bilinvic's Gmade GS02 BOM

[bilinvic]

Earlier this year when I first saw Gmade's sneak peak of the GS02 chassis I was intrigued and when the BOM was revealed, I knew I wanted one in my collection. The cantilever rear suspension, counter-rotating driveshafts, forward weight bias all sounded like features I wanted.

I did have some experience with a Gmade R1 a couple years ago and I had mixed feeling with that rig, I was hoping this GS02 would be much better. I can say with confidence that it is going to be a heavy weight contender in the battle of big name crawlers.

This crawler kit is already built and I'm well into the testing and tuning phase and even completed a 5 hour shake-down crawling session. I will have to back track a bit to show where I was and where I am now with this magnificent machine!

Here's the mandatory box pics and how the truck looks now:

 

[scalemadness]

That sr5 body looks like it was made for the gmade chassis much better looking cab than stock imho

 

[bilinvic]

I know that there's some design cues taken from Axial and Traxxas with the GS02, but Gmade definitely throws in a sufficient amount of there own design as well....and a few that are really worth mentioning; the transmission bottom half being integrated into the skid plate (low CG), the electronics box under the rig behind the servo/under the motor and the beautiful Rockjock axles.

I really like how some SCX10.2 parts are a direct bolt on for the BOM...this means there's already tons of aftermarket options. Gmade has plenty of upgrade parts available as well.

The first thing I tried was a spare set of 10.2 SSD knuckles with brass weights and sure enough, the bolted up like they were meant for this rig...bonus, saves me some $$$.

 

[bilinvic]

Some build thoughts:

- All industry standard metric hex hardware...no more crappy Philips hardware. I did replace a lot of hardware with stainless steel bolts, screws, washers & nuts.
- Some of the plastic is softer than what I am used to and with very little effort, some bolts can easily spin and strip...just go easy!
- Transmission spins super smooth after assembly.
- Lots of places for electronics and wiring.
- the includes aluminum link balls for early orders is a big bonus.
- The stock plastic Panhard mount integrated into the driver's side shock hoop will need replacing sooner than later, there's way too much flexing going on with a good servo.
- The pre-bent Panhard link is a very nice feature, no binding or obstructions whatsoever.
- The shocks leak with the stock O-rings...replace them with Traxxas X-rings from TRX rebuild kit "2362".
- Differential pinion / driveshaft output is like Vaterra...not a good design IMHO. Gmade has a conversion part available to make it like a regular output such as SCX10.2 (which I have already ordered from Junfac).
- There's three completely different mounting options for the rear shocks all included with the kit, including traditional body mounting posts for the rear.
- Rear hinge for the body/truggy cage works great and eliminates two body mount pins.
- Machined aluminum links are very nice.
- The Gmade link ends seems to be very strong and look good with the molded in details.
- Bearing are OK, wish they were shielded. I'll change them eventually.
- Instructions were fairly easy to follow, although there's no mention of grease or Loctite....since I'm not a newb, I figured it out :lmao:

 

[soze]

Nice, I'll be watching your build as I start thinking of building mine.

 

[Teng]

Excellent write up. I don’t have GS02 yet. I still have extra knuckles, so It is good to know the SSD RC SCX10 II Brass knuckle weights fit into the GS02. Who knows I might get one of these GS02"thumbsup"

 

[bilinvic]

With a new build on the workbench, I thought I would order a Holmes Hobby Revolver 540 1800kV brushless, sensorless motor for the BOM. All my rigs are powered by brushless sensored motors and I thought I would try something different. The plan was to use a "tried and true" Mamba Max Pro ESC but quickly found out that this ESC is not compatible with this motor, the bottom end resolution was terrible. After consulting with Mr. Holmes, he indicated a Mamba X or Sidewinder 4 ESC is recommended. Luckily I had a new Mamba X on hand and sure enough, the low end smoothness this motor is known for was showing it's attributes!

I was originally going to use an Xpert B/L WR-7701 servo, and then decided to use a Holmes Hobby BLS HV500 v1 servo because the Xpert servo seemed to be lacking torque.

No BEC is required since the MX ESC has an integrated 8V BEC.

This motor is definitely going to take some getting used to though, this thing sounds like a Star Wars land-speeder!!!

Also seen in the following pics are Samix 10.2 front shock hoops and a Werytmade 10.2 stinger bumper.

 

[bilinvic]

Worth noting is the number of electronic boxes and there size. The rear fuel cell (I'm not using it) can also be utilized for a massive amount of wiring and electronics! The side electronic box is very generous in size (Axial and Traxxas please note!) and then there is a third electronics box that resides below the motor position, behind the servo. I'm keeping the electronics simple on this BOM and therefore didn't utilize the lower box for it's intended use. I did however use this box to fill with lead weights for even more low, forward biased weight since I wanted to have a spare tire on the rear truggy cage.

FYI...I managed to fit 22 individual 1/4 oz (7 grams) wheel weights inside for a total of 5.43 oz (154 grams).

 

[2mtech]

Glad to see you decided to keep this stock as you originally intended. ;-)

It looks really well set up and gave me some ideas for mine, but I do see one discrepancy. It looks like you may have accidentally installed a Traxxas connector on your ESC. I'm sure you'll remedy that eventually. "thumbsup"

Nice thread, thanks for posting!

 

[bilinvic]

I don't mind the look of the "Ford Rangerish" body, but I was hoping I could use my Proline Toyota SR5 body with a Freqeskinz wrap. This body used to be on a 10.2 with a Vaterra truggy cage that is no longer built up. I bolted up the GS02 rear truggy cage without any issues and the body fit perfectly on the BOM chassis, the front wheel wells lined up, the front body post holes were perfectly aligned and even the sliders are perfectly aligned with the cab. There is a Bomber interior within the cab.

I played around with a few different ideas with regards to the spare tire location and which fuel cell to use and that's why you will see variations in the photographs in the next couple of posts.

In the next few pics I'm using .475 SLW hubs and have since swapped them to .350....the tires stuck out too much for my liking. I also used Axial (AX30429) Wraith/Bomber style 12mm aluminum hex hubs because there's more physical support for the wheels (they are a direct fit).

 

[2mtech]

Good spare placement. License plate relocation noted. "thumbsup"

 

[bilinvic]

Glad to see you decided to keep this stock as you originally intended. ;-)

It looks like you may have accidentally installed a Traxxas connector on your ESC. I'm sure you'll remedy that eventually. "thumbsup"

I know, I know...I hang my head in shame. I just can't help myself to make things better!

One day I was thinking of changing all my batts and electronics over to XT60 connectors, but that will be a big job.

 

[bilinvic]

Good spare placement. License plate relocation noted. "thumbsup"

Except it's not like that now...I changed it!!!

 

[2mtech]

Except it's not like that now...I changed it!!!

That's what I meant!

 

[bilinvic]

With all the BOM videos I have been watching, I was looking forward to seeing how the rear cantilever suspension was going to work. I didn't see a lot of torque twist (TT) in the vids.......the first time I got it out for it's initial test run in backyard, the torque twist was way beyond tolerable. Back to the workbench.

Initially I went with 50k shock fluid in the fronts and rears. I dumped the rear shock fluid and filled them with 20,000 cst diff fluid....I know....crazy right!!! It helped to tame the TT, but not enough. I saw pics on the Junfac website that Gmade are going to release a rear anti-sway bar. In the meantime, I modified a a Traxxas Slash sway bar to work and that made a substantial difference and the TT was much more tolerable, but still too much for my liking. I then filled the rear shocks with 100k diff fluid and decided this was going to be the best option for this machines first outing on the rocks.

BTW, the stock O-rings cause the shocks to leak really bad. I changed them out to Traxxas X-rings and they are much dryer now.

Here's some pics of some initial testing in my backyard:

 

[2mtech]

If I have to ask an ignorant question I may as well do it here if you don't mind...the Traxxas x rings are the blue ones in the 2362 rebuild kit?

 

[bilinvic]

Correct 2mtech.

 

[bilinvic]

So with all the testing and tuning I performed with the GS02, I was quite happy with the performance. I have numerous "double black diamond" lines in my backyard for testing. If a crawler rig can accomplish all of them, then the major tuning is basically completed and the truck is ready for the real world crawling sessions with my buddies. The BOM accomplished all these lines except for one. I was OK with that because I have an order in with Junfac for some upgrade parts.

The steering angles are extremely impressive with the BOM.

I added 4mm internal shock limiters on the front shocks to reduce the amount of front end lift when the rear squats on steep rock faces.

 

[bilinvic]

Some more build pics:

 

[bilinvic]

...and some studio pics prior to it's cherry popping day of crawling: