Hi all, I’m building a new crawler (after selling a couple of old ones) and wanted to start a thread documenting my progress and experience. My dad bought a brand new FJ40 back in the late 70’s and I remember riding in the back jump seats and thinking it was the coolest thing ever.
So I’ve always had a soft spot for the funny little things. I walked into my LHS with the intention of buying an Element kit for a budget hardbody build, but when I saw the Phoenix kit sitting there looking all Cruiser-y, but with big awesome tires. I couldn’t resist. A lot of rationalizing went down, and the box found its way into my Subaru, lol. Anyway, on with the build.
Parts:
VS4-10 Phoenix straight axle kit
Hobbywing Quicrun Fusion SE 1800kv motor/esc combo
Spektrum SR515 RX, DX5 Rugged TX
DS3218 20KG servo
Dig & Shift servo, not installed, TBD.
Vanquish servo horn
Paint TBD.
First off, It’s nice not having to upgrade anything right out of the box!
Starting with the axles, everything went great until I tried to put the gear carrier or third member into the rear axle housing. It just would not go. The top edge of the carrier was hitting the link mounts that are molded into the axle housing and angle outward. I could get it all the way in there with some pressure, but it was crooked and I just couldn’t get the two pieces to seal up.
An email to Vanquish about the problem yielded a quick response about 10 minutes later! A bit of back and forth trying to troubleshoot, and they mailed me a new housing and third member in just a few days. The new parts fit together much better. Very happy with this experience. Beyond that, the gears in the axles are super smooth, don’t need shimming inside the housing, and make my SCX10-II axles feel gritty by comparison.
After that I started putting the chassis together and had a spot on the skid plate that needed to be trimmed so it would fit inside the c-rail. Puzzling, but no big deal.
With that out of the way, I tackled the shocks, which went smoothly, although I'm not sure if I put enough oil in them. I used Green Slime on the threaded rod to slide it through the x-rings, and also on the cap and its o-ring. I put a bit of oil on the shock body threads to install the plastic adjustment rings and they went on fine. I finally bought a set of shock shaft pliers and they made installing the ball cups a breeze. Can’t believe I waited so long to do that.
On to the transmission, I was hesitant to start it because of the amount of gears & pieces. But, after poring over the manual it all went fine, up until I got to the part where the metal bearing plate and dig lockout are installed into the transfer case. The manual doesn’t show how to actually do this, it just shows the parts grouped together.
Easy enough to figure out how to place the bearing plate, but I had no clue about the dig lockout. Luckily I found Harley Designs’ awesome build video of the VFD twin transmission here:
https://harleydesigns.com/blog/vanquish-products-vi-twin-step-by-step-instructions
A few short minutes later and the installation order was clear. Following the video as a guide I was able to double check my work, close up the transmission and mark it off the list.
And now, installing the transmission into the chassis. As others have mentioned, I had to trim one of the top link mounts to fit the Fusion motor/esc, but that was easily handled with a sharp Xacto knife. What was a surprising pain was trying to align the holes in the skid plate and motor plate. I tried several times, methodically tightening screws and trying to get it aligned. I was tearing my hair out until I posted my question and learned from the gurus here that these holes are typically misaligned and was advised to just remove the screw. I wish now that I would have sprung for the metal motor plate and standoffs, but this will do for now.
And here's where it sits at the moment:
Up next are the links, and I’ll update this thread when I can and maybe add more pics. Thanks for reading.
So I’ve always had a soft spot for the funny little things. I walked into my LHS with the intention of buying an Element kit for a budget hardbody build, but when I saw the Phoenix kit sitting there looking all Cruiser-y, but with big awesome tires. I couldn’t resist. A lot of rationalizing went down, and the box found its way into my Subaru, lol. Anyway, on with the build.
Parts:
VS4-10 Phoenix straight axle kit
Hobbywing Quicrun Fusion SE 1800kv motor/esc combo
Spektrum SR515 RX, DX5 Rugged TX
DS3218 20KG servo
Dig & Shift servo, not installed, TBD.
Vanquish servo horn
Paint TBD.
First off, It’s nice not having to upgrade anything right out of the box!
Starting with the axles, everything went great until I tried to put the gear carrier or third member into the rear axle housing. It just would not go. The top edge of the carrier was hitting the link mounts that are molded into the axle housing and angle outward. I could get it all the way in there with some pressure, but it was crooked and I just couldn’t get the two pieces to seal up.
An email to Vanquish about the problem yielded a quick response about 10 minutes later! A bit of back and forth trying to troubleshoot, and they mailed me a new housing and third member in just a few days. The new parts fit together much better. Very happy with this experience. Beyond that, the gears in the axles are super smooth, don’t need shimming inside the housing, and make my SCX10-II axles feel gritty by comparison.
After that I started putting the chassis together and had a spot on the skid plate that needed to be trimmed so it would fit inside the c-rail. Puzzling, but no big deal.
With that out of the way, I tackled the shocks, which went smoothly, although I'm not sure if I put enough oil in them. I used Green Slime on the threaded rod to slide it through the x-rings, and also on the cap and its o-ring. I put a bit of oil on the shock body threads to install the plastic adjustment rings and they went on fine. I finally bought a set of shock shaft pliers and they made installing the ball cups a breeze. Can’t believe I waited so long to do that.
On to the transmission, I was hesitant to start it because of the amount of gears & pieces. But, after poring over the manual it all went fine, up until I got to the part where the metal bearing plate and dig lockout are installed into the transfer case. The manual doesn’t show how to actually do this, it just shows the parts grouped together.
Easy enough to figure out how to place the bearing plate, but I had no clue about the dig lockout. Luckily I found Harley Designs’ awesome build video of the VFD twin transmission here:
https://harleydesigns.com/blog/vanquish-products-vi-twin-step-by-step-instructions
A few short minutes later and the installation order was clear. Following the video as a guide I was able to double check my work, close up the transmission and mark it off the list.
And now, installing the transmission into the chassis. As others have mentioned, I had to trim one of the top link mounts to fit the Fusion motor/esc, but that was easily handled with a sharp Xacto knife. What was a surprising pain was trying to align the holes in the skid plate and motor plate. I tried several times, methodically tightening screws and trying to get it aligned. I was tearing my hair out until I posted my question and learned from the gurus here that these holes are typically misaligned and was advised to just remove the screw. I wish now that I would have sprung for the metal motor plate and standoffs, but this will do for now.
And here's where it sits at the moment:
Up next are the links, and I’ll update this thread when I can and maybe add more pics. Thanks for reading.
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