Full Throttle Rob's 10-II RTR. The "not a build at all" build thread.

[Full Throttle Rob]

So, let me start by saying that my awesome wife bought me a 10-II RTR as a surprise back in November.

It was totally spontanious on her part, she even had my friend give her the details of what to buy and made him promise not to tell me.

Let's just say I was completely shocked to come home and see my wife standing behind an empty(yes, I said empty) Axial brown outer cardboard box sitting on the floor in front of the door, with a big grin on her face.

I asked her if the box arrived empty.

She said "No, it had the blah blah blah XJ(spoken like the true Jeep Girl she is) crawler you wanted in it."

"Then I opened the inner box and took the XJ crawler out of it."

The grin on her face got even bigger as she said "I put each thing that came in the box in a different place in the house, and when you find everything that came in the box you can start looking for your batteries and your charger. Then you can go crawling."

After about 30 minutes I had rounded up everything.
I really had to chuckle.
She actually hid all 12 of my battery packs. LOL

I thanked her and gave her a big hug and a kiss for my new gift.

I took an out of the box pic of it.



Then I removed the XJ lid.

I replaced it with an Axial Nukizer lid I painted in a back-woods snow camo scheme.
I also mounted my winch on the stock 10-II bumper.
I run 7 cell nimh packs.
I had to modify the battery tray(with heat and force) to make them fit.



After the first five seconds I decided that the BF Garbages were going to be the first thing to get replaced.
After the first five minutes I decided that both front and rear bumpers have got to go away.

When I got home I decided i wanted to make minimal changes and leave it mostly stock and see just how it compares to the modified SCX-10s I have and the SCX-10 drivetrain-powered crawler I hand built.
http://www.rccrawler.com/forum/1-9-scale-rigs/550712-slow-1-10th-scale-aluminum-zj-body-build.html

So, let me go over my changes.

The Nukizer lid. This has many accessories and a few mods, but I'll post that stuff later.
I did put my Rock Beasts on it.
I also replaced the stock motor with an RC4WD $10 disposable 45T motor.
I totally removed the front bumper and winch.
I removed the rear bumper brackets and replaced it with the stock rear bumper cross brace for an SCX-10 while keeping the stock 10-II bumper.(Yes, the 10-II rear bumper posts are slightly farther apart than the 10-1 brace, but squeeze the posts together a little and push hard and it will slide in and work.)
Does it deform the rear bumper a bit to push it in to the last set of holes? Yes.
Do I give a damn? Not in the least.

Then winter arrived in Maine.
I don't crawl below 40 degrees.

But we do get snow.
So I built a snow plow for it, to help me clean up that nasty white junk.



Stay tuned, and thanks for checking it out.

 

[Kaler]

Very nice sir! The only things I've changed on my 10-2 is the body and tires. Other than that I'm not changing anything, it's pretty awesome right out of the box.

 

[Full Throttle Rob]

Thanks Brent!

Check out a video or two of the 10-II plowing some snow.

https://youtu.be/LXYMerwEvl0

https://youtu.be/dpM1xBrTQYE

Or try an on board view:

https://youtu.be/_ilS7G7Gtws

 

[Full Throttle Rob]

Ok, I had told you that I'd go into the mods and accessories on the Nukizer lid.

I wanted to have a driver and passenger in the cab so I stole the seats from my Wraith and stuck them on with shoe goo.



I used a broken 3D printed milk crate as a base for the passenger's seat to bring it up to the same height as the driver's side, which I glued to the radio box.
I neglected to take a pic of it because it's not very exciting. Lol

So, while I waited for the shoe goo to dry on the seats I chased squirrels for a bit and ended up mounting my RC4WD LED light bar at the base of the windshield, where it would be less vulnerable. I used some more shoe goo for this.



Then I got back on track and stole the dash and steering wheel from the Wraith.
I made a dash top from aluminum flashing and used shoe goo glue that to the Wraith dashboard.
I stuck the steering wheel to a mini servo and used..... yep, shoe goo... to mount that as well.



I'll give you 3 guesses on what I used to install the dash assembly....

Yep, you guessed it!



After looking at my occupants through the windows of the body I decided that the moving steering wheel would be very difficult to see.



I cut out the door windows to remedy that issue.



Then I used even more shoe goo to glue a pair if SCX control arms to the tops of the doors to give extra strength to the sides in the absence of the windows.



I'll let you soak that in for a while, then I'll cover some more goodies!

 

[Full Throttle Rob]

So, before I get on with my latest project I'll get you up to speed on the Nukizer's accessories.

Let me start by saying that I took out Patrick and Squidward because their arms are too short to reach the steering wheel, as you can see in the picture from my last post.

I have yet to find a suitable sized figure(except for some WWE figures... no thanks...) with flexible enough arms to be able to stay on the steering wheel(using some neodymium magnets) as it turns in sync with the front wheels.

Anyway...

The bed of the Nukizer has a bunch of cool stuff.



The accessories are:
Jerry cans- Yeah Racing. One on each step-side step.

Tarps- home made: 2" wide blue ribbon, folded and glued with white glue. "Held down" with an 1/8" wide black ribbon to simulate a tie strap.

Smokes- home made: unfolded 2 packs, shrunk on printer to appropriate scale, printed on heavy photo paper. They even open like the 1:1.
One of the mini mags in the pic is in the milk crate in the 1st pic.



Milk crate- Yeah Racing(I think)

The milk crate contains:
Sleeping bag- home made: 1.5" wide x 12" long(IIRC) camo fleece rolled up with 1/8" ribbon straps.



Toilet paper- Darice Miniatures(doll house accys.)
JP Magzine(not visible in pic)- home made: as seen in 2nd pic.

After the milk crate is:
Igloo cooler- Found on ebay: cast resin with removable top I attached with a wide rubber band and super glue. Inside the cooler are beer cans (Darice Miniatures) and "ice"(lexan "sawdust")



Tent bag(in front of cooler)- home made: 1/2" x 1/2" balsa covered with material from re-usable shopping bag and 1/8" ribbon handles.

HiLift jack- Yeah Racing

Firewood- home made: Dried and split Oak tied in bundles with canvas thread and "held down" with more 1/8" ribbon.


Now on to what I'm in to now.

I'm not ready to use the XJ lid right now, so I decided it needs to be different from every other RTR XJ lid before I do use it.

I went and saw friend who builds cabinetry and picked out some wood veneer to turn it into a woody model.



The dark is going to be the base. It is Black Walnut with a "tiger stripe" effect to it.

The lighter wood veneer will be the trim strips on the top and bottom. That is Maple.

I found 2 strips of Walnut that were obviously cut from each other and used one for each side. they are 99.999% identical.
I am making one continuous piece between the wheel wells and I will draw the door seams on before I give the wood 3 coats of clear poly.



I found a nearly identical strip to use for the tailgate.

Then I glued it on with shoe goo.
I didn't cut the license plate recess out for fear I would break the whole piece and I didn't like the leftover wood. LOL









Stay tuned, and thanks for checking it out!

 

[Itali83]

Looking good Rob. Cool idea with the wood paneling. Might as well work on them
Because we'll never get to use them with the F'n weather we're having!:x
Ben

 

[Full Throttle Rob]

Thanks Ben!
You know me, I can't run the same lid as anyone else. I gotta make mine different. Lol

Actually the updated forecast for Sunday has changed since this morning, they're now saying sunny and 46.
I might try to find a place to crawl for an hour or two if I can get a break from the Honey-do list.

I NEED TO CRAWL!!!!!

 

[Full Throttle Rob]

So, I still haven't had a chance to get out and crawl....

But today I had a few minutes to dub around on my rock pile at home.

A half hour is way better than not crawling at all! Lol







Gotta love some sidewall wrinkle!!!

 

[Itali83]

Looking good rob. Gotta get in some crawling where ever and whenever you can.