BgredPhoenix

[bgredjeep]

Today's project. Used zoku chassis came in. I've made a bunch of progress since this pic but didn't take a picture yet. Unfortunately none of the fenders (stock front or the rear ones I made) will work with the zoku. I figured I'd get one eventually, but hadn't planned to pick one up so soon or I wouldn't have made those yet.

 

[B-MOW71]

Nice! I've been debating on picking up the Zoku kit for my newest Phoenix build.

I'll be following to see how it all comes together. Watching will help me make up my mind whether or not I actually get one!

 

[bgredjeep]

Nice! I've been debating on picking up the Zoku kit for my newest Phoenix build.

I'll be following to see how it all comes together. Watching will help me make up my mind whether or not I actually get one!

It's a pretty nice kit. It went together easily. All the plastic is printed, but the thread were nice and smooth and everything fit well.

The only thing that made it difficult was trying to adapt everything I've already installed over the last few months to the new chassis. I was hopeful I could make the stock front fenders work, but there's no way really. Might have had a chance if I didn't already trim them for the towers I made, but I still don't think it would. I'll probably end up making some aluminum inner fenders so you can't see right through the rig, but I'm taking a break for the moment.

I weighed the car before and after and it did save a good bit of weight (~12oz). Between that and the lower cg it should work really well.

Before (6 lb 15.3oz)

After 6 lb 3.4oz)

As seen above, I made my own sliders.i initially made some aluminum pieces to extend the included sliders to match my body, but doing them this way nets a lot more clearance on the sides.

I still need to slot the right side slider for a battery strap

Had to get a little creative on the rear body mount to avoid needing new holes in the body.

 

[bgredjeep]

You ever get an idea in your head, and you just can't stop thinking it until you just do it? I do, and I have rear fenders now. Lol. I'll figure out some fronts this week.

 

[B-MOW71]

Great! Thanks for the info on the chassis."thumbsup"

I gotta say, all that metal work is looking great! Nice job on the inner fenders!

 

[bgredjeep]

Great! Thanks for the info on the chassis."thumbsup"

I gotta say, all that metal work is looking great! Nice job on the inner fenders!

Thanks. I drew these in Fusion and was pleased to find they actually fit first try since i didn't make any paper templates like i normally do. Today I did the same for the front fenders. Simpler design than the rear but it worked out good i think.

It's got a little squat to it. I'll still have plenty of tuning to do on the suspension

I also picked up some aluminum clamp rings for the treal wheels. These wheels came with heavy clamp rings and I didn't want that extra weight. For now I just swapped the rears so we'll see how that feels. 49grams saved for each wheel

Here's the final weight with the fenders and the lightened rear wheels

 

[twade984]

Inner fenders looking good. I expect you’ll see a pretty good performance increase with that Zoku chassis


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[bgredjeep]

I agree. Everything is lower and lighter so that should translate to performance.

This afternoon I picked up a vrd servo mount from a friend who ordered the stubby trans kit for his vrd. I wasn't expecting this to fit the f10t axle, but was pleased to find that it does fit just fine.

I converted the zoku to 4-link using some 90mm upper links. I'll have to test it to see if it works ok with the shorter upper links. It doesn't do anything weird cycling through the travel on the bench so I think it'll be good.

 

[bgredjeep]

I got the Phoenix out for it's first run since I started working on the k10 body. I've got some work to do on tuning the chassis, but for the first shakedown it was successful. I might raise the ride height slightly, and I think one of my shocks lost some oil.

I'll get it dialed in. It did impress me on a few lines that I've run with my scx10 pro. For as little run time as I've had on it, it's very promising.

The fresh aluminum sliders got some nice scratches, as did the aluminum grill.

 

[bgredjeep]

Here's a few more pictures from Saturday a guy posted.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

Looks like it pulls some impressive lines. I would prefer a carbon fiber chassis for looks alone, but overall I like this.

 

[bgredjeep]

Looks like it pulls some impressive lines. I would prefer a carbon fiber chassis for looks alone, but overall I like this.

Carbon would be sweet. I've seen a few guys paint the chassis black and it does look better imo. I'm not big on painting aluminum in places that I know are just going to drag on rocks.

 

[B-MOW71]

Looks killer out on the rocks! I'm sure it performs just as good as it looks!

 

[xwaz]

The Grill just pulls it all together so well!

 

[bgredjeep]

I got new wheels for this rig. I think this color suits it a little better.

 

[twade984]

Very nice choice


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[bgredjeep]

Looks like I've missed a couple updates on this. I'll blame the forum outage. Lol

So the only thing I was not liking about the zoku chassis was how far the lowest portion of the rails continued forward past the skid plate. It's lower than needed, and I found myself getting hung up on that part of the chassis quite a bit.

I decided to replicate the chassis, and make the adjustment I wanted. I drew it up in Fusion and sent it off to send cut send. ~$50 for 1/8" 7075.

Old profile

New profile

So that was the old update. I had hoped to get that chassis cut from carbon fiber, but it was around 4x the price for carbon so I passed. Fast forward a few weeks and I came across a listing on aliexpress about carbon cutting. It's not as slick as the send cut send interface, but I emailed them the drawing for a quote. Someone got back to me an hour or 2 later with a number for 2 rails, and I purchased. $46 vs almost $200 from scs.

Those rails showed up this week and I got them installed today.

The carbon rails are 58gr less than the aluminum

And in unrelated news, I'm just about finished with my vrd build. I didn't bother with a thread for this one yet. It's pretty much box stock. Just got the body this week so getting close to run time.

 

[bgredjeep]

Quick Phoenix update. I've just been driving this one lately, and not taking pictures when I do. It works great. This might lose its trans for the buggy build when I get further along but I'll swap in the vrd carbon trans in that case since that rig is going to lose its axles.

Now for the actual update, I picked up one of those $15 injora lexan interiors to try in the k10 body. After cutting it down to 2 seats and trimming the width just a bit it fills in the cab nicely. For now it's held in with a couple pieces of tape. Not sure if it'll need anything more than that really.

Overall the quality isn't great but it's $15 so it aligned with my expectations. I don't know what they actually intend it to be used in, but its a decent option if you want a low effort interior to hide the guts of your crawler. The section I used was 22gr if anyone wondered about the weight.

 

[bgredjeep]

I saw someone post that the meus racing leds fit pretty well into the Phoenix/Fordyce headlight buckets. I picked up a pair to try in my rig. It took a little grinding to get them into the buckets how I wanted, but it turned out great. The lights would stick out of the stock body a bit, but fits perfect with my aluminum grill.

https://a.co/d/bJO0PYT

 

[bgredjeep]

My zoku went on a diet today. This rig is donating its vfd twin to the Jimmy's buggy, so the zoku got the trans from my vrd carbon. Full machined and lightweight gears, lightweight motor plate and all. I swapped the plastic driveshafts in place of the incision shafts. Over 7oz dropped when I was finished.

Before

After