• Welcome to RCCrawler Forums.

    It looks like you're enjoying RCCrawler's Forums but haven't created an account yet. Why not take a minute to register for your own free account now? As a member you get free access to all of our forums and posts plus the ability to post your own messages, communicate directly with other members, and much more. Register now!

    Already a member? Login at the top of this page to stop seeing this message.

B-MOW's Vanquish H10 Optic Kit

Looks great, but I just can't justify $35 for a few rod ends! Are those rod ends tight on the shift linkage to make the perfect length steering link for the Hydrosteer?
 
Looks great, but I just can't justify $35 for a few rod ends! Are those rod ends tight on the shift linkage to make the perfect length steering link for the Hydrosteer?
I hear ya on the price. I never had a plan to buy these machined rod ends in the past. I’ve seen others use these on the Optic and thought this would be a good way to get a closer look at them and see how they hold up. I more than likely will never buy these for link rod ends.

They are not tight up against the shift linkage center. There might be another half or full turn to go. There is enough room for more adjustments. I did put a small drop of Loctite on the threads to hold them from spinning.
 
I hear ya on the price. I never had a plan to buy these machined rod ends in the past. I’ve seen others use these on the Optic and thought this would be a good way to get a closer look at them and see how they hold up. I more than likely will never buy these for link rod ends.

They are not tight up against the shift linkage center. There might be another half or full turn to go. There is enough room for more adjustments. I did put a small drop of Loctite on the threads to hold them from spinning.
Thanks for the info. More reason for me to not get these. That space would drive me insane. 😜
 
On to something I haven’t done since 1988. Back in them days during my 1/10 off-road buggy racing days, we’d use Rit dye to dye our white nylon parts on our Team Associated RC-10 kits. I’d always use black, so dying the parts were really easy.

Here’s my OG 1988 RC-10 with the white nylon parts dyed black. This buggy has been thru many different iterations in its life and still has almost all of its original kit pieces. I restored it back to its original look a few years back.

IMG_6144.jpeg

So now on to my newest adventure in dying nylon parts. I wasn’t wanting to run the stock black cage that came with the Optic kit, so I purchased the gray cage and it’s accessories. The plan is to dye the cage a light blue. I bought the Rit synthetic sapphire blue in hopes to achieve a cool blue look.

IMG_6109.jpeg

IMG_6113.jpeg

Back in the day still living at home, I’d use an old pan on mom’s stove to heat up the water and dye the parts. In these times trying not to piss off the wife, I decided to try this process a little different. I’m using a portable 2-burner hot plate on my workbench.

IMG_6110.jpeg

My local Sam’s Club sells these stainless steel pans. Perfect size to hold the cage and its parts. And it fits perfectly on the hot plate.

IMG_6111.jpeg

So trying to go off of memory from about 37 years ago, I started the process of dying parts. The Rit dye instructions call for the water to be around 200 degrees. With the hot plate I could only get to about 180 degrees. From memory I remember leaving the parts in for roughly 30 minutes to get a nice even color. Back then we had a powder dye and I would add the box to get a good black color. This new dye is now liquid and I had no idea how much to add, so I added about half the bottle.

After 25 minutes I turned off the heat to let the water cool. At 30 minutes I pulled the parts out and rinsed them off under cold water to wash off the excess dye.

IMG_6112.jpeg

Here’s the results. Not the light blue that I wanted, but blue it is! I think I either added too much dye to the water or left the parts in too long or both. This was my first time trying a color other than black. Anyways I make this color work. I may pick up another gray cage in the future and try for a lighter shade of blue next time.

IMG_6141.jpeg
 
Nice to see you back around ... always with the great informative post and absolute detail in the images. The Blue looks great and more with some dark colored panels even the CF ones too ... I would think for those that got the green panels, a dark green cage will pop with the lime green and even dye your green panels a shade darker. 💡 ....
 
That blue is vintage Fox (suspension) blue. Before they stole KTM colors (orange and black).

Edit: here's a pic of their old truck shock decals. All the bike stuff was blue up until about 2010 when they did some black and then a couple years later they went orange/black across the board

Blue Fox decals
 
Last edited:
Wow that is a very vivid blue. I love it! Bummer it's not what you were going for, but I think it looks great.
 
Following in the bg as usual lol always a pleasure to see what build project you got on the go. How far does the dye penetrate (looks good), how deep of scratch can it take before exposing the original cage colour, if any?
 
Back
Top