going to put on some 4.75" baja claws but these have bigger lugs and better traction now that I have tried them.

The 20turn motor I think is a little quick, maybe a 27 or 35 turn motor would be better suited if your dedicated to crawling. I do like the 20 turn motor as it has the perfect top speed in high gear and in low gear it still crawls good and you are able to hammer down if you need any wheelspeed.

With the current shocks it sits at 2.5" ground clearance which isn't bad but I could probably have close to 3" if the shocks didn't sag so much with minimum weight in the rig. The rear shocks leak like a faucet to so I ordered a cheap pair of RC4WD 110mm Rock Krawler Dual spring shocks which will hopefully stiffen up the rear and get rid of this leak. Might pick up a GCM front tower plate just so I have more options for battery placement and for that hinged front hood which will help doing repairs on the front end.

Front steering is OK, pretty strange setup with all this plastic mixed with metal rods. Funny my 1/24 Micro losi rally car has a very similar front steering rack but is a lot better design and they had limited space to work with.

Overall though I really like this rig. Has lots of speed if I want and it has handled a few tumbles very well. Pretty much all metal drivetrain apart from a plastic spur which is fine with me. Glad I picked up a kit to as I don't see how those plastic trans gears in the RTR could hold up to the abuse of shifting. The kit version also comes with front and rear sway bars with 3 types of bars to use, stiff, medium, and soft. I only installed the rear sway bar and used the soft one and it still flexes great!

[Toyotarc]

Finally got some parts delivered to my house today!

GCM racing front shock hoop/top plate, RC4WD 110mm rear shock, and axial 90mm front shocks



Here's a shot of the 110mm shocks compared to the old ones, pretty much the same length.



Ball end on the RC4WD is 6.2mm



Old ball end is rougly 8mm so the new ones are close enough to work without modding anything.



Shot of it installed



Ended up moving the top mount to the higher one because the lower shock end was touching the trailing arm.



These are way nicer than the stock shocks. First of all they don't leak. Second they are much stiffer which is good because the old ones bottomed out too easy.

Now onto the front suspension and get rid of the cantilever shocks!



New axial 90mm shocks that I'm putting in. Notice how axial gives me plenty of spare parts which is awsome! I also put in Losi 40wt shock oil in these.



On the shocks I had to put a 5mm ball end inside to limit the travel because the max I could use is 85mm without the cvd's falling out.



Here's the GCM plate installed. Notice how I got room for another battery upfront! I could probably fit a 1500mah lipo in there.



Nice shots of it.





It sits at roughly 3" of ground clearance now with is great!



I could of put a hinged hood on but can't find any HR hinged setups I'm actually willing to pay since it only saves me taking off 4 screws to flip it up manually. Plus the extra strength of having the whole cage tied together without any chopped up parts is nice.

Overall it was defiantly worth it for any upcoming maintenance , battery storage, and of course way better shocks!

Next mod will defiantly be bell crank steering once I find a suitable one.

[Natedog]

Originally Posted by jchammbone

re: plastics... use a small amount of black grease/ or chapstick on the screw before installing. Helps them go in better.
Built both my daughters and mine couple of years ago and I find they are really well built platforms .

X2, recommend chapstic over grease though. The good plastics and nice tight fitment do make assembly a bit more work, but the strength and durability are worth it.

Originally Posted by Toyotarc

...Was doing some test laps around my property and managed to loose the front drive shaft cross pin some how

Not sure how the spring popped off the part it sits on but I'm pretty annoyed as I didn't drive it very long. Kind of a bad design for the driveshaft but it was probably my fault that caused it to pop off.

Always ensure that the retaining ring is fully seated in the groove all the way around the shaft, a bit of heatshrink over it is good insurance too.

Originally Posted by Toyotarc

Finally got some parts delivered to my house today!

GCM racing front shock hoop/top plate, RC4WD 110mm rear shock, and axial 90mm front shocks

These are way nicer than the stock shocks. First of all they don't leak. Second they are much stiffer which is good because the old ones bottomed out too easy.

Next mod will defiantly be bell crank steering once I find a suitable one.

Swapping shock springs and adjusting preload will help get the ride height you want too.

Bellcrank setups are nice, here's the best one imo:
https://www.shapeways.com/shops/scorched_parts

[sgtlt]

Natedog, can that bellcrank setup be used with stock shock setup ? thanks

[Toyotarc]

Originally Posted by sgtlt

Natedog, can that bellcrank setup be used with stock shock setup ? thanks

This one will work with stock shocks

https://www.shapeways.com/product/MB...li=marketplace

[Toyotarc]

So since it's getting pretty cold outside I thought I better start painting the body panels because my basement is already getting on the verge of too cold to paint. Basically just started taping up the body panels and thought I would figure out the color scheme as I go.



Now I only had blue and white lexan paint left so that was the obvious choice for the majority of the painting.





Basically the only other paint that I thought would work two tone is this red high temp engine paint which I was very questionable on if it would stick to lexan



The red paint did end up sticking to the lexan after about 8 coats I thought it turned out not bad. The red was a little darker than I anticipated but it's done now so no turning back. I ended up leaving the hood unpainted so when I get a battery to fit in there I can see what's going on.



Looks alright. Maybe I should of painted the pointed part on the hood but whatever!



Side shot of it looks pretty cool!



Received a better driveshaft in a trade for some parts so I ended up transfering this shaft to my TF2. Not sure why the quality looks so garbage in this picture but whatever

old



new



Threw some heatshink on the shaft to help keep the screws from backing out.

Overall it was a pretty busy last day painting and fitting the new shaft.

I did order a 2S 1300mah lipo to fit in that front space so I'm crossing my fingers it will work Would be cool to have that extra weight up front as it is a little rear heavy. The rear spare tire looks pretty cool so I don't want to remove that yet

[Toyotarc]

So got some more parts delivered recently. Bell crank steering parts from shapeways took about 3 weeks for delivery with the slowest shipping to Canada

Doesn't look like much because they work with the GCM top plate instead of needing a top plate 3d printed.



You reuse alot of existing parts which is great because it cuts down on hunting for little pieces.

Here's an existing steering link adjusted to fit that connects the left and right steering.



I use my carpet for good background shots in majority of my photos as my RC's are all in a spare bedroom.

You require M3x6x2.5 bearing for this but since I went to the GCM upright shocks you remove that exact size bearings from the cantilever setup.



Bearings installed in the bell crank parts, the tolerances are tight on these parts, defiantly well made.



Quick shot of the hole front diff removed, pretty dirty in there!



Link installed on the steering, also used some existing steering link balls from the old steering setup.



You need some m2x22mm screws that I reused from the old setup. These screws will hold the bellcrank together.



Here's another shot of the underside. Here is where the smaller shapeways parts are used, there is a flanged nut that the top screw is threaded into to.



Shot installed with the steering on the GCM plate. Looks pretty slick already!



You need a different servo horn to clear the servo since the link is installed on the backside of the horn. The horn I used is a Losi TLR1557 for 25 tooth servos.



Even with the offset in the horn it still wasn't enough so I had to bend it outwards even more so the link cleared the servo.



Here's another shot of how the steering is connecting to the knuckles.



Ran into a minor problem with rubbing. This screw was hitting the skid plate slightly so some filing on that part will fix that.



Shot of it filed. I guess I didn't file down exactly where the part hits but either way it clears now



Steering is all complete and got a 1300mah 2S lipo battery that fits perfect in the front tray.



Battery all strapped down. I won't be using the front hood anymore just so its easier to change the battery out and stuff.



Well after about 200 pictures I finished what I wanted to in this post. There's no play in the steering now compared to before. I haven't test drove it yet but I can already tell it will be a big improvement. The battery upfront should improve the weight distribution better for rock bouncing on steep climbs so it's a win win situation I think.